Sunday, May 2, 2010

Things appear to be improving at Fred Meyer for now

Like I have mentioned in some previous blog posts, I regularly shop at the nearest Fred Meyer from my house. The last week or so I have been very frustrated at the decisions Fred Meyer has been making.

Well I went to Fred Meyer yesterday to return the Dockers Dress Pants I recently reviewed on this blog because of the size problem. They took it back and I got a full refund without any real hassle. So there is one good thing for Fred Meyer.

They had a $10 off a $50 purchase savings certificate that was valid in most departments other than the food department this weekend. They haven't had one of these for a few months, so I went ahead and spent a little over $50 to get the $10 off. This is another recent positive thing for Fred Meyer.

In the food department, the price of a few picnic items have finally been reduced to their "picnic season" low prices such as the 8 Kroger Value Hamburger or Hot Buns for 50 cents each for the first 2. So that is a third positive thing for me to note.

A fourth positive thing that happened was that the donuts were only 3/$1 since it was after 6PM. I don't know if this is a regular type special or a one time thing since I don't usually shop that late. I think it may be only that price if there are donuts left over at 6PM. But it was nice to get a dozen fresh donuts for only $4 at Fred Meyer when they are usually more like $6 a dozen if I remember correctly.

Lastly, the woman who rang up my groceries, even though she seemed to have a personality like that of a robot, did remember to ask me for my Rewards card which I forgot to give her because of everything going on. If she had forgotten to ask me, I would have had to wait in line or call a phone number up to get my points earned on that trip, and I wouldn't have had an accurate points total for the Fuel Discounts and Rewards Program until my checkout on the next trip.


Now this is stuff Fred Meyer, in my honest opinion, still needs to address:

1. They need to go back to the 3 Rewards Rebate Certificates instead of the soon-to-come Expirable Gift Card.

2. They need to improve their electronics department. They need more big ticket items instead of cheap mini-laptops and really cheap mp3 players. I did notice that the Samsung P3 which I reviewed earlier in the blog is still carried by Fred Meyer. Apparently it was moved to a different spot and I just didn't see until the last trip.

3. They need to give men more choices in dress pants besides DOCKERS and HAGGAR brands. I just learned that the Dockers pair I bought and reviewed here also got bad reviews on Amazon.COM and not just from me.

4. They need to make sure that in the future the reusable bag savings are superior to those that do not use reusable bags and use the plastic bags instead.

and by far the most important is

5. They need to stop the rigging of the Design A Reusable Bag Contest by the highest vote getters. Kroger states that those with the highest votes will get special consideration. But I have seen proof that all of the Top designs are getting hundreds of illegal votes. This can be very damaging to the Kroger Family of stores' reputation if this rigging continues.

So the main problems are at Kroger's HQ, not at Fred Meyer in general. I have e-mailed Kroger about the contest and if I get a response about how they plan to pursue the cheaters of the contest, I will post it here.

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