Write Us!
We welcome your comments and give each one attention and serious consideration. Send them to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or fill out a Customer Comment form in the Owner Resources area. Each month a small selection is printed in the Reader; publication does not necessarily indicate an endorsement of views stated in a customer’s original comment. Many more comments can be found in the commons or in the binder near Customer Service. Thank you!
Register Receipts
Q: Are used to get receipts from my co-op. Purchases sent to my email, but they do not seem to be showing up anymore. Can you adjust the settings on my account so that this automatically happens?
Also, I made a purchase at Willy Street North yesterday and would like to see the receipt from that purchase. Can you send it to me? Thank you.
A: Thank you for reaching out about your emailed receipts! I looked up your account, and you are still set up to receive emailed receipts to this email address. Often they get sent to people’s spam folders, but if you checked there then I’m not sure where they could be going. There is a chance they are not coming through based on the browser/app/device you are using to view your email. Could you give me some information on how you are viewing your email so that I can pass it on to IT to see if they have any information they can offer? Sorry I can’t be of more help at the moment. I have attached your receipt from yesterday’s purchase. Thank you! -Rosalyn Murphy, Owner Records Administrator
Mailing List
Q: We moved from Madison in 2015 and miss the newsletter that you used to send. If it still exists could we get placed on the mailing list? We miss the Coop and haven’t found anything comparable in our area. Thanks
A: Thank you for reaching out regarding wanting to continue receiving our newsletter. I looked up your account and it looks like the last time it was shopped on was in 2015. After 1 year of no use an account becomes inactive and is taken off the mailing list for our newsletter. After 3+ years of no use an account goes into abandonment. Because your account has not been used since 2015 it is considered abandoned. In order to reactivate your account and continue receiving the newsletter, please stop by the customer service desk next time you are in the store to sign a form to request a reinstatement of your account and the equity that you invested in it. At that time you will automatically start receiving the newsletter again. If you are not interested in reinstating your account you can receive the emailed version of the newsletter by signing up here www.willystreet.coop/pages/emails. Don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions. Have a great day! -Rosalyn Murphy, Owner Records Administrator
Maple Roasted Brussels Sprouts
Q: Maple roasted Brussels sprouts need to be chopped into smaller pieces. As they are not being cooked/roasted properly—or thoroughly. Flavor is good, though. Thank you for your attention.
A: Thank you so much for the feedback. I am glad that you enjoy the flavor of our roasted sprouts. I am really sorry to read that you purchased a batch that wasn’t thoroughly cooked. I hope you got a full refund for your purchase.
We have been making them for many years now and they are so popular we often have trouble keeping them in stock. I will work closely with our cooks to make sure they are cooking them properly and thoroughly and if need be we will make adjustments in our recipe. Thanks for taking the time to write. Gratefully, Bob Smith, East Deli Manager
Banana Phone
Q: The front end staff does such a wonderful job! I think the customer service desk should have a banana phone to answer calls or some other novelty phone! It would be really fun to see as a customer and fun for staff!
A: Your suggestion for a banana phone at Customer Service got a laugh out of several of us! It would definitely be a fun sight to see. Our plain looking phones, however, are quite a bit more high-tech than a banana phone seems to be capable of, so we will have to keep them.
That said, I appreciate the props (get it? haha) to my Front End team! Thanks for writing in, James Wolf, East Front End Manager
Farmers’ Market Cookbook
Q: Please carry The Dane County Farmers’ Market Cookbook. Thanks for carrying other cookbooks I’ve written! Here’s the new one, that features local foods and global flavors.
A: Unfortunately, we stopped carrying cookbooks a few years ago due to low sales. We often found customers would open the cookbook, take a picture and then put the cookbook back on the shelf. Since we are limited on space in our stores, we had to make the decision to stop carrying cookbooks altogether. I wish you great success with your new cookbook! Be well, Sara Berg, General Merchandise Category Manager
Cash Cards
Q: I strongly encourage updates to payment system that allows for use of cash cards. Example: Visa cash cards received as a gift, received for percentage reimbursement from Visa card, etc. It is CASH. It’s a common, national format that should be as easy to use at checkout as a bank issued credit card (charge), a SNAP card etc.
A: Thank you for taking the time to fill out a customer comment form regarding the acceptance of VISA and Mastercard prepaid cards.
I am happy to share with you that we do accept these cards. They can be used at the full-service cash registers at any of our three retail sites. When you use the card you will need to inform your cashier that you are using a prepaid VISA or Mastercard. You will also need to let them know how much you want them to charge on the card and then they will apply that amount towards your purchase. If you are unsure about the balance on the card you can call the number on the back of the card before you shop with us and then instruct the cashier to charge that amount towards your purchase. Best, Paige Wickline, Finance Director
Food Feedback
Q: The vegan lemon bar is divine, but the garbanzo wrap sandwich was/is NOT certainly not worth $7! Not much flavor or nutrient density, hardly worth eating, maybe the cooks forgot some ingredients.
A: Thank you for taking the time to write to us about your experience here in the Willy West Deli. We are so glad to hear that you enjoy our Lemon Cheesecake Bar. They are certainly a delicious treat! We hope you’ll give our Vegan Chickpea Wrap another try. With red onion, celery, pickles, and capers in the mix, we certainly try to make sure that our Vegan owners get as tasty a sandwich as we can possibly make! Thank you, Renee Strobel, Deli Manager—West
Tubes of Steamed Corn
Q: Of late (seems like well over a year or more), the tamales have become mere tubes of steamed corn with a bare smidgen of filling. We’ve tried all three varieties with the same result: a tiny strip of jalapeno pepper, barely noticeable; a strip of chicken, again barely noticeable; red-colored corn where there should be bits of pork. For the price, this is a huge disappointment. We now go elsewhere for tamales but would like to buy them from the coop. Thanks.
A: I wanted to circle back on this, it took me a little longer to get in touch with our vendor because to be honest my Spanish isn’t quite as good as it should be for a conversation like this, so I needed to get help from another manager that was actually fluent!
That said, yesterday my colleague had a great conversation with the owner of Tamaleria el Poblano, and he was very receptive to the feedback we provided, and the concerns you and I shared about the filling not being adequate in the tamales. He let us know that they have recently hired some new staff starting, and that this by-hand process can be difficult, but that he will check in with his team and make sure this is corrected.
Hope this was informative and that you might give the tamales another try! I would hope in the next two weeks we could expect that change to take effect and be seen on the shelves. Best regards, Nicholas OConnor, Prepared Foods & Cheese Category Manager
More Soup
Q: Great variety of soup—First thank you for offering soup in your hot bar BUT... I’m sure the actual number cannot actually be known, but there are countless varieties of soup out there... WHY do you just offer 5? 6? 7? 8? kinds of soup? You apparently have access to a seemingly endless ingredient options—yet you offer such a limited variety of soup? BUDGET? LAZY? If you really need some ideas/recipes - give me a call.
A: We currently have 19 different soups that we make from scratch that we rotate throughout the year, with 10 active right now. We also have three local outside vendor soups that are in our packaged Grab & Go section. We are actually planning to add another soup from our kitchen to our catalog soon, gazpacho.
At North, over the past month we have been carrying 10 packaged soups from our Kitchen and 1 from Bunky’s, as well as the hot soup served next to the hot bar, so nearly the full selection. Due to space we may not always have all of them on the shelf at the same time, but we are about to get some new grab and go coolers installed which will help us expand our offerings. All that said, I’m happy to receive suggestions on soups you might like to see! Please let me know what you’re looking for!
Best regards, Nicholas OConnor, Prepared Foods & Cheese Category Manager