Jill Cataldo

I am curious about when Jewel is going to stop mislabeling cuts of meat. I spoke again with an employee of the USDA in Washington, and he said that he was aware of the complaint that I had made to the USDA office in Lombard. While I know that I am not the only person who has noticed this (I started complaining to Jewel management in January), I do not know if anybody else is complaining.

I hope that people interested in saving money via coupons would take the time to complain if they find that those cuts of meat aren't what the package says that they are.

http://inappreciationofhowardbeale.blogspot.com/

It was from their Public Affairs department for what its worth anyway...

Dear Joy:

Thank you for your letter regarding your concerns about the variety of products and brands available at your local Jewel-Osco store and our store redesign project. We appreciate hearing from our customers on issues that are important to them.

As noted in the Crain’s story that you read, a main focus for the CEO of SUPERVALU, Craig Herkert, is to make the shopping experience easier for our customers here at Jewel-Osco and across the country. This effort includes offering the products that our customers want and expect to find in our stores without the clutter of too many similar choices, as well as promotions and sale prices that are easy to understand and give our customers the best value.

Our consumer data indicates that 80 percent of our shoppers are women who live very busy lives. Our overall intent with this program is to make their shopping experience more pleasant. If this was communicated in a way that offended you, we regret that.

With the store redesign project, we continue to roll out and test new elements of this program, constantly refining our execution and planning based on customer feedback. We are being very deliberate with these changes.

We believe focusing on the customer and simplifying the shopping experience will help us achieve our goal of delivering the highest level of customer satisfaction for our shoppers.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact us.

Sincerely,

SUPERVALU Public Affairs

While over all this new article in the Trib isn't THAT bad...it again it says "most supermarket-shopping strategies are overwhelming and time-consuming." I think I'd rather go back to being considered "couponing hoarders" vs. the new trend of "women are too stupid for the supermarket." LOL

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sc-cons-0715-karp-spending-201007...

I was at Jewel the other day with all 3 of my children. One noticed Activia on clearance. I commented I didn't have a coupon with me, but maybe I could get a pack with a coupon soon. My daughter asked why it was on clearance. I explained Jewel's decrease the inventory to make shopping decisions easier and how it wasn't being received. She asked why Jewel would do that? AND the Jewel employee standing about 4 feet from us stopped stocking long enough to say, "Because they want to lose money and drive the customers away" She asked him why they would do that, so he acknowledged he was just kidding, but that they are taking away some of his best sellers.

We had a good laugh about it.

Jewel--Where's the Mariana dried fruit?
Oh, and I don't think hiding all the liquor mqs and rebates in a box behind camera is brilliant. At least put some sort of sign up letting us know what qs are AVAILABLE. What's the point of having them in the first place if no one knows they are there? They won't drive sales hidden away. If you want to curb people taking too many, put up a sign or load them to Avenu instead. duh

So...either Mr. Herket is just not interested in what I had to say, or he already heard about the email from my former co-worker who did read the email. I just got this back from his email address:

Your message

To: Herkert, Craig R; Jungmann, Steve
Cc:
Subject: The direction of SuperValu
Sent: Fri, 9 Jul 2010 14:31:40 -0500

was deleted without being read on Thu, 15 Jul 2010 13:29:01 -0500

As most people have been saying, I too, feel frustrated with Jewel. I never thought I'd say this, but my shopping experience at Dominick's yesterday was more pleasant than at Jewel. I was not able to find several items on my list when I went to Jewel---Snyder Tortilla Chips, Bush's BBQ Baked Beans, and small boxes of raisins, just to name a few. Meijer, Dominick's, and Target will be my stores of choice from now on, if this nonsense at Jewel continues. I also noticed the last 2 times I shopped at Jewel that I recieved no catalinas/coupons/promotions at the end of my order. I'm wondering what the reason is for that. I'm not sure if a small staff-size is also part of the change at Jewel, but there were 2 cashiers working last night at my Jewel. There were about 6-8 people per line, making the wait in line 20+ min. That is ridiculous. Jewel is certainly not my favorite grocery store anymore. I have family in Iowa and sometimes buy a few things here and there at Hy-Vee while I'm visiting. I wish Hy-Vee would come to Illinois. It's the friendliest, cleanest, most stocked store I've ever seen! All stores should take a few tips from Hy-Vee!

No wonder I've been getting more and more dissatisfied with my Jewel and have considered shopping elsewhere. This just makes my blood boil.

* They got rid of my JollyTime popcorn that is only 1pt on WeightWatchers popcorn ... I now buy it at Dominicks.

* They got rid of my specific hair color number ... I now buy it at Target. (All reds are NOT alike.)

* They got rid of my dishwasher & plastics cleaner ... still looking for a replacement.

* They got rid of the 100cal ice creams and replaced them with Stone Ridge which, in my family's opinion, is NOT as good.

* Now, they are slowly reducing the amount of non-refrigerated rice milk ... which will send me to Target again because my formerly milk allergic daughter will not drink cow's milk.

There have been other things but they haven't been quite as important. I have considered shopping at Target as my regular grocery store because their prices on non-perishables put Jewel to shame but then there's the whole clothing section that I have to walk by and that defeats the purpose of my bargain shopping.

I will not buy Jewel brand over my preferred items no matter how much they try to shove them down my throat. I will cross Jewel off my stops just as I have written KMart off and shop where I can pick up the bulk of my shopping list. I remember years (and years and years ... I was just a little kid ;) ago when there was a push to get customers to buy generic which was even more generic than store brand. That lasted for a couple years and, now, there's only a few true generics on the shelves (and a box of generic wax paper in my drawer).

They seriously think we have too many choices?!?!?! You'd think they'd want to give us MORE choices to keep us from going to another store!!! Before they started simplifying my shopping experience, I still had to go to other stores to find some of the items I wanted because Jewel didn't carry them. Simplify Her Experience by giving HER what she wants in one store ... don't make HER run all over town to get the items she's come to depend on because was she wants more than anything is more time for HER. It seems like he buys into the idea that we are all just Stepford Wives that don't do anything unless our husbands explicity tell us to do so. The whole thing definitely sounds chauvanistic!

Thank you so much, Mr. Herkert, for thinking so little of the grocery shopping women that patronize your store. I guess I'll just take my little apron and my glazed over dumb housewife look to another store that cares whether I can find what I want.

Did anybody see the movie WALL-E? Hmmmmm.....

Project SHE... top 10 "other ideas" for this happy acronym...

1. Shop-Hate Experience
2. Savior His Expulsion (in ref. to SV CEO)
3. Simplify His Employment (in ref. to SV CEO)
4. Shuttered Hated Emporium (prediction of what will happen to J.O. if "SHE" moves forward)
5. Stops Having Earnings
6. Stupid Hateful Experiment
7. Shopping Here Ends
8. Skip Here Everyone
9. She Hates Experience
10. She Hates Egotists

Have a good day everyone! :)

Project SHE - Someone Help the Executive.

You really have to wonder if Mr. Herkert does any grocery shopping. Jill, challenge him to a shopping dual!!! Wouldn't that be great? You both have to purchase a week's worth of groceries. He could fill his cart full of Shopper Valu and Jill could super coupon and do the deals. You could compare values..oh, and then let him know you were going to Doms and Meijers to complete your shopping because Jewell no longer carried what you needed.

I was a manager for several years at a very male dominated company. Amazing that they regarded me as an exception to their rule for women. Many times women were talked about in a degrading manner in these meetings A fellow female manager was late once for a meeting and it was decided that she must be 'putting on her lipstick'...ha ha ha.

Don't just e-mail Mr. Herkert. Carbon copy the Board of Directors and other members of management, Jewell store managers, etc. That is how your message will get out. Let the other managers know how you perceive "Project SHE".

There isn't a ton that I can add to this - I have to agree with all that has been said. I often didn't shop at Jewel before due to poor product selection but with super couponing I've changed my buying habits away from the "favorites" when there are such deals to be had. So, the fact that they are going to thin down the product selection even more is really going to test my committment to Jewel.

I've often lamented the fact that if I want to shop for options, I need to utilize all the different grocery stores in my area. Not an effective use of time.

I do have to be one of the ones that does still shop at Walmart. I price compete for produce and other groceries that we have run out of. While difficult to keep each product straight for what goes with what ad, it's certainly simplier than going to 3-4 different grocery stores to maximize the sales for the week. For example, this week I went to Walmart to price compete Pineapples (Caputos), Peaches (Caputos), Eggs (Butera & Caputos), Tomatoes on the Vine (Caputos). They also were running a great deal on Corn (.10 per ear). It also doesn't hurt that the Super Walmart is closer to me than all of these competitor stores (I live in Cary). As long as Walmart continues to honor price competes on produce, I'll continue to shop there for these items (provided I don't have a CAT to use at Jewel). While this week I didn't get a lot of produce, I'll be doing another run later this week for all the salad stuff I need again with my new competitors ads in hand. Even the clerk this weekend was like "I have to call my mom! These are great deals!".

Maybe I've missed something and Jewel price competes produce too? If so, I'd just shop there and do it but I don't recall Jewel doing this?

i would be happy to buy the store brand items if they took my coupons for similar products (i.e. if jewel's brand of rice krispies or whatever would take the kelloggs's coupons)
im sure that would happen when pigs fly, though
JEWEL--YOU HAVE REALLY MESSED UP!

I actually did a focus group for Jewel and had to walk around the Bolingbrook store to tell what I thought of the changes. They asked what I thought about having all the choices of products. Then, they took me to the Naperville store on rt. 59 to compare my shopping experience. In the end I told them I did NOT like the new Jewel layout. One of the managers at the Woodridge store said that nobody likes it and customers are complaining left and right. In fact, the manager at the Bolingbrook Jewel resigned. I am annoyed that I have to run to other Jewel locations to buy certain products, like the Fisher Nuts. This is very frustrating!

I'm discouraged by this article, and disgusted by the "Project SHE" garbage.

I was also pretty disgusted by the Dominick's brouhaha earlier this year, so I decided not to go to Dominicks under any circumstances no matter how great the deal. (After all, if they were going to ask our opinions on coupons and then change their coupon policies to go directly opposite of what we said we were looking for, well, they must not have valued our feedback too much. Why reward them with my money?)

But now I'm wondering if I will need to rethink that stance and start shopping at Dominicks after all.

Or maybe switch over to Ultra?? Jill, would you consider adding them to your deals each week?

Lake Zurich Jewel

Personally, it's not the amount of stuff in the store I object to, it's the lack of hygiene. Get the mop out and use some elbow grease to get rid of the gunk.

These are terrible decisions that are being made, not to mention demeaning both male and female shoppers. It's as if Mr. Herkert is still secretly working for WalMart and is trying to bring down Jewel/Supervalu from the inside... Huge mega-stores HATE competition on ANY level, you know.

I have to agree that this is very disappointing. When we first moved to Woodstock (PRE-super couponing) I tried shopping at Jewel for a few weeks until I realized our budget couldn't handle it. I grudgingly went to Walmart and after awhile started believing I was getting good deals (actually I was mostly impulse buys - not surprising as something like 90% of Walmart's profit comes from that category).

However now that I can affordably shop at Jewel, I do NOT want to go back to shopping at Walmart. It seems to me the customers are on more of a budget, in more of a hurry, and the customer service is definitely not what it is at Jewel. WalMart has so many departments that you have to ask the exact right employee if you can't find a product - if you ask the wrong one they don't have any idea how to help you and it takes much longer than any time I've asked a Jewel associate to check their backstock. Walmart has too many products and they are not organized in a grocery-store fashion, meaning I have to go to the home goods section to get Swiffer refills, instead of in the cleaning goods aisle in the grocery section of the store.

I also have to agree that Super Walmarts aren't all they're cracked up to be. My mother in law is a big reader and she loves that her closest walmart is NOT super yet, because they have a much bigger book selection. When shopping at Super Walmart for Christmas last year, I had the same issue. I couldn't find many of the things I was looking for, which was unexpected and annoying because I assumed "SUPER" walmart was super enough to stock the things I was looking for.

Please, Jewel, don't change what you're doing. I think most Jewel shoppers would agree that we don't think it's broke - so it doesn't need fixing!!!

Lose the name brands + lose the products = lose the customers. In this economy, stores think that cutting merchandise will save $. In fact it will drive the customers away. If they go to stocking only their store brand products, they will only have become a glorified Aldi.

When Wal-Mart went "Super" in Algonquin, all the store employees and residents that didn't have a "Super" were so excited because the store was going to be bigger. I was really upset. I knew from experience that, when they went "Super" in the other cities I had lived in, the product selections were going to be cut or diminished. The store would indeed seem bigger because they opened up a grocery on the other side. However, something else had to give. I knew I would not find the brands that I liked and fewer merchandise selections than I was used to finding on their shelves. They had stocked the shelves with more products, but fewer variety of product and fewer name brands.

I would hope this new Jewel, former Wal-Mart, exec doesn't make the same mistake with Jewel that they did with "Super" Wal-Mart. I have seen the way Wal-Mart brainwashes their employees at pep-rally type conventions into thinking Wal-Mart is offering great products or making great changes.

When Walgreens cut their products, I was upset too. Didn't understand why I couldn't find my product(s) any longer. They gave it to the competition.

Jewel's Osco side already limits the types of products it carries...They have Benadryl, but not the dye-free children's. They don't carry the FULL line of the products in one hair line...Aussie or John Frieda...as well as other personal products....Back to Walgreens.

What these stores don't understand is that consumers are not opposed to navigating a store to find their products. They are upset when the product is not on the shelf.

Jewel's customers have trouble finding products from time to time due to seasonal store changes or sales. The products are moved from other areas of the store to a different isle to promote it or make room for other products. The average consumer knows what they want and wants to be able find THAT product on their shelves when they get to the isle it was in last time.

They are upset when one Jewel/Wal-mart/Dominicks/Walgreens/CVS has a totally different lay-out than another of the same store. When one needs to hurry through and/or is trailing young upset, crying, kids or a husband who keeps checking his watch and the store is not laid out the same as a sister store that is time consuming. (Not everyone has the luxury of shopping without children, husbands, etc.)

If Jewel wants to make a big change, they can make all of their stores with as similar isles and product layouts as they can. Cutting product lines or products in a line does not make navigating a store easier just frustrating...and I realize not all of the stores are the same size.

They just need to cut the amount of each product on the shelf that is not frequently purchased while increasing the sales, in-season, popular, and frequented items.

So, if they don't wise up, Wal-Mart or another store WILL win in the end.

I've noticed that just about all of the "President's Choice" items that we used to buy and really liked are now gone. Unlike many generics, they were first rate quality. And most of them have no equivalent brand name item. I'd stock up on them when they were on sale.

My Wild Harvest organic options have been shrinking by the week. They are the 'store brand' natural choice. But if the goal is "be like walmart", that makes a little more sense.
:(

I was in THAT Jewel yesterday looking for Grandes while they were cleaning out the chips' aisle. They only had one kind--tortilla. What the heck is going on?

If you have the UPC for an item that Jewel used to carry and quit doing so, ask them to order it if you can wait a few days and pick it up next trip. Might work for one item but Jewel will lose business if more than that because customers don't like a second trip after checkout to customer service with a wish list.

Jewel is my favorite store, not only is in walking distance from my house but they USED to have everything I needed. Before becoming a supercouponer I shopped at Super Target (across the street from Jewel) and often found myself at Jewel to get the many things that Target didn't carry. Once I started couponing I was estatic that I could not only save more money at Jewel but more than likely I could shop at one store! I rarely go to Dominick's, Meijer or Target anymore but I'm guessing that will change soon. I am not a Walmart shopper at all.

The Shopper's Value brand is terrible! I could get past the awful packaging (Jill, you're a Graphic Artist right? They could sure use some help!) if the quality was there but it's not. Even if it would save me money, I'm not going to be purchasing those products. If it means I have to take the bulk of my shopping and money elsewhere to get what I want, I'll do it.

I wonder why stores seem to want to drive us away? First Dominick's with their ever changing unfriendly coupon policies and now Jewel with this.. Maybe they should read Jill's Coupon Demographic's post and realize that this isn't a good move on their part.

"Project SHE" is going to get my husband. He does a lot of shopping for me on the way home from work and can black belt as good as anyone. Jewel is really doing a disservice to themselves by limiting their thinking in this way. It's not a good way for Jewel to win customers in all areas.

I'm already buying about 75-80% of my groceries at Dominick's. Thanks to Jill (thanks, Jill ... I've been a member for about 1-1/2 years ...), I stockpiled enough last spring, I really haven't even done any CAT deals in almost a year, except the Kraft Cheese deal. I buy what I need at Dominick's. And yes, I'm one of the few die-hard Dominick's fans still out there ... I know if I go to my local Dominick's, they'll have what I like to buy. The last few times I"ve been to Jewel, I've picked up so many clearance items of my "faves", it has been ridiculous. Manager even said they've been clearing out the shelves as they will no longer be carrying flavor/size/brand/any combination of those of particular items... items that have been cleared out so far and their clearance prices: Gerber Graduates fruit treats (apple flavor) - $1.29, Gerber Graduates L'il sides carrots/sweet potatoes - $.59; 8-pack Duracell C batteries - $2.99; Mrs. Butterworth LITE syrup - $2.49; Earth's Best baby food 1st foods certain flavors - $.29, 2nd foods - $.39; I didn't buy, but other items: Crystal Lite several flavors, G2 powders several flavors, Kool-Aid various flavors, and about 4 other endcaps FULL of mainstream items being cleared off the shelves.

My main shopping areas (Palatine/Arlington Heights) all have Dom's and Jewels within a few stores from each other, so I find I can complete a list at Dominick's when I can't at Jewel.

I think the "SHE" thing is stupid. Idiots. Nothing else to really say about that. And, I will add, the few Shopper's Value items I have tried, I have not liked AT ALL (the bacon most recently). The only Jewel brand-item I am loyal to is the Jewel blue-label tomato paste (when it is $.39) and the tomato sauce (when .$.49). Otherwise, I much prefer the Safeway line of foods - and will actually purchase some of those over brand-name, with or without a coupon!! If/when I buy "generic", I head to Dominick's.

As an educated professional who is on the lower end of the pay scale....my hubby and I together earn under 50,000....I have to say that I too am offended by this! I am no idiot and if they are going to become like Walmart they will receive less of my business. Since I started following Jill I have been in Walmart only a handful of times and Jewel is now my favorite store! I used to only like Meijer and Aldi...but now spend most of my time in Jewel....and occasionally dominick's. What a shame!

Forgive my rant, but here goes:

Above and beyond all else, the "Project SHE, which stands for Simplify Her Experience." jumped out at me. Demeaning? Yes, Insulting? Absolutely. Unless it is 1952 or this "concept" was pitched by the cast of Mad Men I am completely stunned that this made it out of the boardroom and into reality.

Simplify Her Experience? Here's an idea...stop "renovating and rearranging" your stores every other year. Take a closer look at the layout and product placement. Confused by what I mean by that? Let me "Simplify it for YOU", Jewel - Powdered salad dressing mixes should be with the SALAD DRESSINGS. How many of your stores stock them with the powdered soup starters? A LOT. Considering they are ridiculously over-priced compared to the bottled kind, you would think you would want to make it easier for consumers to find them.

Shopper's Value? There is no value in a low quality paper towel which isn't strong enough to absorb an eye dropper's worth of water. Speaking of water, if I wanted water, I'd buy it. Please don't masquerade it in a bottle labeled Shopper's Value dishwashing detergent.

Stop playing pricing games which are a clear indication of how 'simple' you think your shoppers are. I could walk into my Jewel, go down the aisle to the Reynold's aluminum foil today, know what I'd find? Wow! A red clearance sticker! Only $2.99!!! Too bad it is stuck underneath the yellow sticker with the original price of $2.99. You'll have to do better than that to convince me its a bargain. 'Simple' math 2.99 minus 0.00 is a 0% markdown.

I'll shut up now lol