Safeway are becoming very expensive (Safeway)

Member Name: cpf1993

Product:	Safeway
Date:	02/10/00 (21 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good range of bargains most weeks

Disadvantages: Prices are generally too expensive

I always used to be a big fan of Safeway. They normally have a lot of stores in local vicinities and consequently they are normally convient to use. However recently things have changed and I am doing less and less of my grocery shopping with them.

It started with the scrapping of the ABC Card scheme. Whether Safeway executives meant to or not this in my opinion appeared to say that customer loyalty was not important to Safeway. Apparently though there would be a lot more cheap prices.

Well this does not seem to be the case either. While Safeway produce a weekly leaflet in our area of all the bargains they have (most of which are pretty decent) a lot of the everyday items are very expensive, especially if you like the lower-priced products. A loaf of their cheapest bread is 23p. Their cheapest baked beans are 19p a can! Most supermarkets sell large packets of their own ham for around £1.49 - Safeway are still around the £1.79 bracket.

Also Safeway were one of the first companies to hike up their petrol prices. They put them up by 5p a litre. Interestingly I drove past one of their forecourts the next day and there was not a single car in it, very different from the norm.

My one final gripe about Safeway is that they never seem to have enough checkout staff working. While other chains have policies which try to get checkouts open as quickly as possible in the event of queues Safeway seem to settle with what they have. This makes for a longer and far less pleasureable shopping experience.

However the main thing which Safeway need to work on are their prices. They are becoming very expensive in my book, and they cannot afford to do this as they do not possess a classy reputation (like a chain like Waitrose). I will continue to do occasional shopping in Safeway for bargains and a few of their good (and cheap) own brand items, but they need to start looking at their pricing policies very seriously before I consider doing all m
y shopping there.

Summary: