The Most Petty Blog of the Year
Let me just be clear: I love Hannaford supermarket. I've lived in six states with about a dozen grocery stores and it's the best.
Except for the salad containers and the customer service related to the salad bars. Yes, I'm back on this again because I got a subpar response from customer service. More on that in a minute. Let me explain the problem in graphic detail.
I like to eat my vegetables in bulk, preferably with some bacon and feta cheese crumbles to make the medicine go down a little easier. Grocery stores aren't the greatest salad places in the world, but they get the job done with their $5-a-pound services.
The Hannaford containers suck. This isn't really about all that, but let me explain the threefold reasoning that has kept me from going to Hannaford. The containers aren't very big. That's the root of all evil in this situation. You simply can't fit THAT much salad into a container. The bottom's a little flimsy, too, but it's cheap aluminum, so you expect that.
Problems really begin when you load up on a salad, as I tend to do. Onions, cauliflower, REAL ham and REAL bacon (I'm knocking Shaw's, our Albertson's/Super-Valu owned alternative with the all-caps typing. They prefer Bacon Bits). You get a good pile of salad on there and try to put that lid on.
Go ahead, try it. The soft alumnium is very bendable. So if there's any pressure at all put on the package, the lid pops off. They are cheap pieces of junk.
This is all so damn trivial, except it's not trivial. I buy salad a couple of times a week. Throw in a bottle of soda or a bottle of salad dressing and I'm easily spending $15 a week on salads. We'll call that $750 a year, to keep the math simple. That's in lieu of eating out, and in lieu of making $35 salads at home, so please stow your criticism. That's $750 a year I'm spending at Shaw's.
And really, kudos to Shaw's for having a single piece of plastic for a container. It's recyclable (my final problem with the Hannaford ... thing). It snaps tightly shut. I've dropped it and it doesn't spill salad everywhere. It's superior in every way.
But I don't like Shaw's. I'd rather spend my $750 a year at Hannaford. So I decided to tell Hannaford about the salad containers. I mean, why not? How could they possibly object to changing the packaging? I guarantee salad sales would go up with bigger, sturdier containers. People would purchase more salad and Hannaford would make more money. Also, the small minority of shoppers who avoid the salad bar would take notice of the new packaging and return. Could current Hannaford salad buyers prefer the old, rickety, two-piece salad container to a solid piece of plastic? Doubtful, so you're not going to lose any customers by switching packaging. It's a win every way you see it.
Unless you don't see it. That's the problem. I contacted customer service. I don't know what I expected, really. I'm just a simple journalist with 12 years of professional experience writing a few thousand stories. I'm not very good at conveying information to people, but I tried to explain the situation to Hannaford customer service.
They said they'd take three days to get back to me, which I took to mean that they were going to actually address the problem. What I got back, after 72 hours, was a form email which mentioned neither the words "salad" nor "containers." In fact, the email states that Hannaford will "contact our suppliers" to notify them of the problem.
Uh, thanks? The problem isn't something a supplier can fix. You need new salad containers. If you'd read the email thoroughly, I think you would realize that Hannaford could make a few thousand dollars a year per store off better containers. But they didn't do that.
I'd take my business elsewhere, but like I said, I love Hannaford. Just a little less than a week ago, it turns out.
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| The hand is in the picture for scale, and to show off my dainty digits. |
I like to eat my vegetables in bulk, preferably with some bacon and feta cheese crumbles to make the medicine go down a little easier. Grocery stores aren't the greatest salad places in the world, but they get the job done with their $5-a-pound services.
The Hannaford containers suck. This isn't really about all that, but let me explain the threefold reasoning that has kept me from going to Hannaford. The containers aren't very big. That's the root of all evil in this situation. You simply can't fit THAT much salad into a container. The bottom's a little flimsy, too, but it's cheap aluminum, so you expect that.
Problems really begin when you load up on a salad, as I tend to do. Onions, cauliflower, REAL ham and REAL bacon (I'm knocking Shaw's, our Albertson's/Super-Valu owned alternative with the all-caps typing. They prefer Bacon Bits). You get a good pile of salad on there and try to put that lid on.
Go ahead, try it. The soft alumnium is very bendable. So if there's any pressure at all put on the package, the lid pops off. They are cheap pieces of junk.
 |
| So annoying. |
And really, kudos to Shaw's for having a single piece of plastic for a container. It's recyclable (my final problem with the Hannaford ... thing). It snaps tightly shut. I've dropped it and it doesn't spill salad everywhere. It's superior in every way.
But I don't like Shaw's. I'd rather spend my $750 a year at Hannaford. So I decided to tell Hannaford about the salad containers. I mean, why not? How could they possibly object to changing the packaging? I guarantee salad sales would go up with bigger, sturdier containers. People would purchase more salad and Hannaford would make more money. Also, the small minority of shoppers who avoid the salad bar would take notice of the new packaging and return. Could current Hannaford salad buyers prefer the old, rickety, two-piece salad container to a solid piece of plastic? Doubtful, so you're not going to lose any customers by switching packaging. It's a win every way you see it.
Unless you don't see it. That's the problem. I contacted customer service. I don't know what I expected, really. I'm just a simple journalist with 12 years of professional experience writing a few thousand stories. I'm not very good at conveying information to people, but I tried to explain the situation to Hannaford customer service.
They said they'd take three days to get back to me, which I took to mean that they were going to actually address the problem. What I got back, after 72 hours, was a form email which mentioned neither the words "salad" nor "containers." In fact, the email states that Hannaford will "contact our suppliers" to notify them of the problem.
Uh, thanks? The problem isn't something a supplier can fix. You need new salad containers. If you'd read the email thoroughly, I think you would realize that Hannaford could make a few thousand dollars a year per store off better containers. But they didn't do that.
I'd take my business elsewhere, but like I said, I love Hannaford. Just a little less than a week ago, it turns out.
Hmm. Maybe transfer your salad into your own container right in front of checkout? Dunno, but maybe that will get your point across better than customer service. Take your time about it, too.
ReplyDeleteCompanies tend to be ridiculously cautious with what they send out in writing. Many customer service departments cannot send out anything other than the form emails/letters. Their legal department has to review anything that isn't part of the approved forms. I know from my own experience that the legal team can take up to two weeks to approve something.
ReplyDelete