The following was sent to me in December, 1998. "I have been frustrated by Vons since moving to California a year ago. But, it's probably a personal problem as I've talked with numerous Californians who see nothing wrong or don't realize the impact of what Von's is doing. Before arriving in California, I had lived in South America for 4 years. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, but was looking forward to the common comforts of the U.S. I had missed having the confidence in quality products, general trust or honesty in business practices (like supermarkets), and that fraudulent money hoarding businesses were dealt with quickly by citizens and the media. Well, I like to save money as much as anyone and when asked if I wanted a Vons card in Oct 97, I said yes. I am naturally a suspicious and extremely analytical person, so this cards' potential uses and the "Vons Club benefits" began to gnaw on me. You have aptly pointed out that the card can be easily used to database every purchase the consumer makes. This has dozens if not hundreds of possible results. I'll provide a few that are very apparent to me: tracking purchases to assist in evaluating marketing (store set-up) techniques; cut down on wasted store purchases because every item sold establishes the stock required; several types of analysis on the types of people buying certain products (economics, demographics, etc); coupon mailings as you pointed out; increasing the prices on hot items and determining at what price, sales for the item drop, thus indicating that the max price that a consumer will pay has been reached, so back it down a little (maximizing store profit); evaluating store efficiency; and kickbacks to item producers for doing marketing analysis. For each person that uses a Von's card, which is probably almost 90% of their patrons, the company is saving millions in marketing research and store analysis costs. Does the Vons club membership really pass on the saving that the commercials state? No. Unless, you buy the stuff that already should have a huge savings. On virtually every item that a patron saves money with the card, the store could make a lower price and pass it on to everyone without using the card, which is the catch: Vons saving money by having the unsuspecting patron do the product, store, advertising, and marketing analysis for them. Make a close look at the items that you get "Von's savings." Look at hamburger meat...you don't get savings on the 7% or 14% fat content meat. You only get it on the 22% fat package. On most of the name brand staples of which the Von's brand is made, the Vons brand is the one that gives savings. And the list goes on and on.... If you want the savings in the commercials, you have to buy the Von's brand or buy the lower quality product. The only thing that the Vons card provides the customer is the discount (on the stuff that I stated above should be naturally lower without the need for a card). I had been writing checks since I got the Vons card and every time they would have to see my identification or license. I asked why several times and here are the answers I got: it's because your check numbers are still in the 100's (between 101-199); next it was because I wasn't using a driver's license as ID; then it was because my license was out of state; and the most recent excuse when I was writing check 246 and asked again they said it had to be a number greater than 500 (at which the manager suggested that I order my next set of checks beginning with the number 500 so I wouldn't be asked for I.D. any more). I asked the manager why the Vons' card didn't stop the ID check from happening, and he said it's not meant for that. Getting pretty frustrated I decided to ask something else that had been bothering me. I asked why I hadn't been receiving my last years worth of cash vouchers for spending a certain amount of money in the store. He looked up my card on his computer, after talking to me like an idiot because maybe I had moved or used a different form of ID when filling out the card request form. He said that I didn't exist in the database, but could fill out a new card request. I then asked well what about all of the money I've spent and your TV commercials say you owe me....look it up on that dumb computer by the Vons member number and give me my money. He said "can't do it," as he was trying to fill out another card request form. I promptly snatched up my ID, told him to forget it and left. Vons management clearly feels the card and analysis that it provides the company is worth them taking advantage of the consumer. I will never set foot in a Vons again. When I ran across your page, I was searching for the Vons website to write this same type of letter to them. Thanks for the conduit to vent, John December 09, 1998. Please E-mail us your VONS and
PAVILIONS complaints for consideration of publishing. Thank you. REMEMBER, THIS SITE IS NOT PUBLISHED BY THE VONS COMPANIES. |
