Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Bloggers-At-Large: The 'Tao of Ben': Blogger Ben Tao Voices Dismay With Tesco's Fresh & Easy; Posts 'Dear John' Letter His Girlfriend Sent the Grocer


Ben Tao writes and publishes his own Blog -- "Random Thoughts: ben tao's thoughts -- at benjitao.com.

In a post today, Ben's random thought is about Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.

Specifically, as is apparent by the title of his post today about Tesco's Fresh & Easy -- Unhappy Fresh and Easy Customer: An Open Letter -- Ben's random thought, and conclusion, about the small-format, convenience-oriented combination grocery and fresh foods chain's stores isn't a positive one.

It seems Ben and his girlfriend starting shopping at their local Fresh & Easy market because of the famous $5 off purchases of $20 or more store coupons the grocer has been liberally distributing since its first stores opened in Southern California in November, 2007 -- and then shortly thereafter started opening in Metropolitan Las Vegas, Nevada and in the Phoenix, Arizona Metro region. There are now about 110 Fresh & Easy markets in the three states.

Ben Tao says the deep-discount store coupons, which were given out in multiples with each purchase he and his girlfriend made at the store, "hooked him." The discount was so good he and his girlfriend continued shopping at the Fresh & Easy store regularly, as long as the store coupons kept coming. One might even call the deep-discount store coupons "coupon crack" in the hands of Ben Tao.

However, Blogger Ben says once Tesco's Fresh & Easy stopped distributing the $5 off store coupons so liberally (as we've reported the grocer has stopped handing out the coupons in-store in most cases, distributing the store coupons primarily in its advertising flyers and sometimes on its Web site), he stopped shopping Fresh & Easy regularly -- but not his girlfriend -- she continued as a regular Fresh & Easy store shopper despite the less frequent availability of the deep-discount store coupons.

But the Blogger's girlfriend, like significant other Ben, has also now ceased being a Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market shopper -- completely.

And her reason for no longer shopping at Fresh & Easy isn't because of the more limited availability of the discount store coupons.

In fact, her reasons are much more global -- and serious. So serious in fact that Blogger Ben's significant other wrote a letter to Tesco's Fresh & Easy detailing why she no longer shops in the grocery chain's stores.

In his post today, Ben Tao posts his girlfriend's letter to Fresh & Easy company management, along with offering some words of his own about why both he and his significant other no longer shop at the markets. Blogger Ben and his girlfriend do leave the door open a crack though about shopping at a Fresh & Easy grocery and fresh foods market once again in the future, assuming some changes are made.

But we've said enough. Click here to read, in their own words, why Ben Tao and his girlfriend are no longer shopping at a Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market grocery store, including the reasons detailed by Blogger Ben's better half in her letter to the grocer.

Can and will Tesco's Fresh & Easy lure back Blogger Ben's girlfriend to what he says are her former Fresh & Easy "junkie ways?" Or is it too late? Will she find a competitor to Fresh & Easy that gives her an even better grocery shopping high? Or is it all just a ploy by Ben Tao to get a whole bunch of Fresh & Easy deep-discount store coupons, as might be suggested by the second-to-last paragraph in his post (right above the "Fresh should always be this easy" picture? Stay tuned.

[Editor's Note: Fresh & Easy Buzz occasionally publishes stories/posts by Bloggers about Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, as part of our 'Bloggers-At-Large' feature. The content and opinions offered in the 'Bloggers-At-Large' feature posts are those of the individual Bloggers and not those of Fresh & Easy Buzz. If you are a Blogger and have written something about Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, or are a reader that sees a post you think we might like to publish, feel free to e-mail a link to us at freshneasybuzz@yahoo.com. Of course, we reserve the right to choose which submissions we run.]

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yup, you guys summed up our story pretty well. We'll let you know if anything positive comes out of this story...

Anonymous said...

I've had similar problems with spoiled fresh products. I originally liked buying some of the fresh foods marked down by 50%. But after getting a couple bad items, even though they had a couple days left on the code dates, I stopped buying the markdowns. 50% off isn't any good if you have to toss the stuff in the trash when you get it home. I've complained to the store employees about it and they have always taken care of any problems and let the corporate people know about the situation. After all, it's not the store employees fault. Sounds like fresh & easy hasn't fixed this problem yet. Hope they respond to you.