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Shoppers sanitize grocery carts with push of button
Posted By SARAH DEETH , EXAMINER STAFF WRITER The Peterborough Examiner
January 27, 2010
The Lakefield IGA has installed a new, germ-free way to shop and may be
the first grocery store in Canada to do it.
Lakefield IGA installed the Sani- Cart-UV system at its Queen St.
location Monday, a system that kills germs and bacteria on grocery carts
using an ultraviolet light.
Ross Bletsoe, president of Lakefield IGA, said the grocery store is the
first to install one.
"Customers are just beside themselves over it," he said.
The system is essentially a boxed-in unit that flashes a UV light over a
shopping cart, killing all germs. It's located near the store's front
entrance.
Customers can sanitize either the front or rear half of the cart, then
flip it around and sanitize the other half.
Bletsoe said the grocery store had previously offered customers sanitary
wipes to clean their hands and cart handlebars.
But then he saw the new system, designed by a Canadian, at a trade show
in October.
"As soon as I saw it, I knew customers would like it," he said.
It takes about 20 seconds to completely sanitize the cart and Bletsoe
said it's incredibly simple.
You place the cart in the unit and push a button, he said.
"We call it backing into the garage," he laughed.
While the UV light goes to work, customers can use hand sanitizer to
clean their hands.
Cashiers will be out helping customers and showing them how to use the
unit, he said, and there's a seven-second tutorial video that plays on a
small screen.
Bletsoe said the light kills germs in every nook and cranny on the cart,
something that wasn't possible with the wipes.
Carts were cleaned off on a regular basis, he said, but are handled many
times throughout a day.
Bletsoe said he expects the units to eventually begin to appear in other
grocery stores.
For now, he said, his customers seem to be delighted that they're the
first Canadians to get a crack at the germ-free system.
sdeeth@peterboroughexaminer.com
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