The comments under the link to the TJ Rice are so awesomely fake. That or people are so awesomely stupid. Ann Arbors original whole foods upgraded to a larger building and Trader Joes occupied their old one. People were really excited in anticipation of TJ's and because I'd never been to one, I was too. Then I went and was kind of shocked. It's not a place I go to unless we are throwing a party for people last minute and those people don't care much for food/beer/wine. Which is to say I never shop there. Edit: some of their frozen food is admittedly good though. But thems dangerous waters.
It's grocery outlet for hipsters. I'll be there in half an hour because you generally do get better processed food than you do from the local Kroger/Ralph's/Fred Meyer/whatevertheycallitwhereyoulive. But man, their produce sucks. There's another discussion there.
Interesting. In Los Angeles and Seattle, at least, the staff at TJ's are stable and friendly. They remember you. It looks like they pay substantially better than Safeway or Albertson's. The trick to Trader Joe's coffee is to buy beans, and buy the expensive ones. And, based on where you're at, you might still fail. They used to have Santa Fe Coffee Co beans but now they only have ground; that was a heartbreaker. As it is, their beans do me fine most of the time. Not great but better than Starbucks, as good as Coffee Bean.
Actually that pay isn't really all that bad. More than I made at my high school job (more than a decade ago, but probably still higher in real dollars). Maybe I had bad luck with the coffee. I tried two varieties out of the many they sell before I called it quits.