Felicidades Waldo’s Mart

Happy B-Day to Waldo

I like to give Waldos Mart a hard time. But I shop there, and I know lots of people that do. Last time I was there they had a new shipment of religious candles on the shelves…and not a ‘Holy Death’ candle in the bunch! Bravo, bravo, Waldo. I don’t know if there is an actual Waldo, but the big news is that the discount chain, with outlets across Mexico, turned 10 years old this year. In fact they had a glossy flier printed to help celebrate. It was something like 10 weeks, 10 items, 10 pesos, to mark 10 years. I’m sure you get the theme. So all I can say is:

Happy Birthday! ya’ big lug….

Gentrified Waldos

Probably the really big news, (for Waldomaniacs), is that the chain has started to go up-scale. Well, okay, there has been an attempt to go a little more up-scale. Actually, the new stores I’ve seen are in ‘roomier’ buildings, better lighting, wider aisles, with what would appear to be, oh I don’t know, a more thoughtful layout of the myriad of products offered by the great Waldo. True, the shelves still contain some of the same kind of crazy stuff from the four-corners-of-the-world. Like, for example, strawberry jam from Egypt, enjoy it with “Obrian’s”  brand peanut butter from China; spread some on your favorite crackers from Spain, Vietnam or Indonesia. The ones from Vietnam are kind of a generic “Ritz”, produced under the “Kihn Do” label, clever, huh?

Exotic treasures for the sweet tooth brought to you by Waldo from the Far East

There’s a variety of hard candies from a variety of places stretching from the Argentine to the United Arab Emirates. Don’t forget to pick-up some snacks for the kids. I especially like the “Fear Factor” gummies, but a lot of tiny tykes go for the Gummy Dinosaurs; a selection of bubble gum pops, candy-filled straws, marshmallows and assorted gumballs, (all of the above imported from China), should be enough to give anyone a sugar-rush, not to mention trace amounts of a hand-full of other, as of yet, unidentified chemical compounds. I shouldn’t really pick on China, but what the hell? I’m sorry, but I just can’t bring myself to believe that it can be cost-effective to export and distribute Chinese marshmallows around the world. I mean, what is the pay scale for a Chinese marshmallow maker?