Grocery Delivery
Dear Willy Street Coop Board: Like many in the Madison area, we want to greatly reduce or even eliminate our spending atAmazon/Whole Foods. But we have health issues—and others have transportation or time crunch or other issues—that make delivery a requirement. Willy Street offers limited delivery, but not enough to help most Madison area residents.You recently switched your delivery drivers to Door Dash. When making that decision, did you look at Instacart? If Willy Street were available on Instacart, we could get the majority of our food from you, even if you have to charge higher prices, or if Instacart adds a charge for long distance delivery. It would also increase accessibility in the SW area of Madison before you add a brick and mortar store in that region. (Is Instacart perfect? Nope, it’s not. But neither is Door Dash.) Using Instacart would allow us to send way fewer of our hard-earned dollars to Bezos. That would be a big win. We are sending this to you today—the first day of the People’s Union economic boycott. Please give this idea serious consideration. We hope it is one you can implement in the near future. Thank you
Thank you for reaching out regarding Instacart. When we made the decision to replace our old eCommerce program we reviewed a number of companies, including Instacart. We evaluated each potential company to determine if their platform would integrate with our register software, allow us to offer sale pricing on the website, integrate with our Owner database, and provide a delivery area that covered most or all Madison and Middleton zip codes. Unfortunately, during our review of Instacart we determined our platforms were not compatible and their website could not integrate with our Owner database. This meant offering any sale prices on the website would have been extremely difficult and time consuming. Additionally, purchases made on our website would not have been associated with Owner accounts. eGrowcery (in conjunction with DoorDash) was able to offer us both of these things as well as provide a delivery area that covers nearly all of Madison and Middleton. We understand we have Owners and shoppers who live outside the Madison/Middleton area who cannot receive delivery from DoorDash, which was certainly a disappointment when making this decision. We will continue to research options for providing more opportunities to serve customers, although to be transparent—I do not anticipate being able to extend service to the southwest side of Madison or the Verona area in the immediate future. Thanks again for reaching out. – Jenny Skowronek, Willy North Store Director
Flourless Brownie
I am a lifelong willy street shopper (my dad shopped with you religiously when I was a child) and am a bit perplexed that the past few months that I have visited multiple locations and searched the website there haven’t been any flourless brownies. They have been my favorite brownie ever since I was a child and had the privilege to introduce numerous people to that incredible dessert. I’m hoping you didn’t stop producing it entirely and if so, is there anyway I could acquire at least the ingredients list to try to recreate them?
Thanks for writing in to us! The chocolate market has been a little crazy lately with chocolate prices soaring. Here is an article that we published in our Reader in July, which will explain more about it. www.willystreet.coop/reader/july-2024/record-chocolate-prices-reveal-vulnerable-supply-chain/. Unfortunately, the Fudgy Flourless Brownie was cut from the catalog because of this price increase. Not all of our chocolate items have been affected, it depends on the percent of chocolate utilized in the recipe, and what the end product’s size is. That said, I do hope to be able to return to us making them in the future! Lastly, you asked for the ingredients, here is the recipe: www.willystreet.coop/recipe/fudgy-flourless-brownie/. Note that this is a production sized recipe, if you choose to make it, you may want to convert it to a more manageable size for at home. -Nicholas OConnor, Prepared Foods & Cheese Category Manager
Kudos & Product Requests
Thanks on the good job with hiring and training staff. Customer service is fantastic at this store. I have shopped at your store for 24 years, and the customer service has been getting better and better. I have a few comments on the offerings at your store, listed below.
(1) Organic non-dairy Pesto: I would really appreciate it if you would carry a Pesto that is organic and has no dairy. Typically, Italian pesto from Tuscany does not have cheese. Parmesan is usually added later, and it is optional.
(2) Unshelled nuts: Please carry unshelled nuts.
It would be preferable if they were organic.
(3) Difficulty of buying nondairy chips: I have stopped buying chips at your store because many have dairy, and it takes to much time to read all the ingredients. It would be great to have a nondairy section for chips.
(4) Plastic packaging: I do not buy tangerines at your store because of the plastic netting. I do not buy basil at your store, even though I love basil, because of the plastic containers. I am considering not buying blueberries because the plastic sheets on some of the tops are not recycleable. It would be great to reduce plastic packaging. I would appreciate your passing on this message to your suppliers. Blueberries are relatively tough. I would be open to buying bulk blueberries, with a scooper. I bring my own containers. I think people would be open to buying them in paper bags.
Note that only 10% of plastic gets recycled. Much of it ends up in the ocean, such that there is more plastic in the ocean than fish. Microplastics are everywhere now, and many plastics bind to hormone receptors and cause cancer. Also, plastic consumption is propping up the fossil fuel industry, such that Oil companies are making more money now from plastics than from gasoline.
Thanks for taking the time to let us know what you’re looking for! I worked with our Grocery & Produce Category Managers to answer your product requests:
Pesto: We have not been able to find an organic pesto without dairy ingredients available to us. We do have a shelf stable option that is unfortunately not organic, but is dairy-free, available at all our stores. That product is Seggiano’s Basil Pesto in a 7oz container.
Unshelled Nuts: We typically carry nuts in the shells only during the winter holiday season because that’s when we see the most customer interest in them! I will absolutely pass your request on—at this time, I do not anticipate we’ll see them on the shelves year round but with additional requests/interest that could certainly change.
Chip Section: I appreciate your suggestion for creating a specific section for them, however this is not a request we’ll be able to fulfill at this time. As we’ve mentioned in the past, there are a lot of barriers to doing so. My recommendation is always to read packaging, especially if you have health concerns related to certain ingredients. We do carry many tortilla, potato, and veggie chip options that are non-dairy. If you find that it’s difficult or time consuming to read ingredients in the store, would it be a possibility for you to do some online research in advance of your trip so that when you’re in the aisles you know what you’re looking for? Staff in the aisles are always happy to help as well—feel free to ask for suggestions or assistance in looking for options!
Plastic Packaging In Produce: I hear your concerns regarding plastic packaging. We do offer a lot of
bulk produce that contains no plastic packaging; larger format packaging is most times only available with a plastic wrap—whether that’s a plastic bag or plastic netting. As I mentioned before, we’re subject to what’s available on the market. Our Produce Category Manager offered these thoughts on the issue as well, which I hope you find helpful!:
We can’t sell bulk blueberries because they are not offered in the industry! The plastic packaging in produce provides serves several purposes: It provides growers/packers an opportunity to sell smaller sized fruit and/or products that are maybe not as visually appealing as the higher grade. Bagged apples are often smaller and may have cosmetic blemishes not found in their bulk counterparts. It provides stability to products that are vulnerable to dehydration. Salads packaged in paper would not be edible by the time they were shipped from California to other parts of the county. It provides the industry a control factor to help ensure the crop is economically feasible to sell. This is why high input/labor crops such as berries are sold in packages rather than bulk.
We’re so happy to hear you’re having such a positive customer service experience in our stores, it’s something we all take a lot of pride in. Thank you again for reaching out and sharing your thoughts! -Liz Muñoz, Director of Purchasing
Plastic Forks
The plastic forks have broken one of the tongs off three times now when I’m eating a salad. When it breaks off its hard to find in the salad and i’m afraid that I or someone else will swallow it and choke to death.
Thank you so much for taking the time to fill out a Customer Comment and thank you for sharing your unfortunate experiences with the plastic forks. We hear you and are actively looking for a replacement for the current brand of plastic forks so this won’t continue to happen to you or anyone else. Thank you for your compassion and concern. -Bob Smith, East Deli Manager
Stonyfield Farm Greek Yogurt
I saw you are carrying the Stonyfield Farm Greek, plain, organic, FULL fat yogurt! Hooray! Thank you! I’d asked a couple years ago, so it was a lovely surprise.
We are so happy to have surprised you with the yogurt you wanted!! Enjoy and have a beautiful day! -Amanda Ikens, Owner Resources Coordinator
Eggs
Just wanted to say THANK YOU for having a good selection of eggs at decent prices. Greatly appreciate it.
You are welcome! Have an awesome day! -Dean Kallas, Grocery Category Manager
