Customer Service? Sorry, Not Today: An Open Letter to The Kroger Company

I’ve been a lifelong Kroger customer. I regret to inform you this undeserved loyalty has reached an end.

I’m afraid your $16 million investment in the Holiday Manor Kroger is being pissed away by incompetent management.

An encounter with one of your employees has pushed me over the edge from frustrated and disappointed to irate and unwilling to return.

Earlier in the week, I purchased a package of Heritage Farm boneless skinless chicken thighs. Before I could get around to cooking them, I could smell without even opening the package the chicken had spoiled.

For the fourth time in the past year, Heritage Farm chicken purchased from the Holiday Manor Kroger in Louisville, KY had spoiled before the Best By date. Either Kroger consistently mishandles this brand of chicken, or perhaps somebody is routinely slacking off when it’s time to check temperature on this particular refrigerator.

OK, fine, so I have to return the chicken yet again. Should be no problem, right? It’s the middle of the afternoon on a Sunday, my local Kroger’s busiest day. Surely the Customer Service counter will be open and taking returns, right? Wrong.

Yet again – as has happened numerous times in the past few months – I walk into our local Kroger expecting Customer Service and see it nowhere to be found. Instead, I’m greeted with a sign stating “Sorry, customer service is currently closed.” and with the shouting of a nearby employee: “Customer service is closed.”

(You fool, you. Can’t you read the sign? Go away and leave me alone!)

I asked if she wanted the raw chicken to be left on the CS counter (or perhaps somewhere closer so she could smell it better). She said something to the effect of “Kroger doesn’t take back perishable items. Never have, never will. You’re lying when you say you’ve done it before.”

I was prepared to just leave the smelly chicken on the counter and walk out without my refund, but I stood my ground and reiterated that the chicken was rotten. The disgruntled employee begrudgingly told me to come to the self checkout for a refund while continuing to make me feel like I should be ashamed for inconveniencing her.

This incident was only the latest in a long sequence of shortcomings at the Holiday Manor Kroger. This was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back.

Quality control seems to be a frequent problem at this Kroger. Green onions are sold wilted and within a day of being ready for the trash. Salad rarely lasts to the expiration date; in fact we’ve seen spoiled dripping bags of salad still in the refrigerator waiting to be sold.

I was willing to tolerate lackluster produce quality in exchange for having a wide selection of products. (The produce section is the only section of the store that’s usually fully stocked.)

I was willing to stick with your company through pandemic restrictions, supply chain shortages and price hikes.

I was willing to stick with your company when half the shelves in your store are bare despite other stores having the missing items in stock.

I was willing to stick with your company despite the fact that you fill the aisles with stockers and Clicklist people so customers can’t get to anything. (How can you be stocking endlessly yet never have anything in stock!?)

I was willing to stick with your company even when you arbitrarily shut down the pharmacy drive thru and change the pharmacy hours to close at 3 PM / 4 PM on weekends and 7 PM on weekdays.

I was willing to stick with your company despite across the board price hikes and lackluster discounts.

No más. I am not willing to shop at a store that puts corporate cost-cutting ahead of Customer Service.

If this means never having another Private Selection product or cutting out certain brands I can’t find elsewhere, then so be it.

In Louisville there aren’t really many good alternatives. The thought of doing more business with Walmart (another mega corporation) is unappealing to say the least. Perhaps Meijer is more interested in earning my business.

If your company can afford to alienate customers with your ridiculous policies and poor management, then maybe it never deserved my business in the first place. Maybe you could afford to hire more help and pay your staff properly if you took care of your customers rather than treating them as disposable. (As disposable as the rotten, spoiled Heritage Farm chicken you keep peddling.)

I estimate my CLV (Customer Lifetime Value) to Kroger to be around $400,000. Over the past 14 years, I estimate an average of $400/month spend at Kroger on groceries, prescriptions and gasoline. Over the next 40 years, I estimate I would have spent an average of $750/month ($9,000/year) at Kroger, which over 40 years works out to $360,000. You can kiss my $360K goodbye.

Until and unless your company returns to putting customers and employees ahead of your bottom line, I will be going out of my way to do as little business with Kroger as humanly possible.

Until and unless your company begins to address some of these shortcomings, I will remain:

Your former customer,

Sean Talbot