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simont

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Tue 2003-06-17 10:21
Supermarket rant

I'm getting increasingly sick of supermarkets discontinuing precisely the products I really like. It's happened several times in the last few months and I'm starting to think it's beyond pure coincidence.

Harvest Crunch breakfast cereal comes in three types: one with raisins, one with nuts, one with apple and strawberry bits. I tried all three; I decided the nuts one was far and away the best of the lot. This year they have apparently discontinued just the one with nuts in, while continuing to sell the other two.

Sainsbury's cheese section used to contain the three very similar cheeses Port Salut, St Paulin and Chaumes right next to one another on a shelf. I tried all three, and decided that St Paulin had a perceptible edge in terms of creaminess and taste. This year, it has now disappeared and the only options are Port Salut and Chaumes.

Last week I noticed the Tesco close to ARM, where I walk every day to buy my lunch, was selling little packets of ripe golden pineapple chunks. I thought that would make a nice addition to my midday meal, and indeed it did. So, naturally, I haven't been able to find it since then – all I can find is the huge packet of noticeably less ripe pineapple chunks, which is far too big to eat in one meal.

A couple of years ago I acquired a taste for Sage Derby, from the Sainsbury's delicatessen cheese section. Guess what happened to that. And I used to like Idris ginger beer for its medium-hot quality – so now obviously you can only buy Old Jamaica ginger-beer-of-exploding-doom and Sainsbury's own-brand weak'n'feeble.

I AM GETTING SICK OF THIS. What is it about my taste in food and drink that makes it precisely orthogonal to everyone else's? I've tried complaining to the customer service counter once or twice, and despite their ‘if you do not see what you require, please ask’ signs and eager-to-help manner, nothing has ever come of it.

I'm just amazed they haven't stopped stocking my favourite grape and melon high juice yet. Though they probably will, as soon as I inadvertently bring it to their attention.

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[identity profile] ghoti.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 02:27
St Paulin
I think M&S still sells this, at slightly-cheaper-than-JS prices.

Less convenient for you, though.
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 02:39
St Paulin
I'm actually visiting the town centre more often since I moved, because I can now sensibly walk there on a Saturday and get some exercise. So I might have a look, if I remember. Thanks.
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[identity profile] j4.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 02:47
Idris ginger beer still exists (I often see it in newsagents and suchlike); Sage Derby should be available from any respectable cheese shop -- I suspect the cheese shop in Cambridge would a) do it anyway and b) get some in if asked. Likewise the St Paulin. Can't be helped if Harvest Crunch actually discontinue a line, but couldn't you just buy a plain one and throw nuts in with it?

It's certainly not some kind of campaign to victimise you, it happens to everybody all the time. (It's the downside of a free market economy, I guess.)Supermarkets sell the things that they can shift in huge quantities; if you don't want those things, go somewhere other than a supermarket.

(Incidentally, www.say-cheese-shop.co.uk (http://www.say-cheese-shop.co.uk/catalog.php) seem to do both the types of cheese you're after.)
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 02:54
Yes, I know Idris is still available, but it's annoying that the shop on my direct route home from work that used to do it has stopped...

Plain Harvest Crunch would be preferable in itself to either of the raisin or apple-and-strawberry versions, IMO, but I've never seen any anywhere - I suspect they think it's too boring to sell without throwing some Stuff into it first.

I wasn't under the impression I was being victimised! What gave you that idea? If what's been happening to me is beyond the bounds of plausible coincidence (which is by no means clear, statistics being the tricky beast it is) then I'd be far more likely to think that my taste in food was in some way unusual than to suspect conspiracy :-)

I'm never entirely sure about the Cambridge Cheese Shop. I've been in there a couple of times and they tend to have a big display full of nothing I've ever so much as heard of, and no other cheeses visible anywhere in the shop, which usually puts me off buying anything (to say nothing of making me think of Monty Python!). I should probably get round to asking next time I go past...
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[identity profile] ghoti.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 03:49
big display full of nothing I've ever so much as heard of
Isn't that sort of the point? That it has rarer cheeses that the supermarkets can't or won't sell?Actually, the cheeses you have heard of are mixed in, and if you look hard enough you'll find what you want, probably...
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 03:51
big display full of nothing I've ever so much as heard of
Er, yes, certainly it's a good thing that it has rare cheeses. The important bit of that sentence was "no other cheeses visible anywhere in the shop". Where should I have been looking?
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[identity profile] ghoti.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 04:31
big display full of nothing I've ever so much as heard of
>Actually, the cheeses you have heard of
> are mixed in, and if you look hard enough you'll >find what you want,
> probably...


They're mixed in among the cheese you've never heard of - hard cheeses in the display on the right, soft in the display on the left. Alternatively, you can just ask...?
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 04:41
big display full of nothing I've ever so much as heard of
Clearly we have different experiences of the CCS; I did look carefully at the entire display, and found perhaps two cheeses I'd heard of, but nothing I actually wanted to buy.

Yes, I know I can ask; that's why I said "I should get round to asking" a few posts ago.

(Dear me, I seem to be getting crotchety here. I'm sure the people responding to this entry aren't really trying to tell me I'm stupid and lazy, but I keep having to remind myself of that quite hard at the moment. Perhaps it's the weather.)
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[identity profile] j4.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 04:29
I wasn't under the impression I was being victimised! What gave you that idea?

The way you were ranting about how sick you were of supermarkets doing this to you, and how it couldn't possibly be just a coincidence -- it sounded like you felt it was a personal affront to you and your tastes in food!

To be honest I don't think your experience is unusual -- everybody finds that supermarkets stop stocking (or companies stop making) the things they like from time to time. Sainsburys stopped doing the croissant dough that I liked, and (years ago now) St Clements (now Barr I think) stopped doing the cola I liked, and EVERYBODY puts aspartame in EVERYTHING (I'm particularly annoyed about Vimto), and Schweppes stopped doing 'Schizan' (and had started putting saccharin in it anyway), and you can't get Cherry 7Up in big bottles any more, and ... I could go on. But generally I find something else I like instead eventually. But then I'm not really a creature of routine when it comes to food. <shrug>

I'm never entirely sure about the Cambridge Cheese Shop. I've been in there a couple of times and they tend to have a big display full of nothing I've ever so much as heard of

Try something new? You might find a new cheese that you like even more than the ones you can't get any more. :) Okay, so you don't know, but you can tell from looking at a cheese whether it's hard/soft/blue/etc. (if you have particular preferences or whatever-the-opposite-of-preferences-is for any of those), and I'm sure they'd be happy to answer questions (and possibly let you taste stuff before buying). And you can always just buy very small pieces of things if you're not sure about them. (Sainsburys/TescOS deli is good for that too, but their selection is a bit variable.)
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 04:44
Hmm. I'd intended to imply that the problem (if any) was that my taste in food was inconveniently nonstandard, not that I'd been personally affronted. (In particular, I thought it ought to be obvious that my last paragraph was meant in a Murphy's Law sense rather than a genuine they're-out-to-get-me sense.) Perhaps I didn't communicate as well as I'd intended.

"TescOS"? Does that sell Blue Cheese of Death? :-)
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[identity profile] dennyd.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 03:06
I have in the past expounded at some length to anyone who can't get away on my theory that both Sainsburys and Tesco hire someone who follows me around and then discontinues any product that I buy more than 4 of in a week. It's an evil conspiracy, I tell you...
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[identity profile] valkyriekaren.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 04:29
cheeses, particularly French and English regional cheeses, are often seasonally produced. The bigger brands are usually available all year round, but you may find that some come and go as the seasons turn.
This is part of life's rich tapestry.
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 04:47
Yes, I know some cheeses are seasonal. That's why I waited well over a year before ranting about Sage Derby, to deal with the possibility that it might just have been out of season :-) And precisely because St Paulin is very similar to the two other cheeses next to it, it seems unlikely that it's gone out of season while the other two haven't...
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[identity profile] mtbc100.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 05:23
Have you had no positive response to contacting customer service and asking them to carry a product again? It's quick to do and sometimes works, also for getting them to carry things they don't already when they already get stuff from that same manufacturer. IMLE it's the particular store's customer service you need as they have some local power over purchasing decisions.
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[personal profile] simontTue 2003-06-17 05:34
No, I haven't. I've tried it twice; on one occasion they said "we'll see what we can do" and nothing happened, and on the other occasion they looked very confused at me, ran back and forth like headless chickens, summoned a supervisor who said nothing readily comprehensible, and eventually said there was nothing they could do.

After that I wasn't sure I had the energy to try again :-/
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[identity profile] ex-lark-asc.livejournal.comTue 2003-06-17 07:06
I feel your pain - this happens to me all the time with haircare products. Conditioners and hairdye - two, maybe three years if I'm lucky, then they vanish off the shelves. Food seems to be another one - Gallo instant risottos are the latest casualty in Newmarket Road tescos (wankers).
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(Anonymous)Tue 2003-06-17 09:59
I have Kelloggs Bran Flakes for breakfast. Every few months, I find that Tesco's have no stock of them, and have filled the space they normally fill with their own brand. The first time this happened, I tried Tesco's version and intensely disliked them. Now I just keep a large stock of them to get over the periods of drought...

Louise has observed that Tesco's no longer sell free-trade bananas - despite having signs up by the banana section encouraging people to buy free-trade bananas. They even have the free trade logo displayed. On writing to customer services to ask about this they said (paraphrased) "there isn't sufficient demand, and we trade fairly with all our suppliers".

I find the Diet coke pricing amusing too. 4-packs are generally somewhere between £4.19 and £4.79, but there is almost always an offer on allowing 3 bottles to be bought for 3 pounds. There are very often several conflicting prices advertised too...

Richard
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[identity profile] senji.livejournal.comTue 2006-11-21 11:39
Tesco now sell Sage Derby.
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