CART CHRONICLES
Grocery Run Couture: Decoding your superiority complex
Your cart gives away your class. From Erewhon's performance art to hardcore survival mode at 99 Ranch: nine grocery stores, nine lives.
Translated from Jasmine’s original Chinese. The illustrated slides are on the interactive reader.
Key points
- Erewhon: everyone's pretending they always belonged here
- Whole Foods: everything is correct, and everything is boring
- Trader Joe's: parking-lot PTSD, but you still have to buy the flowers
- The farmers market: carefully curated chill
- Bristol Farms: the point isn't that it's pricey; it's that there's no line
- Sprouts: the Erewhon life on a Sprouts budget
- H Mart: you came for kimchi and left with a whole KBBQ spread
- 99 Ranch: zero aesthetic; snagging the seafood is the win
Full text
The LA grocery store field guide: Grocery Run Couture
Decoding your superiority complex: the LA grocery pyramid, where your cart gives away your class disguise. From her with an Erewhon smoothie to her pushing a full cart at 99 Ranch: swipe to decode.
Erewhon | Tourists × celebs × fake-casual elites
Grocery shopping here is performance art. Everyone's pretending they always belonged here. #Hailey'sSmoothie #ErewhonIcon; #FunctionalShopping #NoGlutenNoCarbs: browsing $30 water, functionally. #ErewhonVibes #OrganicLifestyle #Aesth…
Whole Foods | The boring but safe middle-class pick
The boring but safe middle-class choice. I'm the backbone of the middle-class health fanatics: everything is correct, and everything is boring. No personality, just convenience (mildly over it). #PerfectKPI #MassiveKale #KombuchaHaul #Probiotics; leggings…
Trader Joe's | Parking-lot PTSD × limited-edition believers
In it for the frozen snacks and cheap flowers. Dead eyes + fighting for parking like a professional athlete; the parking lot alone makes you want to give up on life. Microwave meals: 'I love the frozen food here, but I'll never admit it.' #SecretStash #GuiltyPleasure; South…
Farmers Market | Carefully curated chill
Designed Effortlessness: the weekend-morning main character glow. #WildFlowers #OrganicChic; $8 for one #HeirloomLove (#UglyBeauty #$$$); #ColdPressed #HealthBoost. Main character energy at the heirloom to…
Bristol Farms | Old-money vibes × rich people who don't want to be seen
No Logos. No Drama. No Lines. The point isn't that it's pricey, it's that there's no line. Erewhon is for being seen; this is for actually using. Erewhon is for influencers. This is for people with no patience. #CashmereShroud #EffortlessLuxury #TheQu…
Sprouts | The sensible version of living the Erewhon life
Erewhon lifestyle, Sprouts budget. You want health, healing and a life reset, but the budget says no. #ClawClipVibe #SupplementDeepDive #WellnessAspiration #SproutsSavings #RationalLiving; the outfit staples: #SageGreenSweats #Bi…
Nijiya / Tokyo Central | Japanese-aesthetic perfectionists
Aesthetic Perfectionism: The Tokyo Style Seeker. Happy to sit in traffic for an hour just to buy a strawberry too pretty to eat. Wasting time for aesthetic perfection. A $20 premium white strawberry (hand-picked), Premium Bento Box: Exhibition of…
H Mart｜K-Town Survival Mode × Food Hunter
You came for kimchi and left with a whole KBBQ spread, after a little upsell. Focused Battle Face (Tired); Initial Kimchi Plan (Failed); Whole KBBQ Table Setup (Unplanned); every kind of side dish. Came for banchan. Came for b…
99 Ranch | Hardcore SGV survival players
SGV Hardcore Survivalist. No vibes. Just survival. The Taiwanese snack wall #IconicTaiwaneseSnacks (I-Mei mini cream puffs); zero aesthetic here, only efficiency; snag the seafood and today's a win #TheRealMVP #FreshSeafood; a giant sack of rice #SurvivalFuel; #SGV…
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In this series
Read it with the slides →The illustrated version on the LA Guide →
An original JSLALALAND field guide by Jasmine Chang (@jslalaland).