To our WONDERFUL fans of Slawsa,
As many of you know, Kroger has been a great partner of ours for over four years. In fact, Kroger has historically been one of the leaders of embracing innovation in grocery. All of our previous buyers have loved the fact that:
THE UPROAR
As of late, we’ve received many angry notes from fans asking why their Kroger store is discontinuing Slawsa from their shelves. To be honest, we were quite shocked when we heard the news as well, especially given we did have a 10% increase in sales last year at the time of our annual review. As you can probably guess, buyers change often. Our new buyer, who was conducting her first category review, opted to leave Slawsa out. It’s one decision made by one person.
WHY?
We have been informed that the decision was made solely as the result of a report that identifies lines with the most national distribution based on total national sales (not per store sales). Not only was Slawsa cut, but other small business products were cut as well to make room for more major manufacturer items…even if those items are no different than other products they already have on the shelf. Slawsa is in thousands of stores and we cannot rank amongst products that are in tens of thousands of stores. Buyers are often over-worked and they don’t make decisions like they used to. Instead of looking at the whole picture of offering customers diverse products, they’re increasingly relying on national sales reporting, which obviously gives preference to the products that are already well established in the market. This shift in decision-making makes it tough for the little guy for sure.
The good news is that another category of Kroger has expressed interest in including Slawsa in their department. In all honesty, it might be a better area of the store where more people will see us due to higher traffic.
HOW CAN YOU HELP?
Believe it or not, YOUR VOICE CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE. Word travels quickly at Kroger corporate and if enough uproar is made, ears will open. We would strongly encourage you to express your feelings of their corporate decision and demand they get Slawsa back into stores. We urge thoughtful responses that are respectful of their employees. We also urge you to notify other Slawsa lovers who shop at Kroger and encourage them to do the same thing.
Call them (M-F 8am – 9pm EST)
1-866-221-4141
Mail them a letter:
The Kroger Co.
Customer Relations
1014 Vine Street
Cincinnati, OH 45202
Send an online message
https://www.kroger.com/customercomments
We would prefer that you use the channels above to voice your opinions and NOT use social media as we don’t want the public awareness to impact other retail partners. You have my word that we’ll keep our sleeves rolled up until we get back into Kroger again, as we far prefer for our customers to patronize local stores whenever possible versus buying online. Without retailer support, we couldn’t exist. Without YOU, our slawesome fans, we couldn’t exist.
Thank you for your support and your VOICE!
Julie Busha