Woolworths - formerly the fresh food people

Toolbeater you pathetic dipsh!t, how about you go back and actually read my post you rancid little excuse for an ar$s-wipe. If you actually bothered to read what people were posting instead of sprouting off about how bloody wonderful supermarkets are you might actually get the point. You’re a bloody fool.

And I stand by my comment about the checkout staff at Kambah Woolies. Without exception the checkout staff are a bunch of surly fat trolls.

@Thumper
You might not visit the supermarkets but what about your fuel? your alcohol? you don’t visit any Coles/Woolworths owned department stores? If you manage to completely avoid any of their business then you truly are in the minority.

@sepi
IGA’s a good if you just want to pick up a few items but not really designed to do your weekly shopping. The prices are significantly more expensive than the majors, 10 or 20 cents may not seem a lot but as a percentage its a significant mark-up. Their range is also significantly smaller than that of the major supermarkets.

You mentioned Aldi. They are a completely different story. Yes they are cheap but so is their product. If you were to shop at Coles and Woolworths and purchased only their generic brands you’ll find that you can do the same shop there as you can at Aldi for a very similar price. The thing is though, that for most people when given the option of a generic brand Vs. a premium name brand they will go for the more expensive option so when they shop at Coles/Woolies they spend a lot more money simply through the choices they make on individual items.

A large part of this discussion is centred on customer service standards, something of which Aldi has none. The shop floor is usually void of staff and when going through the checkouts you get to pack your own bags. Though they are cheaper on the overall you. as always, get what you pay for.

@Ingeegoodbee
You approach the deli with the attitude that the person serving you is a ‘fat surly troll’? I can’t work out why you possibly don’t get good service..

@green_frogs_go_pop
Good point. Most supermarket employees have a dislike for their job. In fact most retail employees don’t enjoy working in retail. I’d suggest the reason being not that the job itself is bad but that its ruined by shoppers like asp who walk around the stores with the attitude that they are better than everyone else.

@asp
Your getting a bit fired up there.
“If i’m retarded then what are you, a f*cking troglodyte.”
Def – “troglodyte” – a person characterized by reclusive habits or outmoded or reactionary attitudes
Sort of like someone who’d rather sit at home and post on the internet about a trivial piece of cheese without any real understanding of the issue? I had no idea that I was dealing with someone with such an extensive vocabulary. You’re still an asshole too by the way.

Thanks for the business 101 lesson. When I refered to expansion I was refering to diversification, sure it adds to their cost base but by diversifying into other markets more profitable than groceries but it also improves the bottom line of the entire company. Expansion doesn’t come from reducing costs. Profitability does. I already explained that the wages are the first to be cut when a supermarket isn’t profitable. Less staff means less time checking the dates on products but it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t happen. Date checking is just one of a thousand tasks that happen in stores so the assumption that your out of date cheese is a direct result of Woolowrths turning a profit is pretty far fetched.

Why are you still arguing the carton size? 12 is the average size, end of story. I agreed that there are some products that come in larger qtys. Long life milk comes in boxes of 12, fresh milk in creates of 6-9, canned foods 12-24, personal care products almost always 6, shampoo 6, deoderant 6, face creams 6, cheese 12-24. You really are a cumstain, theres even supermarket employees comfiming what im sayaing.

If you managed to comprehend my explination you’d understand that lagrer quantities simply add the double handling and therefore increase costs, but you have ‘logic’ on your side, right? Stop arguing the carton size, you are wrong and its simply countering your argument.

Thanks for expalining what the acronym for FFS meant, this is my first time using the internet. Who told you about the pixie living in my cupbaord?

@tom-tom
I’ll add you to the list of people who get it. Thankyou.

It’s the great Australian way. When the customers are upset about something, abuse them! That’ll teach the ungrateful buggers, we work hard all day and here they are complaining. How dare they.

bsunch of savages in this town

Genuinely LOL, caf…

Quite right.
And I would surmise that the increasing problems at Lanyon Woolies are not due to laziness, but rather under staffing and poor management. I don’t take it out on the front line staff. I just tell them if I find something off.

i should first say that i work for woolies, whenever someone tells me about out of date products i go check them and if they are out of date i get rid of them. simple. it’s hardly a hassle and besides i’m paid for it.
I do however object to comments like bd84’s blaming lazy staff. A perishables filler is expected to fill about 60 cartons per hour, at on average 12 units per carton, toolbeater is 100% right about that (you’re an idiot asp), this means the filler is handling stock for 5 seconds per unit. While it would be nice if the filler check dates on each item thats really not practical, besides most stock in my experience will sell long before the use by date.
If you find stuff thats out of date tell someone (who can actually do something, the 15 year old on the busy register can’t just leave and sort it out) Don’t yell at the staff or take Mr. Evils approach, that just makes you look like a tool.
out of date stock happens despite the best intentions of everyone. get over it.

“What I base making the statement that most lines come in boxes in quantities of 12 on is years of experience working in retail… Block Cheese – 6-12”
FFS (for f*ck sake) are you on drugs. Did you get all you facts from a little pixie who lives in your bdroom cupboard and tells you to smoke dope and set things alight? I was in Woolies yesterday and the boxes of Bega large block and Woolies Select large blocks were in QTY of about 24 per box. Not 6-12. Christ, logic would dictate that less boxes means less time consumed with handling.

All that BS you said about bigger cartons not been better is just that, BS. You only have to look at the boxes for a lot of canned items, health and beauty products, chesses and you’ll see that 12 or less is rare. Hell milk comes in QTY of 12 and larger items. But that is well less than half.

“…retarded” -toolbeater

I’m retarded. Christ, If i’m retarded then what are you, a f*cking troglodyte.

“I’d love to see your research that proves the ‘record profits’ vs. their out of code management practices. Perhaps you could request their shrinkage results and graph them against their profit for us? Surely its not possible that the increased profits isn’t a result of business expansion, technology advancements, better management practice and the like. You are the naive one.”
Well let’s see here. Service and quality getting worse, especially in delicatessen. And your argument about expansion accounting for increased profits is rediculous. Expansions also expands costs and is a drain on capital. For a coropration like Woolies, expansions comes from reducing costs. That’s business 101.

I’m not sure of the ethics of shopping there yet

ok……………….

Well…i personally work at woolworths myself and..all i can say is..to the people who suposebly dont work there, yet are writing heaps about stuff, play in traffic.

Yeah..that does sound like lanyon woolies soo much..

The so called “delicatessen” at the Woolworths in Kambah does a a great line on pre-cut smallgoods that are drying up and curling around the edge. You also get the added bonus of waiting in a long queue to get served by some surly fat troll.

Yep.

I avoid woolworths like the plague (dickson woolies is so vile). Local IGAs are quite good around the inner north. The prices are slightly higher on many of the products (not all), but you don’t have to wait in long lines and you even get a smile from the checkout ladies.
\
If you want bargains Aldis is the cheapest by far, but I’m not sure of the ethics of shopping there yet.

For someone who no longer works in a supermarket, you sure do go out of your way to defend them.

What I base making the statement that most lines come in boxes in quantities of 12 on is years of experience working in retail. Some products do indeed come in carton sizes of 24, but these are the exception. The only line I can ever recall coming in a box of 50 is the small 60-90gm potato chips, and perhaps chocolate bars. In fact you’ll be surprised how many come in cartons of 6.

1.25l Soft drink – 12, 2L Juices – 6, Cereal – 6-24, Washing powder – 6-12, Canned veg – 12-24, Health and Beauty items – 6-12, Block Cheese – 6-12, Shredded Cheese – 12-24, Yogurt 6-12… etc, etc..

I don’t know who you talked to but either, clearly they are as ignorant as you in regards to how Supermarkets work or you twisted what they said to suit your argument. In any case I, and I’m sure anyone else who has ever worked in a Supermarket, can assure you that 12 is easily the most common sized carton. And THAT makes sense. I’ll tell you why.

Supermarkets need to keep their shelves stocked, I’m sure you’ll agree. The number of facings a product receives is based on its average weekly sales. For example, this is why 2L Coke has 50-100 facings where as the stores generic cola will only have 4 or so. Stores aim to allow space to hold at least a week and a halves worth of stock on the shelves at any given time. This is the best way to ensure that product is available for the longest time possible on the better selling lines. Now, the majority of lines will only receive 2 facings as a minimum, and perishable lines like Yogurt will only receive one. Not necessarily because they are poor selling line but because shelf space is a limited commodity in a store. Shelves are only so deep. They can only hold so much stock.

How does this relate to carton size? Let’s say you are filling the shelf in the pasta sauce section. Due to the quantity of stocked SKUs each variety only has the space for 3 facings each. The shelf is deep enough to hold 5 units. 3 facings wide by 5 units deep is 15 jars maximum that the shelf can take of that particular variety. There are only 2 jars left, you fill your carton of 12 neatly on the shelf and the job is done.

Now lets assume we’re living in asp’s supermarket dreamland. Same situation, though this time we have a magical box of 24 jars of pasta sauce. The shelf holds a total of 15 remember, there’s 2 on the shelf already… now what happens is we have 7 left over jars.. Nearly half a box. What are we going to do with those 7 jars?? We could put them on the capping where they will stay, waiting for a staff member somewhere down the track to come along and work that stock onto the shelves. Perhaps we could stack the overstocks onto a pallet with the rest of the stock from these 24unit cartons that don’t fit We could then store that stock out the back, again to sit and wait for someone to fill it for a second time. Both of these options have negative side effects. Stock stored in a location anywhere other than the shelf is likely preventing the next carton from being ordered as you are showing a stock on hand of a quantity that is most likely above the minimum requirement to have the next carton ordered. These overstocks, as mentioned, now require attention from a staff member for a second time. This double handling of the stock isn’t free, its costing the store money to pay people to fill the same carton twice.

So, you see, it may appear that the larger the carton size the more cost efficient it is for the store yet it its quite the opposite. This brings me to my next point. Why are we arguing about carton size anyways? I used the example of 10,000 lines by 12 units to make 120,000 units of stock that need date checking. I did this to highlight just how big of a task it is to maintain and out-of-date free store. You seem to think its so easy to maintain so you counter argue that its actually 30,000 lines by 24 units?? 720,000 units of stock now need date checking. Way to support your argument. You clearly are a retard.

You ask why I’m so bent on defending the supermarkets? I ask you why your so determined to target them? They had some out of date cheese, whoopdy shit, who fucking cares. Classic David Vs Goliath, one man taking on the big evil money grabbing corporations. Really, you should get Today Tonight to do a story on you. You really are a community hero. In fact I’m going to nominate you for Australian of the Year.

No, I don’t work for a supermarket anymore, though I do have a thorough understanding of how they work. I actually shop in the Lanyon store as obviously do you. Plenty happens in stores that pisses me off as well but I’m forgiving, I get over it. Mainly because I understand the reasons why the shelves are raped last thing on a Sunday afternoon, I understand why the I have to queue with my 2 items behind a full trolley shopper at 10 at night, and I understand why there may be a packet of out of date cheese at the front of the shelf.

This is where you and I differ. You don’t understand how a supermarket works. You think you know the law and your rights as a consumer so when you discovered that cheese you thought ‘Ripper, I’ll make Woolworths out to be evil, and their staff incompetent by posting about it on the internet’ and to that I take offence. You may think that I suffer from a social disorder but I know that your an asshole, and that is much worse.

Your ‘friend’ that dropped the eggs. You stood there while he put them back on the shelf, yet you said and did nothing? Did you ask him not to? Did you take them to another staff member and ask for their disposal? I doubt that you did, yet your social conscience has you posting on the net about some out of date cheese? Your as guilty as he is. Naive tool? Believe me I’ve seen similar, if not worse, instances happen in my time in supermarkets; I just don’t make it my duty to tell the world.

I’d love to see your research that proves the ‘record profits’ vs. their out of code management practices. Perhaps you could request their shrinkage results and graph them against their profit for us? Surely its not possible that the increased profits isn’t a result of business expansion, technology advancements, better management practice and the like. You are the naive one.

Speaking of technology. You also mentioned RFID. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rfid . The technology for RFID is nothing new; many supermarkets in Europe and the US make use of this technology not just in stores but throughout their distribution process. The can even in theory be used to write your shopping list for you my monitoring what you use from your fridge! I remember hearing of shelving used in one overseas supermarket that had digital ticketing on their shelves that could update pricing instantly at the start of promotions and the like. These shelves could also monitor the weight of the stock placed on them for ordering purposes. In this regard there is plenty of supermarket specific technology that we will see in the future that will not only make shopping a more pleasurable experience, but also significantly reduce the overheads of the companies. However, the Australian supermarkets are more than a little backward in regards to the way they implement it. Though the change is a significant one you can rest assured the days of the barcode are numbered.

Any RFID tags I get will be going straight to the microwave. Well, maybe not the frozen deserts…

Toolbeater gets Dickhead of the Month award. It’s not hard to see why so many supermarkets are doing such a woeful job, if he exemplifies the type of person who works in them.

Toolbeater, we had valid points to make. And all you could do was dish out abuse. I think you just proved our (many) points.

And no, I didn’t wade through the entire rant, either. Just a sad, angry person with a shit job that he’s evidently very poor at.

One thing I would like to make clear. Except for a small minority of staff in the supermarkets like the one who dropped the eggs and tampered with food, I don’t blame the staff for these problems with keeping expired or old stock off the shelves. It’s the company that is squeezing every penny and putting quality and freshness last.

I have read that systems that us RF tags, like an advanced barcode, are being developed that not only speed up the checkouts, but also allow computers to monitor stock in the store are being developed. There like the existing RF tags for cattle, but are smaller and more versatile. Still a couple of years off, but that would be a great innovation and time saver.

Actually for anyone who lives between MacArthur/Wakefield and the lake the alternatives are closer than the Colesworth duopoly outlets.

“12 is hardly a random number.. most lines arrive at the stores in quantities of 12.”
What do you base that on. After talking to some people, hardly any product shipment come in boxes of under 24 or more each. And that makes sense. What supermarket orders in 12 of a product or a single box. None. It doesn’t make sense. It wouldn’t be cost effective.

Who are you toolbeater. No one not directly linked to a defends a supermarket that much. We may all put up with supermarket and learn to be tollerant with them. But you exhibit the signs of being either:
a) a Woolworth’s/Coles staff member
b) a person who suffers from Antisocial Personality Disorder

“If a staff member has told you they tamper with stock to make it go off then thats an issue with a particular individual.. sooner or later they will come unstuck and loose their job.”
Four years an he’s still there. He once dropped a pack of eggs and broke a couple. I was there at the time. He put it on the shelf again. You are very naive tool.

“Either way your mistaken. It would be safe to say that for the entire 10yrs that you’ve shopped at the store there as always been a small percentage of stock that has been on display yet past its used by. Its an unavoidable reality.”
True, my point however isn’t that they should stop having items that are past it on the shelf. That would be impossible. But in the past couple of years, the instances have increased. This coincides with record profits for Woolies and cost cuts over at Coles.

Nice comeback too by the way Mr Evil… very witty. Perhaps if you were louder about it people would respect and listen to you… tool.

I agree with pjp, if you don’t like you local major supermarket then feel free to shop elsewhere… you wont be missed. The only problem is that shopping at smaller business’ takes effort as they are further from home with shorter trading hours and much less range. Woolies and Coles have us all by the balls and the sooner you realise it and just make the most of it the better.

Try and go a whole week without shopping at a Woolworths or Coles owned business… yes it can be done but it will be a major inconvenience and youll soon find yourself right back where you started.

Toolbeater – what an apt name!

sorry http://www.southsidefarmersmarket.com.au

to show the big businesses we do matter try to buy every thing you can from smaller businesses. Like Farmers markets http://www.southsidefarmersmarke.com.au

I probably get it and am inclined to agree with ToolBeater that the supermarkets try to do the right thing. It’s not as if it’s in their interest (especially the biggies where the person who runs the store doesn’t own it) to sell rotten, unhealthy food. Bad for the rep, as this blog is showing. They can ditch it and write it off with hardly a dent in the profit.

But they do make mistakes. Everyone with a mass function does. It’s why Centrelink and the Tax Office have (mostly) good complaint management systems. The problem (for an outsider) is not that Immigration makes errors, but that it has trouble correcting them. Supermarkets sometimes forget to turn stuff over properly or someone leaves something that should be chilled/frozen where it can thaw or warm up.

If you come across a dud product, tell someone. It’s the only way they find out. If they treat you with disrespect, fill out a complaint form and/or have a rant on the complaint page of the relevant supermarket website. Whatever you do, don’t rage at the teenagers and other low-level employees in the aisles or on the checkouts. They’re paid enough to do their work, but not enough to have abuse hurled at them. And it doesn’t work – all it does is provide a frisson of excitement and amusement for other staff and shoppers while making the perpetrator look ridiculous. Calm almost always works.

If you don’t get a result (and you almost always will), then I suggest the ACT Health authorities may take an interest.

12 is hardly a random number.. most lines arrive at the stores in quantities of 12. Sure there is plenty of lines with more stock than that so 120,000+ products is probably an understatement.

If a staff member has told you they tamper with stock to make it go off then thats an issue with a particular individual.. sooner or later they will come unstuck and loose their job.

Well maybe if you did read my post you’d have a better understanding of how stock past its use by could come to be on the shelf of any supermarket.

The reason you are posting is because you feel that you have been wronged, or perhaps that the staff just don’t care and you feel that its your duty to tell as many people as you can. Either way your mistaken. It would be safe to say that for the entire 10yrs that you’ve shopped at the store there as always been a small percentage of stock that has been on display yet past its used by. Its an unavoidable reality.

So as I suggested before, it is you who is the dickbrain for making such an issue of something so trivial.

By the way toolbeater/F*ck wit,
“I’d like to see you date check the 10,000 lines that most Supermarkets carry, and that’s lines, not items. Multiply that by 12 units of each and you have 120,000+ items potentially going out of date.”
Get your facts straight. Woolworths has 30,000 prdct lines. And when you say most supermrkets, Woolies and Coles have 30,000. BiLo have more like10-15,000 and Aldi has 1000-5000 product lines.

“Multiply that by 12 units of each”
12. That is a f*cking randomn number. Where did you get 12 from. Theyhave around 30blocks of Camambert on the shelf at any one time alone. Larger blocks, they could have 50 or more. Where did you get 12 from?

“What you need to understand is that your anger will most likely be directed at the wrong person. Someone like you. Someone who is simply trying to do the best job they can.” At Lanyon, many of te staff responsible for the shelves are from my class in high school. Beleive me, they are not doing the best they can. Especially the guy who has on numerouse occassions stated he fiddled with goods so that they would leak or go off.

Wow, and I though Ted Bundy was a nut job. We have a new contender… Toolbeater.

Didn’t read most of it, though this caght my eye:
“You are gutless. Approach the store manager if you take such offence to such a trivial issue. ”
That is the reason I am posting d*ckbrain. I have informed the store (the service desk and on two occassions, duty manager) of the pressence of goods that are siginifcantly past their use by and more rarely, best before. There continued failiure to keep these goods in check is why I am posting. I have shopped at Lanyon Woolies for about 10 years since it oppened. Only in th past 2 years have the problems with stock being past it become a noticable issue.

bunch of savages in this town

Sorry if I missed you VicePope, but from the comment you made I thought you ‘got it’. I agree that in the most part the majors are pretty good at stock rotation and that the smaller independents are often worse, though not necessarily.

You said that you worked in a Supermarket when you younger… surely you can relate to at least some of the points I’m trying to make..

Oi, Toolbeater. I made a comment, don’t I get some abuse too? I feel all neglected … sob.

I’ve never seen the dye tubs that you describe but that doesn’t mean I missed your point. Your point was clearly the assumption that freezer temperatures aren’t monitored. My point was that nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact if you look more closely at some of the different types of freezers, mainly the upright types, you’ll find many of the newer ones have an LCD displaying the current temperature.

Did anyone actually bother to wade through that rant?

I read the bit addressed to me and the wunderkid missed my point completely: the devices are in the freezer. They are a small plastic tub with dye, the dye changes colour if the temp ever goes over whatever. Everyone, including customer, can see if the freezer has ever malfunctioned since the tub was put in. Cheap, easy, effective. I’ve never seen them here.

Somebody get ‘asp’ a tissue. You found some out of date cheese on a supermarket shelf, you chose not to buy it and you even decided to be a Good Samaritan and bring it to the attention of an employee… congratulations, we’re happy for you. Why post about it on the internet? are you trying to start some sort of supermarket revolution? It’s trivial, it happens, get over it.

I’d like to say that I’m surprised by how ignorant and anal some of the comments are that have been posted, but im far being able to.

@cranky
Yeah ‘smear ’em’, you got it pal. I don’t think Woolworths gives two shits about some tools, such as some of you, having a cry about the standards at their local Woolies, especially on a community website such as this. I’m betting every single person who’s in agreement with ‘asp’ has shopped at their local Coles or Woolies at least once since joining your ‘smear’ campaign. Way to show those ‘evil’ corporations. You’re also right about not expecting any ‘sense’ from the store manager; surely we couldn’t expect someone of such a position to be able to converse with someone on the same level of intellect as you. You’re a joke.

@el
Send my regards to the couple of people who became unwell after having consumed the ‘stuff’. It’s a pity they we’re so stupid to consume it without checking the use by date and even more stupid not to notice that the product they were consuming was off. They are also doing extremely well to be able to pin point the actual product that made them sick and to identify it as food poisoning and not just a gastro virus. Of course though, the only ones to blame are the Supermarkets, they forced them to consume the product right? Surely its not possible that it was a contaminated food product that they bought elsewhere, dodgy takeaway or such, especially considering that food poisoning can take several days to occur after consuming a contaminated product. Suing Woolworths is clearly the only option.

Oh, and if these companies are such ‘crap merchants’ why don’t you shop elsewhere?

@jemmy
You’re an idiot. You haven’t seen the device used to monitor cold storage so you assume that they don’t at all? All Supermarkets have policies in place to monitor the temperatures of all their cold storage. Weights and measures checks are completed multiple times a day on things such as the scales at the checkouts. Dock people record the temperature of the inside of trucks that deliver cold items from the distribution centres and the stock itself is checked with a temperature gun when being delivered by smaller vendors. Stock not meeting the required temperature is not accepted. Seeing as this is going on behind the scenes and you’ve not seen the ‘device’ you assume it doesn’t happen?

“Sure, the transport time is longer, but the trucks are refrigerated, aren’t they?” What do you think?… way to show your ignorance…

@bd84 – indirectly though… you seem to at least have an idea of how it works but you raised some comment worthy points.

Its not that the Supermarkets are too slack to get someone to do the date checking, its more the pressure of running such a complex business. You’d be surprised just how little profit the Supermarkets make. In fact I could rattle off a few local stores that run at a loss. Now I’m talking about individual stores and not the companies that run them. Before you jump up and down saying that Woolies made $1.8bn, Coles and Woolies make most of their profit in other subsidiaries of their companies and not necessarily the Supermarkets. The biggest cost component, and the one the stores have the most control over is their wage percentage. What this means is that casual staffing is the first to go when stores need to tighten their belts and all this achieves is added pressure on the staff that remain. The shelves still need to be stocked; the customers still need to be put through the checkouts and the date code checks need to still be completed among many, many other tasks.

As far as the ‘fking lazy’ people who don’t bother going to work comment goes. I don’t know what you do for a living and I don’t assume to know but I can assure you that the staff in Supermarkets are overworked and underpaid. Those of you who want to bitch about your local Supermarket missing an out of date product on their shelves and especially those of you working 9-5 jobs you need to realise that the staff in a Supermarket are running a 24hr business, even if the store isn’t trading for that period of time. Department managers, and many other staff, often start work earlier than 5 am to have your precious consumables ready to go at 7am and they often work a day longer than 12hrs, weekends and public holidays included. On top of that they have to deal with tools like some of you who want to bitch and moan because you need to wait more than 5mins to be put through a checkout or because you found some cheese past its use by. Its a shitty job compared to most of yours no doubt, but someone has to do it, right?

@I-filed
I’m pretty sure you’ll find that all staff in a Supermarket who replenish perishable goods are trained to rotate date codes when filling, granted some are lazy and don’t always comply. You used eggs as an example. Even if the Supermarkets’ staff are not doing it correctly it’s my experience that you’ll find that egg companies have their own reps who visit stores on a weekly basis to place orders and to check stock rotation. It’s in their interests after all, seeing as they credit stores for out of date stock.

As far as you comment on learning not to reach to the back to get fresher stock. If you are doing this then you are just adding to the issue by leaving the older stock at the front… stop your bitching, you’re part of the problem!

@ant
Quote: “They solve this problem though by just not stocking the shelves at all. They seem to think that, once the popular (cheap) stuff is gone, customers will just grab the expensive versions, thus ensuring that all the stuff is sold and so nothing goes off”

Nice theory dickhead, you’ve got it all worked out. They let the shelves run down in order to avoid out of date stock. Now that would be good business sense wouldn’t it! Force the customer into buying the premium products by letting the more popular items run out of stock? I’m sorry, but you have no idea.

Milk goes out of date earlier when purchased from one store over another? I seriously doubt that. its safe to assume that Milk is delivered by the same vendor daily to both those supermarkets. Its all in your head.

@swamiOFswank
You did the right thing bringing the in date, yet mouldy, cheese to some ones attention. Sure the checkout operator ‘tut-tutted’ about it but did you consider that this may have been because of the way you approached them about it? Maybe a checkout operator wasn’t the best person to approach? if they are operating a register they are hardly an senior staff member are they? I don’t assume you were aggressive about it, but approaching a kid on a checkout about it can be intimidating for them when people often lay the blame on the first staff member they see, especially when that staff member doesn’t work in the department where the product originated or have any real power to take action if they don’t.

How do you know that the bag of cheese was taken back to the shelf? You were going through the checkout at the time weren’t you? Did you seriously hang around to watch the action taken by the staff member who they passed the issue on to? I doubt that you did and if so don’t you think that that’s kind of pathetic that you stuck around? I know I do.

@VYBerlinaV8 now_with_added grunt – Again not really directed at you. I recognise your sarcasm in your first comment but for many people there is none when they make the same statement.

Evil corporations? They are businesses like any other. They have shareholders to answer to and more importantly deliver a profit to. As I covered above, wage expense is one of only a few costs of doing business that these Supermarkets have control over at a store level, yet you want an ‘army of highly trained food specialists’ to save you? Perhaps you’d like it if you had a staff member to greet you at the door and push your trolley around for you advising you on your purchases before processing your sale and helping you load the goods into your cupboard at home? It is possible you know. Though you can expect a hefty jump in the shelf prices, but then we’d be bitching about the cost of our groceries wouldn’t we.

@Mr Evil
You Sir are possibly the biggest tool to leave a comment. Loudly making comment to a staff member for all to hear servers only one purpose. It makes you look like a dickhead. I can assure you that you had no part directly or indirectly helping the mentioned store ‘solve their problem’. In fact I’m sure all the staff that you may have commented to in your quest to ‘help’ most likely remember you and only because you are ‘that guy’ who embarrasses himself shamelessly every time he’s in the store. Customers as well probably think ‘look at that knob having a go at someone over something petty’. You may think otherwise, but I assure you that that is what they are thinking.

@blingblingbears
Quote: “Just last night I had decided to stop shopping there altogether. EVERYTIME I buy milk from there it always goes off in the fridge several days before the use-by date.”

Are you one of these morons that tell staff members that you’re never returning to their store only to be sighted there the following day? I’ll bet you are. You are also a joke. They say that as a consumer the most powerful way that you can ‘vote’ against a company is to take your business elsewhere. Do you think any of the supermarkets really give a toss about your $100+ a week that you most likely haven’t taken away from their business? You’re all talk. You’ve been back in that store since you posted and we all know it.

As far as your milk that goes out of date mysteriously before its used by date. Try turning down the temperature of your fridge, or perhaps even replace it. Clearly it’s how your storing the milk at home that’s the issue not the supermarkets evil plan to poison you.

Also, although its disappointing that you may have been overcharged on particular items in the past I’m glad you check your receipt. Human error at the checkout happens and most don’t check for it. It’s not a conspiracy, of that I’m certain.

And as far as your anecdote about the mop you were charged THREE times for… I’d put money on it that the first time was the correct scan, the second was the error and the third was the operator correcting the mistake, hence the same item appearing multiple times. The minus symbol is easily missed on the Woolies recepts. Hence you thought you were charged ‘three’ times. I could be wrong, but its happened to me like that before.

@ant
There’s nothing bizarre about the different shopping conditions at Coles Manuka and Queanbeyan. Supermarkets have different pricing bands; Manuka being a more wealthy area has a slightly different pricing structure than that of Queanbeyan being a bit of a ‘struggle town’. A few cents per item here and there makes a massive difference to the staffing levels of the store. Like I said before, if you want to pay more for your groceries in order to receive a better level of service go right ahead but the nature of the consumer is that you want to have your cake and eat it too, therefore people feel the need to start bitching as they have in this topic.

@asp – the instigator!

Staff generally date check chilled goods across the store on a weekly basis, if not several times a week, its recorded in a book, there are records of what is approaching its used by dates and the action to be taken. The Supermarkets are well aware of their legal requirements in this regard and it is not something that they take lightly. Remember that stock approaching its used by date is better sold at a reduced rate rather than being written off and binned, another cost to the business. No system is perfect, stock can be missed and there is always the factor of human error.

Perhaps you should also consider that the stock may have been delivered to the store already past its used by date. It happens. You’d assume that all stock delivered by a supplier is well within its shelf life, yet the suppliers themselves are subject to the same stock management principles that govern the very stores you are bitching about. They have a responsibility to rotate their stock and to deliver the shorter dated stock first, but it doesn’t always work out that way…

‘New’ stock arrives at the store, the staff member brings the old stock to the front of the shelf as part of the filling process and the newly delivered, yet expired, stock gets placed at the back of the shelf ready to be sold to the next anal pillow-biter with a desire to bitch on the internet. See what I’m saying???

You yourself admitted in one of your own posts that you have had experiences in the past regarding stock that you had purchased that had issues that had originated at the manufacturing level. Sure, in this case its possible that staff incompetence is to blame but as GnT pointed out, why didn’t you take it up with the store? What have you to gain posting it on here?

I’d like to see you date check the 10,000 lines that most Supermarkets carry, and that’s lines, not items. Multiply that by 12 units of each and you have 120,000+ items potentially going out of date. Should be easy to stay on top of, right? I’m sure you could ensure that not a single one is on the shelf at the stroke of midnight on its expiry. I mean your capable of using the internet, surely managing the date checking of an itty bitty Supermarket would be a piece of cake for you the mighty asp!

Bottom line. You have a warped view of the world. If you think that it’s possible that a Supermarket anywhere, Canberra or otherwise, is capable of maintaining a store completely rid of out of date stock, law or otherwise, you are sadly mistaken. I’m surprised you haven’t bothered to contact a ‘reputable’ current affairs program like Today Tonight. I mean, why stop at the internet? Make it your personal calling in life to rid the world of out of date cheese. You seem like the right person for the job.

You are gutless. Approach the store manager if you take such offence to such a trivial issue.

Before any of you start calling me out, saying that I must work for Woolworths or Coles… I don’t. I have worked in Supermarkets in the past and understand the impossible task of managing the ‘perfect’ Supermarket that so many of you seem to think is so easy. The media tells you to demand a high level of service and not to accept atrocities such as out of date products, they tell you to protect your rights as a consumer and to screw the ‘evil corporations’ by holding them accountable.

What you need to understand is that your anger will most likely be directed at the wrong person. Someone like you. Someone who is simply trying to do the best job they can. Someone who becomes disgruntled and equally offended when an asshole like you decides the best course of action is to make a scene in their workplace and to target them for something that may not be within their control or not be an issue they were aware of.

Many people here commented positively. I’m glad to say that the majority have some common sense, and for you I have great respect. It’s just a shame that there are so many people in the world who persist in thinking that they are above those who work in not only Supermarkets but in retail and other customer service roles.

ant – out of all the big and small supermarkets i’ve been to in canberra i would agree that coles manuka is the best but they definitely also have issues with not turning over stock.

for example, on a couple occasions i had bought packet noodles (singapore, hokkien etc) from there only to discover, when i went to use them, they were well out of date (with black mould growing inside no less!!). after a few times of this happening, i figured maybe it wasn’t actually my fault of not using the food fast enough (i don’t have that giant a cupboard or hoards of food at home!), so i took to checking expiry dates on the noodles in the store. sure enough, the first time of doing this, i found 3-4 packets of well expired noodles, so i actually took them up to the front desk as well as telling them i’d purchased (accidentally) similarly expired food. they apoligised profusely and said they’d check all the rest of the noodle stock. but when i was back there for my next fortnightly shop – STILL expired noodles a-plenty. now i am one of those mad people who obsessively check the expiry date of every item 🙁

I must say, I now do most of my shopping at Coles in Manuka. Now THIS is a good supermarket. The shelves are stocked, they seem to have a bigger range of stuff, like el cheapo meat, and you do not wait in lines (I complain endlessly to Coles by email about the disgusting long lines that are endemic at the Queanbeyan shop).

It’s bizarre that Manuka Coles and Queanbeyan Coles are the same company, and a few kms apart. Qbn Coles is like a 2nd world supermarket. Even Qbn Woolies is better, despite the cramped aisles and current major renovations. At least they’ve got the lines better under control.

“I find most yoghurts taste better up to a month after the use-by date”

There are no words.

So there ya go… in days gone by there was no requirement to print a best before or use by date. Then the govvie chaps decided to do something to give the consumer a way to check food for possible spoilage etc.

So what happens now? Lazy sods wander round supermarkets blithely tossing items into their trolleys, safe and secure in the knowledge that the staff diligently check that products are regularly checked for out of dateness. Grow up kiddies. It’s not going to happen. If anything the requirement to print these dates has shifted more of the onus on the consumer to check.

So, you lazy people who want mummy or daddy to hold your hands for the rest of your days, here’s how it is done by sensible self-accountable people: as you wander the highways and byways of your local supermarket, and something catches your beady eye and you feel the urge to purchase it, take responsibility and check the expiry date. If it has expired, you have the option of being socially responsible and advising the store of your find, or if you can’t be bothered, simply put it back and keep perambulating through the aisles. Not hard really.

Something else to remember if your tendencies are to be a bit anal… a use by date almost always contains a safety buffer, and most products that have been properly stored can be safely consumed for a period after the nominal expiry. For instance I find most yoghurts taste better up to a month after the use-by date…

Good stuff, one of my managed funds had Woolworths shares.

Oh, just read on news.com.au that Woolworths has posted a $1.3 BILLION DOLLAR PROFIT.

Same poblem with the milk. Infact, several times, I have not purchased it because the cartons are “inflated”. When openned if they are slightly bulging, you can here air escape. This is a sure sign of microbial contamination and that the milk is spoilt. The reason no doubt is inproper storage. Just last month, I was in Coles at 4pm on a Friday afternoon. They were restoking the frozen goods including frozen pies, veg, chips and ice creams. There were over 30 large boxes linned up infront of the freezers. I was in the store for 20minutes and it was quite warm. The boxes were almost all full stll and were still there when I left. I have a photograph, which pissed off the staff when they noticedm taking it with them in it. Might be useful one day.

I have had quite a few problems with the Woolworths at Lanyon as well. Just last night I had decided to stop shopping there altogether. EVERYTIME I buy milk from there it always goes off in the fridge several days before the use-by date.

Also on many occasions I have been double or triple charged for an item I only bough one of. For example I bought a mop and I was charged three times for it. I mentioned to the check out girl that the total bill did not seem right and she didnt bother to check. I now have to check evey receipt closely and go straight to the returns counter to rectify the problem. Its such a waste of time having to wait there while their return counter person is getting annoyed with you, the poor cheated customer!

I find that loudly pointing out the problem to the staff is a good way of getting the message across, especially if half the shop staff and customers can hear you. Jamison Coles was bad for a few months but I think I helped solve their little problem by vocally highlighting it. 😉

What is it about these evil corporations? I mean, geez, they should be employing an army of highly trained food specialists to go around removing old food, to save me, the precious customer, from the mental anguish of checking the use by date on fresh or spoilable food before I buy it and eat it.

What a load of crap. I check the use by date on every fresh-type thing I buy. I don’t worry about cans or dried food (eg cereals, flours, etc), because if I find it out of date I can simply return it next time, although that’s never happened yet. Foods like meat and dairy go off very easily, so I make it my business to check before I eat.

Grated cheese. What is it about the stuff that attracts trouble. I once found some mainland tasty that smelt like an morgue when openned. It’s normally a strong cheese, but this was rediculous. Still within best before though so no one wasat fault, except the manufacturer who has since updated their packaging and I haven’t had the problem again.
Oh, there was also the rather large wasp in a pack of noodles. Again, the manufacturer’s fault.

I recently picked up a bag of grated cheese at Coles at Jammo, only to find that it was within the ‘best before’ but full of the fuzzy green stuff. There were several bags like that on the fridge shelf. I took them to the console operator who apologised and ‘tut-tutted’ and said she’d get someone onto it. She sure did. Someone took th bag back to the shelf and put it exactly back where I’d taken it from. Beware.

And no, I don’t work for Woolies.

It shouldn’t be that hard. When items are restocked, the older items should be brought to the front. It should be obvious at that point.

Notice my constant use of the word ‘should’….

Queanbeyan Coles is worse. They solve this problem though by just not stocking the shelves at all.

Aha, the Southlands Woolworths technique.

Queanbeyan Coles is worse. They solve this problem though by just not stocking the shelves at all. They seem to think that, once the popular (cheap) stuff is gone, customers will just grab the expensive versions, thus ensuring that all the stuff is sold and so nothing goes off.

meanwhile, their milk always goes off in the fridge several days before the use-by. While milk from queanbeyan Woolies is fine.

The end ‘aisle’ at Woollies Dickson where the chicken is STINKS from three metres away. I saw a woman buying chicken on special in a plastic bag that was extended from the gases building up inside. EW. Oh, and I’ve learned not to bother reaching to the back of food to get the latest date in say eggs – most shoppers would assume that they rotate the stock, but they just shove it all on the front. Bad luck to anyone buying later! Huge kudos to the practices of small retailer Mountain Creek in Griffith – anything out of date they give you for free, or practically nothing. And no, I have no association with MC, just shop there every few weeks.

Most supermarkets have staff who check all the perishable stock on a daily basis.. but as jr mentioned most supermarket chains are just too slack to get someone to do the job on their days off (combined with the fking lazy people who are around these days and just don’t bother about going to work)..

It happens, they can’t guarantee that every single item in the many thousands of items in store won’t be out of date no matter how hard they try, if there was more than one it was probably placed back on the shelf by accident.. best thing is to tell a staff member and if it happens regularly speak to the manager.

From Food Standards Australia New Zealand:

What is a ‘best-before’ date?

A ‘best-before’ date is the last date on which a food can be expected to retain all of its quality attributes, provided that it has been stored in accordance with any stated storage conditions.

Quality attributes include things such as colour, taste, texture and flavour, as well as any specific qualities for which express or implied claims have been made. For example, the freshness of the food or certain vitamin levels. A food that has passed its ‘best-before’ date may still be perfectly safe to consume, but its
quality may have diminished. Food date-marked with a ‘best-before’ date can be sold after this date, provided the food is
not damaged, deteriorated or perished. It is an offence under New Zealand and Australian State and Territory Food Acts to sell food that is damaged, deteriorated or perished at any time, regardless of whether the food is within its specified date mark or not.

My understanding (unless it has changed in the past year) is that items with a Use-By can not be sold past that date. Items with a Best Before can for up to 4 weeks, and then only when clearly marked as past the Best Before. This could be state dependent though, as this was the word I got from NSW Health about a year ago. On this occasion however, the cheese had a Use-By. Odd, because most of those special Southcapes have a Best Before.

There is a difference between “Use-by” and “Best Before” dates. My understanding (and I could be wrong) is that it is illegal to sell items past their use-by, but not their best before. Chees usually has a “best before” date. You can safely consume items past their best before date, but should avoid items past thei use-by.

Still, 4 months is a bit much.

Jemmy – The trucks are refrigerated. The freezers at most supermarkets here just aren’t that cold, I’ve noticed it too.

Now, completely off-topic – I’ve just discovered a WordPress feature -I can click, drag and expand the text window that I’m typing into now! Stoked! I thought it was fixed only showing about 3 and a half narrow lines. Really, really hoping that this wasn’t common knowledge amongst the rest of you but I thought it worth sharing. Makes editing/proofreading long comments a lot easier.

Anyway, continue….

Just to double-check: was it a “use by” date, or a “best before” date?

Eww! thats so gross…but that is so lanyon!!

Being a woolies employee myself (thank god i dont work there..), all i can say is complain, complain, complain, complain!!

and really, how did they manage to make THAT stuff up?

(and about the whole unloading stuff in freezer..i thought most places already do that? Well..at least my woolies does!)

Talking about refrigerated goods: a particular thing I’ve noticed here is how much frozen food has thawed and refrozen. It’s endemic, to the point where, for a particular frozen desert I buy, it is the exception to find one that hasn’t thawed (you can tell because the contents are semi-liquid when thawed and so have shifted within the container). It’s illegal where I come from and supermarkets have to monitor freezer temps to make sure they don’t go above freezing. I’ve never seen the device they use here in Canberra, so am assuming the freezers aren’t monitored.

Someone suggested it’s because we’re in the middle of the bush, but surely the system is the same no matter where you are: load the truck, transport it, unload the truck and stock in freezer. Sure, the transport time is longer, but the trucks are refrigerated, aren’t they?

My neighbour used to have a (part time) job going around the local Woolworths supermarket checking the use by dates, bringing older stock to the front of the shelves, marking down items that were close to use-by dates and removing (throwing out) the stock that was actually past its use-by dates.

She remarked on several occasions that other people that were “supposed” to be doing that role on her days off were typically slack as they they were running flat out just keeping up with their normal other tasks.

Unfortunately, I have found that the issue of stock past its use-by date is probably more prevalent in the smaller independent local centre supermarkets where the turn over due to lower patronage is often much lower.

The problem is really of most concern with perishable/refrigerated goods. As in most cases there is typically a large safety factor between the use-by (or best-before) dates. A classic example of this would be bottled water… not sure that plain water in a bottle realistically has a use-by date of 12 months or so in the bottle given that is may have spent thousands if not millions of years in the ground before it was bottled.

Either way, I was under the impression that it is not legal (on health grounds) to sell food stuffs where the use-by date has expired. You should make the store duty manager aware of the problem if it is happening on a regular basis, otherwise the food safety inspection area within ACT Government usually achieves the desired longer term compliance effect if store management just ignores you.

It’s not cheese if it’s not green.

I’ve always found Woolies and Coles to be pretty good at turning stock over and heavily discounting stuff that is running out of date, and I hope what ASP experienced was an aberration. Woolies has a complaint page on its website and this might be a good option.

On the other hand, some small/independent/local businesses have been problematic, in my experience. A couple of regional cuisine specialists stick out in my mind.

Food is not eternal, and if it is not a mushroom or a truffle, one should not be eating fungal matter.

(I do not work in or for a supermarket and have not done so since I was about 15).

I always check bacon, ham, etc now after getting one two months past the use-by a couple of years ago. It’s more common than you’d expect to find an expired one, so I don’t think it’s just W Lanyon. And when I say expired I don’t mean yesterday, I mean weeks out-of-date. BTW, the original one when I first noticed it was Coles.

Unfortunately I’d suggest the outbreak of food poisoning has already occured, asp.

Perhaps a lawsuit might be a sufficient wakeup call to these crap merchants?

GnT, you don’t work for Woolies do you?
As soon as I found the product was past it, and realized it was not the only one, I took it to the service desk and informed them. The staff member took it, checked it, produced a rather annoyed face and stated that this was unacceptable and she would rectify it.
It seems pretty pointless telling them again and again though. This is the third time in 12 months for the Lanyon store. I still do because I would feel bad knowing products were off and then hearing about an outbreak of food poisoning.

Yep. I know of a couple of people who have become severely unwell having consumed the stuff.

Hooray for big business!

Um, if I overstay my parking meter, the wrath of Hopeless arrives.
The powers that be have decreed that food over the use-by date should be disappeared. I would not expect any sense from a Woolworths manager on this subject. Smear ’em.

What do you expect living all the way down there? It takes at least 4 months for the cheese to be shipped there. By the time the cheddar arrives it is stinky, soft and white so they relabel it.

Did you voice your concerns to the manager of said Woolworths? Or have you just come straight to RiotACT to smear them?