Why is Amazon fresh so bad?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think of Amazon Fresh like a better stocked local 7-11 or other small convenience store. Good for an item or two you forgot but not the weekly shop.

I have only gone in one once but this matched my experience. I went to the one in Potomac Landing right after it opened. It was sparkling clean and well stocked with what they were selling, but I found the selection and variety really weird. The produce section was very small and, for instance, they only had two kinds of apples (gala and Granny Smith) and they only had white onions (no red or yellow). They didn't have King Arthur flour. They only had Campbells soup. There's no bakery so they only have commercial breads which we prefer not to buy. And so on. Even though the store was a decent size, it was so limited and they would only have one brand of anything and it was often some middling brand I never buy. I'd go in one again if I needed a few items urgently and it was very convenient. But I will never go out of my way to go to one.

Also, yes, the employees were awful. I went to pay during check out and pulled out my phone and she said, very rudely, "you can't use Apple Pay here." I said, "does Google Pay work?" because I have an android (and also what grocery store doesn't accept smart phone payment systems now??) and she literally yelled at me, "NO! That won't work either!" Like I'm sorry if that's something you've had to repeat all day because everyone asks but also, it's your literal job and it's not my fault the store you are working for couldn't figure out how to set up a very common payment method before opening.

So yeah, it's a hard no for me.

[Anonymous]

I like the one in Bailey’s Crossroads. But I also cycle through stores, so I don’t always notice if a store doesn’t have everything - if I need a very specific item, that week I go to the store that has that item. Amazon Fresh is not a huge store. It has good prices on what it has - I do things like stock the freezer with kids ice cream treats, buy whatever fruit they have that looks nice, get some other basics. I don’t buy shrink-wrapped meat, so if it’s a meat week, I go to WF, but the first time I went to Amazon Fresh I had gone to WF the day before and I was pissed to see the exact same produce and other items for half the price.

I will say that if you see the super sales, check the dates. I got two boxes of King Arthur gluten free cake mixes for some obscenely low price on special, but the best by date was only a month away. Didn’t bother me because on something like a cake mix, I know they will be fine for at least a year after that date, but if you care, check. I suspect some of the super specials are things from the warehouse that are getting on the old side, so they bring them out to get them gone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As someone who launched a bunch of them, it never had a shot. The model was never set to work and the entire leadership team has turned over, multiple times in some cases. When the first store opened in Woodland Hills, there were vendors on the floor crying the night before because they realized how poorly they’d done their jobs. We donated hundreds of pallets of food to homeless shelters because no one knew how to order. We had to go to other retailers to buy Coke to put it on the shelves. They’ve been a disaster from the get go.

So why do you think Amazon doesn't care about its Fresh stores?

They do and they’re taken steps to improve them but that’s a long road. They froze expansion for sole time and began experimenting with changes to the format, brought in new leadership, are hiring tons of people for it etc. It wss just a disaster at the start.

I see. Thanks. If you still work there or keep contacts there, please alert them to the disaster that is Chevy Chase Amazon Fresh. It's too cold, physically and psychologically. The floors are grey concrete and really off-putting. The store is very dark and the lighting manages to be harsh without being adequate. The poor workers are no doubt feeling the vibe and some of them are not very competent. None of them are happy. The few times I went there, I had the feeling I was in some extralegal industrial zone looking for low-grade contraband. And I LOVE Amazon, the online experience!

It's so weird, because despite being owned by the same company, shopping at Whole Foods seems so warm and inviting, and Amazon Fresh just didn't get the memo at all about marketing 101 and how to make customers feel at ease. The AF managers should takes notes from Whole Foods, and other inviting supermarkets, regarding temperature, color scheme, materials used on floorings, ceilings, shelvings, the type and amount of lights to make it look natural, the set-up (like in non-food stores, most people have a certain preferred route in and out of the store). No doubt they've been to Asia and shopped at really pleasant and welcoming grocery stores in Tokyo and Seoul, where the lighting and ambience makes everything look delicious. They're not reinventing the wheel here!

I left Amazon quite some time ago but sadly the issues with flooring and lighting were raised back in 2021. They also completely changed the manor model in a negative way and well you see the impact of that.