Too Much To Ask?
I have been contemplating this post for quite some time now. We go to supermarkets here in the states and you cannot get the sale price listed on the items and in the circular ads unless you have that particular stores savings card. I have seen many people with at least a dozen of said cards on their keyrings for both supermarkets and drugstores. What happened to the days when you could walk into any store and save? Long gone are the days of having one or two markets in a town. Now we must chose which card we desire to carry or have a dozen of them in our billfolds or cluttering up our keyrings. I went into an Ingles Market once and the girl at the cash register asked if I had an Ingles card. There are only two of these markets in town and neither are near my home. I politely said I did not have one and the girl just looked at me and laughed. I looked at her, gave a sarcastic chuckle and left without buying anything. Another store I didn’t have a store card for (can’t recall which) the cashier got into an ugly discussion with me when I said I didn’t want the card as I rarely shopped there and it wasn’t worth my time to fill out the paper and then to carry the card. Finally, I gave up and just left. My choices are being limited because of the merchandisers desire to control the population.
Generally I have done my weekly marketing at Food City. I get good customer service for the most part at the main store I shop in. The one that used to be closest to my home (practically across the street till it closed) I would always get bad customer service. The last time there, I told the girl at the customer service desk who was ringing up my items that I would not be returning and she leaned across the counter and said that it was okay, because she wouldn’t even shop in that store. What a representative for the store. I did have to lodge a couple complaints at the two primary locations I go to due to milk going bad. I was led to believe that my complaint was not the only complaint. I found I could get good milk at Walmart and started doing my marketing there. Produce is the main thing I would go to Food City for. It has been my experience that the produce sold in Walmart, no matter how nice it looks, isn’t the best.
This morning I got up and went to Food City desiring some fresh produce. It was snowy, but I went anyway. I arrived at the store closest to my home (about 3 miles) and went in to begin my excursion. There was a gentleman there buffing the floors. It seems he followed me around the store with his machine which emitted fumes that left me feeling dizzy and nauseous. The produce was less than attractive. The kosher section has diminished to almost non-existent. The stock clerks had their giant stock-laden hand carts placed strategically so that a shopper could not get to items they desired to look at and possibly purchase. I gave up. We are living in tough times financially. I am at an even tougher disadvantage as I have (like so many these days) been out of work for over 14 months and have no income in sight. If I am going to pay the already outrageous prices for things, then I should get quality products.
By the time I got to the self-checkout I had already decided I would not be returning to this particular store. It would be well worth the gas to schlep across town to the other location I frequent to purchase what I need. I do try to go to that side of town once a week to run other errands and can easily fit this in. I decided that in stead of just leaving and not returning, I would tell a manager why. I had to drawl the attention of someone who just looked at me like I had three heads and ask about a manager. The front-end manager was conversing with the operator of the wretched machine which followed me around the store. She came over and I began. I also reiterated my complaint about the milk and she indicated I am not the only one with that issue, just no one seems to know why it is bad. I told her that I didn’t feel I should pay all that money for less than perfect merchandise and would spend the extra gas to go across town to another location of Food city. She wanted me to wait till she could call someone else. I was not happy, it was getting late. I had groceries to get home and put away. It was still snowing and I was still feeling the affects of the buffer. I gave her my business card and left.
No store is perfect. The checkout clerks at Walmart still don’t know the meaning of the word “everything”. I say divide everything between my two bags and they still leave out the milk and other items saying they didn’t think I meant those to go in. Everything, means everything. You still find some customer service personnel who are having a bad day. But is it too much to ask for to get quality for the money we have to pay? If all we do is complain about these things to our friends and family, or in a blog post, then we get nothing, except the satisfaction of venting. If you are having issues with poor quality in products or continued bad customer service then tell the proper people. Speak to the manager while you are in the store since it is fresh and can be confirmed immediately. If you have lodged complaints with the manager, write a letter to the corporate office. Always keep a copy of the letter for your records. Venting can be useful to help you get the ill feelings out of your system, but it can also lead to others who have had similar experiences. Get them to file complaints as well. having handled complaints for a company at one time and actually initiating the conversations to find any complaints, I speak from both sides. let the proper people know what the problems is. On the other hand, also let them know when they are dong things right. We all like compliments and giving the right compliments can keep things good in the establishments you frequent. Then pass the good words along to the rest of the world.
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