First let me say that I am going to write this week’s post a little differently than I had originally planned to as some breaking news has happened to make me change what I was going to write.

 

Could it be that there is a company that really is worse than Staples?

 

Apparently, there is one that comes very close or possibly even exceeds evil Staples.

 

Welcome, please, the new low in retail: Shaw’s Supermarket.

 

Yes, a few weeks ago, I wrote about how I felt about the company by having them remove their self-serve checkouts from the local store.  Apparently, my post on Facebook was not the only one showing my frustrations with the company.

 

Lately, it seems that the company has some real issues.

 

Amongst the problems is widespread expired food on shelves, rude employees, long lines, and overall dissatisfaction with the way the company operates.

 

This is definitely a company in trouble.  Lately they have been using gimmicks to get customers into their stores.  The first was giving away (or selling at a reduced price) cookware that could be purchased elsewhere (or similar items) at a better price.  The gimmick was to get stamps for every $10 spent and as you fill up books, you can get the reduced cookware.  This reminds me of the old Green Stamp program back in the old days.  What is so bad about this gimmick is that many stores still have some of this cookware in the clearance section and selling it for its full retail value despite that it was never sold for those prices to begin with.  They created a higher retail price just to make it look like it was really on clearance.

 

The most recent scam that has reared its ugly head for a second time is its Monopoly game.  This consisted of both a game board and entering codes online.  Of course, it was impossible to win anything with either.  I know this first hand as I spent hours entering 100’s of codes and the most I received was 2 free tickets or free Redbox rental, which I don’t use.

 

While many store items had bonus tickets attached to them, this caused many locations to run out of tickets weeks before the game actually ended.  This created frustration and a lot of angry comments by customers on their Facebook page.  Even though the company’s spokesperson Dan apologized for the problems, it still didn’t help the situation much.

 

This brings me to Dan, the single spinner of everything Shaw’s.

 

While Dan seems to be the spokesman, he still can’t solve all the company’s problems.  A couple of problems that stood out to me were the following 2 scenarios:

 

  • In northern Maine, a customer complained about shopping carts that regularly showed up in their driveway. While usually only one cart was on their property at a time, the person was frustrated that these carts were leaving their parking lot in the first place.  The customer would regularly return the carts back to the store, but when more than one cart showed up on their property, the customer contacted the store and told the manager that someone should come and get them or else the customer would be disposing of them.  The manager told the customer that he would be calling the police if the customer ever did such a thing.  Certainly, this is no way that any manager should handle a situation like this at all.  My recommendation to the customer was that he should be calling the police because of property that didn’t belong there was showing up.  It is not the customer’s responsibility to take care of carts that show up on their property.  Shaw’s should fire this manager for having threatened this customer.  Another case of how customer service is bad at the company.
  • In New Hampshire, a Shaw’s manager seems to have a problem with a customer and whenever the customer is around, the manager seems to making despairing remarks about the customer. Why would any manager ever say anything bad about a customer when they are standing right in the area?  No company deserves a manager like this and should be fired.  But then again, this is Shaw’s, home of the rude employee.

 

Given these 2 scenarios, it is apparent that people like Dan will have his work cut out for him endlessly spinning and apologizing for the acts of its management and employees.  No company should really have to do this as companies should always do the responsible thing.  (Are you listening Staples?  I know you never have and never will.)

 

Given everything discussed above, it is apparent that the company is losing market share.  A recent consumer magazine ranked Shaw’s fourth from the bottom of a survey of supermarkets around the country.  Ironically, dead last was Walmart.  Was this a surprise to anyone?

 

However, in this survey, fourth highest ranked was Market Basket.  Despite having its own issues last year, this company has excelled in most everything service related.

 

This finally leads me to the breaking news:  the Biddeford Maine Shaw’s store is going to be shut down around the 4th of July holiday.  What a great way to celebrate the holiday especially for the Market Basket store, which is right down the road.  Yes, this Shaw’s store has been a huge underperformer since the opening of Market Basket, but companies like Shaw’s deserve to close.  But is this just a trend in the area as Lowe’s and Best Buy also left the Biddeford area in the last few years or just Shaw’s just being the lousy company that it really is?

 

I am thinking the latter in this case.

 

So how long can Shaw’s survive at its current rate?  It has already lost me as a customer and I expect more customers will also give up on them as well.   I see a very short future for Shaw’s.

 

Now if Staples could continue its downward trend as well…

 

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