225BatonRouge.com

Husbands dread nothing more than the following phrase from their wives: “Could you go to the grocery and pick up some….?” It’s not that we don’t like to do things for our spouses. We do. But that frustrating zigzag journey around, through and clear across the store and back again can be a complete drain on the male psyche. Women, though more immune to such shopping-induced pains, can relate, too.

It doesn’t matter what the blank is filled with, it’s a challenge to find any array of items at a large, crowded supermarket and check out in a decent amount of time. Add in one or two unavoidable stop-and-chats, and what was supposed to be your quick trip to the supermarket has ballooned into an exasperating night out.

Bill Kelley, manager of the recording studio at the LSU School of Music, was one of these desperate husbands, but he decided to do something about it. A free online database of supermarket inventory called EasyShoppingList.com is Kelley’s solution. This is how it works: Baton Rouge shoppers log on from home and select the store they will visit. They are then presented with a grid of categorical items found in a typical grocery store. Users check boxes next to the items they plan to purchase, click “view list” and the site feeds back a shopping list with the aisle numbers or region of the store next to each item. Users then print the Easy Shopping List and use it as a roadmap at the store.

Kelley thought this would be a boon to both independent and chain grocers, but managers have given the customer-friendly invention a lukewarm reception.

“I suspect owners want shoppers to be lost in their stores,” Kelley says. “That way they wander around and see items they weren’t initially looking for and spend more money.”

So Kelley has done the initial work himself, cataloguing product locations at eight local grocery stores including Calandro’s, Wal-Mart and Target as well as Home Depot and Lowe’s.

With a little corporate cooperation, Kelley believes EasyShoppingList could go national. Lower level managers with Albertsons showed great interest initially, but the higher-ups only asked Kelley to send details on how his site works and said they would get back with him. They haven’t.

As it is, the serene 47-year-old artist has little motivation and even less time to expand the site himself. And with zero interest from LSU’s College of Business, EasyShoppingList.com seems like a useful tool that just needs a champion. But that champion will not be Kelley. He points out space on the Web site where ads could go, but he’s done nothing to promote it other than spread word among a few friends and colleagues.

“I don’t care if it’s me running it or someone else,” Kelley says. “I just think it makes sense to have it done, and someone should get on with it.”