Customer Service

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
I have not been a shopper at Walgreens since they moved to town a couple years ago. Oh, I' think I stopped in once right after it opened out of curiosity. But I never used to shop drug stores as their prices are usually too high.

Since doing coupons.......Walgreens seems to be my biggest hit each week so far. That alone is a good thing. lol

But I have to say their customer service, at least in our store, is amazing. Their employees literally bend over backward for you. And honestly you'd think they'd see me coming with my binder full of coupons......and my envelopes for several transactions.....and curse under their breath.

Instead, they're always helpful. I'm just learning this process.......and mistakes are easy to make, especially if you have to split up what you're buying into several transactions for the most savings. But our walgreens folks know what they're doing, they will help you keep it organized, help make sure you don't forget a coupon.....or give them in such a way that will mess you up........and even remind you to put in fillers when you need them and will point you to the cheapest ones. These ladies are awesome! One lady tonight was going to go get a box of body soap off the truck for us if the sale item on the shelf's scent wasn't what we wanted! Of course we didn't let her do it. lol

I will say that so far easy child and I do our shopping together. They've gotten quite used to us. lol But we're always careful to be polite, smile, and friendly to them. We are also careful not to clear out the store shelves so no one else can get in on the savings too. And I've learned clearing out the shelves is not necessary. In two weeks I've gotten enough body wash and deodorant to last each of us 6 months and filling my cart wasn't needed. I think I now have enough denture cleanser and fixodent that we're good to go for a heckova long time. (and that stuff is expensive!)

Kroger's isn't horrible.......but you have to watch every little thing. Our other drug stores.......no where near as helpful and act like it's a major pain to check you out. Which sort of irks me as we go in totally organized to make it as painfree as humanly possible.

I'm gonna figure out who to call to brag on these people. They're doing one heck of a job. I actually enjoy going into their store.

And I am so very proud of myself. I hauled a huge bag of stuff out of their store and they paid me 6 bucks to do it! (the 6 bucks goes toward the next purchase) I never thought I'd be able to do that.......seriously. Total cost was around 40.00 or more before coupons and rewards from a previous purchase. :jumphappy:

So........... I know who to call to complain. Have no clue who to call to brag and praise store employees. Ideas? Would it be like the district manager or corporate?
 

susiestar

Roll With It
You can also call the complaint number to leave praise. Believe me, it is very much appreciated by the employees. Also when you go there one time, ask if the mgr is there - and tell her how wonderful the staff is and how much you enjoy shopping there. Walgreens has some of the best house brand products around. Their version of cetaphil cleanser is what kept Jessie from having skin like sandpaper until she was five - and hwen it was like sandpaper it was very painful and itchy to her (eczema) so we ALL appreciated that! Other store's house brands for many products are good, but not as good. Walgreens is usually the closest to the actual brand product if that matters. They also have a shampoo for dandruff that is like Ionil or neutragena TSal shampoo (has salicylic acid for the dandruff) and it is the best I have used for dandruff. The walgreens brand is the best I mean.

I know the area you live in and am quite aware of how many store employees can act like you are a PITA or worse when you want to buy something even with-o coupons. I am glad your Walgreens is so friendly. Here that is the way most people are, and it is very very different than what we experienced in OH.

So spread the praise around.

Have you thought of looking into secret shopping/mystery shopping? If anyone wants you to pay to get lists of shops or anything, RUN. There is a mystery shopper association and it has a certification that is about $15 and another that is an all day seminar or something that is more, but you pay to take their tests and go to the seminars. NOT for the shops - the company names are available for free. I think you and the girls would be very good at it. Plus you would get to eat out and get stuff for very little $$, though you have to pay up front you do get paid back a certain amount.
 

1905

Well-Known Member
I call that going "free shopping". CVS has the best things for free shopping in my area. I get the circular on Thursday for the upcoming Sunday and plan out my coupon savings combined with my extrabucks rewards, I get so many things free. I go early Sunday morning, before everything's gone.

I just watched the show "Extreme Couponing". The guy lives with his mom, and has a toothpaste room, with 1,000 tubes. Why?
He has an entire supermarket of random things in his garage. I'm really not impressed with that, it seems wasteful. These other women got all 15 bottles of antacid. That's too much, there's no way they can use all that and now nobody else could either.

I did notice something awesome, on your birthday many stores give you free things, like a meal, dessert...I'm going to google what you can get free in my area, husband's birthday is soon!
 
H

HaoZi

Guest
Call corporate and local to praise them. It doesn't hurt to send something like a holiday or thank you card to the whole staff either.
 

AnnieO

Shooting from the Hip
No joke you have to watch Kroger. I had a $1.00 coupon on toaster strudel. But they wouldn't let me use it because somehow I had a $0.60 coupon on my Kroger card. I didn't load it... I have no idea. Honestly. Ugh.

My Grandma used to have tons of stuff she'd never use, too...
 

KTMom91

Well-Known Member
Email customer service at corporate, and tell the manager in person. Very few people ever tell the manager anything nice (I remember those days), and then they'll remember you on your next trip.
 

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
I emailed corporate.

And I'll be sure to hunt down the manager to tell them what a great job they're doing, too. The card for the staff is a good idea!!

CVS is pretty good with savings too. I think it's the way sales are swinging right now as to where the bigger deals are. I just haven't done as well so far there yet.

The guy with all the toothpaste on the show? He's donating it as part of care packages for the troops since he has too much for himself. Another woman donates regularly to a local food bank and shelter. Still I remember when I saw that guy with the toothpaste......I'm like dude you have a whole wall full, maybe it's time to stop and use it for a while. lol But toothpaste a lot of times you can get for free, or free with money back. Which is the only reason I've been buying it in bulk. If it starts to get more than we can use, I'll donate it to the dv shelter or homeless shelter. husband and I have dentures, Travis is only one person.....he can only brush his teeth so many times a day. lol

I just hate to see a person come along and wipe out the store's whole supply. There are other people out there who's budgets are tight or who are hurting and would like to get the same deals. So to me that's just rude. If it's a really great deal or a money maker, I might go back again when I know the trucks have come in, which is what we did last night. But usually we only do that if they were already sold out of something by the time we got there the first time.

I want to figure out that birthday deal thing too. That was cool. lol
 

Shari

IsItFridayYet?
You gotta let me know how you're doing this. I've heard of others doing it, too. Not sure I'd have time, but I need to find time.

Its so nice when people are helpful. Its sad thats the exception and not the rule any more. I took some negatives of our wedding photos to one of the Walgreen's north of us, and they refused to let me have them without a copyright release from the photographer. They were from a private individual's camera...there was no "photographer" to get a release from.
 

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
Shari

It is hard work, at least for me. It doesn't help that I had no way to organize the coupons at first so kept them in sandwich bags. So now that I have organizing materials, I'm playing catch up getting them placed into the binder. I'm planning on having them all in there today. husband has been helping me separate them into categories, which makes it easier to pull them for the ads. Sunday I spent about 12 hrs on it, cutting out this weeks coupons, organizing, making the plan for the shopping trips to each store and pulling coupons for them (which stinks when all your coupons are not organized) Then I check online to see if there are any deals that aren't in their ads.......those coupons need to be added. There is also hours of coupon printing online, although now that I've caught up that doesn't take very long. So, all together? I think I'm spending about 30 hrs per wk on it.......but my coupons aren't all organized yet, so once they are that may cut down a lot. Once I have that done, when I clip the ones I don't pull for that weeks sales are going immediately into the binder. I hope that will be faster.

But when I can do like I did last night? I spent 35.00 between kroger and walmart. (half of the kroger bill was meat) Walgreen's was free. in my opinion it's worth that 30 hrs per wk if that's what I have to put into it. Last night I walked away with a 98 percent savings for all 3 stores. A rare thing. Averages are 50-90 percent (depending on what you're buying) I got lucky, things I needed but didn't have coupons for were mostly also on good sales.

We're also lucky our stores are clumped together. So driving from one to another isn't a big deal gas wise.
 

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
Oh this was so nice.

I got a call back from the store manager thanking me for my email to corporate praising the store and employees. This gave me yet another chance to lavish praise on them.

I'm going to pick up a nice Thank you card or something and give it to the cashiers when I go in to shop the next time. :bigsmile:

Nichole just did her 1st transaction at walgreen's where she lives.......staff were abrupt and rude. She got her deal, but like she said, they made it unpleasant.
 

Shari

IsItFridayYet?
That's really cool. And obviously pretty special, since Nichole's store was so different.

30 hours a week leaves me out! lol I can dream, tho.

I am going to have to just take a few days off and get my house back in order. Used to, I kept the pantry stocked, and anytime things we used went on a good sale, I'd stock up. I grocery shopped on my lunch hour, hit a different store each day, and stack it up in the pantry. Since the accident, who knows what's in that pantry. Its a mumble-jumble mess just like everything else. We might have 83 cans of tomato sauce, or we might have 2. Heck, we might have none...who knows. But I at least need to get back to that. I saved a ton of money just doing that.
 

tiredmommy

Well-Known Member
I'm pretty adept at picking out upper management that's visiting a retail store (it must be the 14 years of retail management experience, lol) and I can tell you that they love it when you introduce yourself as a customer and make sure they know what a phenominal staff they have on site. You know that store gets a good rating when that happens no matter what else is going on.
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
Very good! I rarely shop at WalMart because of the size, scope and noise. But it is much less expensive than other places.
I use Walgreens often and they are good about their coupons.
I used Bed, Bath and Beyond 2 wks ago and was shocked when the woman asked if I had more than one coupon so I could split up my items. The coupons say "one per transaction" so I didn't even ask. Cool!
Competition in a "down" market economy is great!
 

shellyd67

Active Member
I always call to compliment employees when are courteous and helpful. I always treat people with kindness and respect and don't always receive either in return.

My kids are also very mannerly and I wouldn't have it any other way.

These days it is hard to find someone to go the extra mile (in my town anyway, lol)

I do love Walgreen's and they are quite helpful. I also noticied that every employee I have every asked for help at a LOWE'S has been awesome !
 

1905

Well-Known Member
Shari, you can still do it without putting in 30 hours a week. Of course you'll be doing it on a much smaller scale. Just get the coupons out of the Sunday paper. Open up the circulars for chain drugstores and the supermarket. Make your shopping list for the week based on what's on sale and go through the coupons from the paper, taking even more off the sale price. You can get some things for free each week. This week I got 2 @12 packs of CVS brand disposable razors, a pack of trident, 2 Old Spice bodywashes and a small extra strength Tylenol for $2.20 total. I'm not extreme, but it's still money in your pocket for things you need anyway. I packed all that stuff in a duffel bag for easy child to take back to school. I always give difficult child a huge amount of toiletries for Christmas that last him all year, all free or mostly free. There are mean at CVS, I guess I should have called the corparate office years ago! Good thinking Hound, they'll hook you up!
 
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