Safeway – the second largest supermarket chain in North America is struggling with bad reviews. What is it doing wrong and how can you learn from its mistakes?rude
From a tiny grocery store bought by an ambitious young man from the small Idaho town of American Falls, to a multi-billion pound company with over 1,300 stores across North America and Canada, Safeway could be viewed as a great success.
However, the company has been suffering from bad customer reviews online, bursting the success bubble somewhat.
“Customers can always count on us for great prices on the freshest produce and meat, plus thousands of everyday lower prices down every aisle”, boasts the Safeway website. After reading some of the bad reviews from this branch in Reston Viginia, it would seem that in some locations, Safeway is struggling to meet these promises.
The comments make for grim reading. From shabby customer service, rude cashiers, lengthy till cues and mouldy fruit, the number of complaints from this particular branch is a cause for concern.
Why the Complaints?
Put simply, not enough focus is placed on customer service. Unfortunately for Safeway, the experience in this store is so bad that customers are willing to shout from the rooftops in an effort to deter unsuspecting shoppers hoping for a fine shopping experience at the Reston store.
Customers have complained about the lengthy queues and lack of open tills for more than five years with waiting times of up to half an hour reported by some.
Reports of rude staff also appears to be a real problem. Many customers suggest that this unprofessional approach appears to be fostered by managers who couldn’t care less about the customer’s experience in the store.
Here are a few reviews from unhappy shoppers:
Safeway has obviously made the decision not to liaise with customers on review sites like Yelp, instead deciding to make social media its first port of call for complaining clientele.
These negative reviews can also be found on Consumer Affairs and at the top of the page, it clearly says Safeway doesn’t take part in the website, meaning customers will never get responses to their complaints.
How Safeway deal with complaints on Facebook
While customer service and response to complaints in some stores appears to be an ongoing issue for Safeway, the supermarket does well to respond on Facebook – its biggest social network for engagement.
Facebook is an effective way to respond to customer complaints expediently, with genuine concern and empathy.
Safeway’s Facebook page has over one million likes meaning that customer engagement is in front of a large watching audience. Quite often, the customer support team will reply to the customer who raised the complaint within a couple of hours. The Safeway representative will acknowledge the complaint, apologise for any inconvenience caused, and will request that they email through the details of the complaint.
You can see evidence of this in the post below:
A genuine response from Safeway as shown above goes some way to mending some of the trust and goodwill that existed prior to the complaint.
Often, other fans will respond too, generating conversation – sometimes good, sometimes bad. Safeway will always reply with a prompt and relevant reply though.
Companies would do well to take some inspiration from Safeway and engage with customers via social media quickly and genuinely so as to deal with customer complaints effectively and in turn retain the business of valued customers.
In return, Safeway could take tips from other companies that respond to customers publicly on review sites to lessen the damage.