Retail stores specialising in the sale of bulk food, candy, and baking goods. This type of store is most popular amongst the elderly, the impoverished, and parents of small screaming children. Most locations offer a help-yourself format, allowing basically anyone to dig through, breathe on, and spit in the products.
The most popular items at this type of store include cashews, chocolate covered almonds, jujubes, and closer to the Christmas season, that glazed fruit mix used in the production of everyone's favourite holiday treat: fruit cake.
Many people view the bulk food store not as a business, but as a buffet. A common practice by these sly "shoppers" is to obtain a handful of cashews (worth two or three dollars) and enjoy them while browsing around the store, before proceeding to the check-out with thirty cents worth of wafer cookies for dessert.