The following is an edited email I just wrote and sent from the Safeway.com web site:
BTW, Albertsons has a preferred customer card operation, too. However, Albertsons will issue you a card to obtain discounts without having to give them any personal information.
Ah, I’d’ve delayed my departure to discuss the clerk’s comment with the management.
Can you explain the part again why you found it necessary to drag the Chicago Reader and this board into your dispute? I must have missed it first time around.
Manny, I’ve transcribed the reasoning below.
You could always just give them fake information to get the card. They’re not a governmental agency, they’re just a grocery store.
Your anger is justified as is your letter to Corporate. Bringing the SDMB into it was nothing short of idiotic though.
Haj
Yeah, giving a corporation you’re pissed at bad publicity is such a bad idea.
The fact that you have dragged the SDMB into your petty hissy fit is absolutely ridiculous. I really don’t believe that anyone here is going to avoid a grocery store because of something a cashier said to you after you were undoubtedly rude to her. And the whole ‘even if my life depends on it’? Yeah, way to go. In their eyes, you’re twelve years old.
In their eyes, he’s lost money who has just ensured they’ll lose more money.
Why the hell is this so hard to grasp?
I can see the president of Safeway now:“OH GOD, NO! NOT THE SDMB!!!”
Dude, just make up all the info for their club cards, that’s what I did. Acording to their records, my card is used by Ben Dover who lives at 1600 Pensylvania Ave., Washington D.C. It still works just fine for getting the discounts.
I think (and hope) that you missed my point. Posting the rant is fine, telling Safeway that there is a rant about them here is idiotic. Yes, it’s a really, really bad idea.
Haj
We aren’t supposed to bitch about things in the Pit anymore?
A lifetime of substandard health care. :rolleyes:
Grind your axes elsewhere, asswhipe.
Manduck, This is the part that bothers some of us. The rant is fine.
Haj
Au contraire: Telling Safeway that you’ve just informed x hundred other people how bad your experience there was is a great idea. Money is what Safeway needs, and we are money. The less of us they get, the less money they get. That’s what counts.
Let’s see a show of hands. Everyone who is honestly going to stop shopping at Safeway only because of this rant, sound off.
Haj
haj: Logical fallacy. It’s rarely just one thing that makes someone stop doing something, unless it’s one really big thing. This rant will be in my mind whenever the topic of shopping comes up, and it will find company among other things about Safeway, positive and negative.
I would have isolated my complaint to the rudeness of the clerk and left out the ranting about their higher prices. All that “I’ll never ever shop there again, even if my life depended on it” stuff makes you sound irritable and flaky and prone to exaggeration. If I were in Safeway management, it would make me wonder if you’d caused a scene and upset someone or made things difficult for any of my employees. It wouldn’t register as a big loss to me if you decided not to shop Safeway anymore.
I agree that sharing a bad experience with a place so that others won’t shop there is a good thing to do, but there are ways of doing so that don’t involve mentioning specifically who you talked to or your means of doing so. Mentioning the SDMB wasn’t necessary.
You’re right. I concede that point.
Haj
Again, the problem is not that you’ve “informed x hundred other people how bad your experience” was, it’s that you specifically named the SDMB. There was no reason to do that, you could have referred to internet communities or online message boards without specifically naming this one. You have drawn attention to this board, but without obtaining the backing of the people who run the board. What if Safeway decide to be jerks? Will the Chicago Reader be hearing from Safeway’s lawyers over your comments? Unlikely, but you involved the Straight Dope in your own dispute by naming this venue to Safeway.
You do know that the cashier doesn’t have a lie-detector hooked up at her station? This means that she’s unlikely to realise that you’ve given her a false phone number. Also, the “good or bad” Christmas comment may not even be related to you refusing to get the Club Card. She might say that to everyone - it may be her idea of a witticism.