Chef Alan B.
Yelp
If you read other low rating reviews below, you will see I am not the only one. I have been shopping multiple Sprouts locations for years, until yesterday. My favorite items to get were there flavored sausages. Over the years, I have seen the price go from $1.99 per lb up to $5.99. Speaking with meat department employees, they told me that it is their new (since 2019) CEO, Jack Sinclair, who came from Wal Mart Groceries, that escalated prices, streamlined efficiency, and took away the sausages actually being put together IN STORE, to having them made in a central location and shipping them out. I was also told that most customers have made the same complaint and that the only way they could now sell a high priced sausage was to pre-package them (3-4 per package) and discount the per pound price by $3-5 and put them out with other packaged meats. This reduced need for more employees. The attitude of those behind the counter expressed gratitude of "At least I have a job. So many other lost theirs." Now, these guys have always been so nice, friendly and helpful, but now, they are heads down low and not making eye contact. Understandable.
But Friday was a different story.
Yes, it was New Years Eve and so many people were shopping for their holiday. I have chosen to mainly purchase packaged chopped kale for many of my recipes. The large bag, going for around $3.65 a bag, was very convenient, compared to using fresh, bunched. On this past Friday morning, kale was the only item I needed. Sprouts has a policy of discounting the customers' final cost at the cash register by $0.05 if they bring in their own bags, saving Sprouts an extra cost for getting you out the door AND expresses their gratitude to the customers for being environmentally aware for using bags over and over.
This past Friday, there were two cashiers lanes open and there were 8 people in each lane, which is a call for management to open another lane. Standing in line, I heard one cashier call over the intercom for a manager. Within 60 seconds, a man came up and opened another lane. I got in that line with only two others in front of me. I also offered a man from another line who was originally in front of me holding three items, to come into my lane in front of me, because the customer in front of him had a FULL shopping cart.
So, by the time I got to my turn to be rung up, I got no greeting from the manager, like all the previous in front of me did. All I got was "That will be $3.95." I gave him a $5 and then asked him "Good morning. How are you? Did you find everything in the store OK today?" Asking these questions to most cashiers, who are notoriously underpaid for handling money and being the last line of customer service, or let's ever call it a part of branding image from a corporate awareness, puts a smile on the cashiers' faces and heightens their attitude. But this manager continued to look down and not make eye contact with me. He handed me $1.05 in change and said "Have a great day," turning his attention to the next person in line and ever greeted her appropriately.
I looked at my receipt and saw that there was not a $0.05 bringing my own bag in discount given to me. YES! It is only $0.05, but it's MY money. So, I asked him if Sprouts had discontinued to pay out the nickel for helping the environment and the manager stopped dead in his tracks from ringing up the current person in front of him, pressed a few buttons, opened the cash drawer, pulled out a nickel, handed it to me and said "Here ya go." That's it! No apology to me or the current customer in front of him. No admitting responsibility from deleting from company procedure.
After seeing prices go up 200% in some areas of Sprouts, wouldn't it be possible to increase that savings to the customer as well?
Sure everyone has bad days. The manager could have been having a horrific day, but I am shopping their because of the branding of being a community of open air friendliness, quality and good prices.
Sprouts failed me for the last time. I will now get my kale at an Aldi (organic, thinner cut strips of kale, my preference, with about 2/3 of the Sprouts package and about the same price).
No. This goes all the way back to the CEO, Jack Sinclair, raising the earning reports for investors and sucking out every inch of using the Sprouts' employees until they drop.
There was one employee there that had been there for many years, a head cashier. She ALWAYS spoke one-on-one with me. She told me of another location going to be opened up close by and was hoping to be offered a bigger management position in that store, but that didn't happen. I saw sadness in her face from then on and over the past few times, have not even seen her there. I guess enough is enough goes through out all the company.