Giant Food, you've got some 'splainin' to do.
I love my Giant supermarket. Or at least I did, until tonight.
My nine-year-old son and I stopped at our neighborhood Giant tonight on our way home from a birthday party for one of his teammates. This was a quick in and out—yogurt, 3 cases of water bottles (on sale 3 for $10), and romaine for a salad dish I would bring to a party the next day.
Five minutes and we’re in line at the “family-friendly lane.” You know the one. It’s got a bright green disc proclaiming “Smiles for all…family friendly aisle.” And just below, it happily tells us that this is the place with “fun choices for kids and parents.”
Yeah. I guess it depends on what you think is appropriate “fun” for kids.
We were eager to get home as fast as possible, so my eyes and hands moved quickly from basket to conveyer belt to basket to belt, until the cart was empty, but for the three cases of water. And then I turned towards the checkout lane displays, where my son—like the typical kid that he is—was busy fingering the selections.
Boxes of granola bars stacked on one side. On the other, Kleenex, chapsticks in groups of threes, and…condoms?
Trojans, in their bright yellow packaging, stacked three boxes deep. Hung at a child’s eye level, no less.
What’s this? Child-friendly, indeed.
Blissfully ignorant of the “fun” that beckoned, my son clamored only for more snacks. For once I was glad for his food-focus, even if it meant begging, because it kept his back to those eye-catching little Trojans.
(Thanks to my iPhone, you can see what it looks like here in the kid-friendly checkout at my Giant.)
Trojans on left, four deep.
I finished checking out, keeping him distracted all the while, and left.
Giant will hear from me by email tonight and on the phone tomorrow–when I don’t have to explain, to a nine-year-old standing by, exactly what a condom is and why it’s not “fun for kids.”
To Giant’s customer service representative:
Who decided that a “kid-friendly checkout” should include a display of condoms, brightly packaged, at a child’s eye-level?
And what are you going to do to ensure this doesn’t happen again, not just in my store, but in any of your stores?
(Note: It’s obvious the Trojans were not inadvertently hung in the wrong place, but rather placed in that aisle with some, ahem, forethought. Your clerks successfully kept that checkout clear of candy and trashy magazines, while hanging multiple packages of Trojans with the other personal care items, right above the many stacks of Kleenex. )
Giant’s customer pledge states: “We pledge to make a difference in our customers’ lives every day with great food, low prices and friendly helpful service.”
You “made a difference in my life” tonight—and it wasn’t positive.
Giant Food, you’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do.
(You can contact Giant on the website or by phone at 1-888-469-4426.)
(c) 2010 Mary Rice Hasson
Hi – which Giant was this? I can tell you that those condoms are most definately not part of the line-up. Want to get this addressed asap. I just didn’t see a location. Thank you for bringing to our attention.
Mary,
I have never noticed that, but it is rare that I will do my weekly shopping with a kiddo along. I am discouraged…they had made some very positive changes.
Thanks for the warning and the info to contact them.
Kathy
Please…… do you really for one second think a major corporation of that sort would do something like that on purpose? This was clearly some dumb kid’s (or disgruntled employee’s) idea of a joke or payback. My guess is you just got there before anybody else noticed. Or it’s always a possibility that you hung them there yourself for the inflammatory value so you would have something to post. Did you bother to tell the manager so the next family wasn’t traumatized? Or did you just use this forum to trash a reputable company who is very active in the community?
Yes, actually, it was purposeful. I spoke this morning with the store manager, a very nice man named Daniel, who confirmed that the re-stock employees placed them in that aisle five days ago. He acknowledges that he had misgivings at the time but let them do their work. He apologized and is removing them and speculated that the re-stock department (which I gather makes those decisions on a broad basis, not specific to one store) were seeking to place them up front to avoid theft. He is notifying corporate of the issue and agrees that condoms in the family-friendly aisle undercut Giant’s implicit promise to parents.
Mary
I came here by way of a story on “Preservation IVF”. Then I stayed to poke around your other posts. You have some great posts, but I guess I don’t understand why condoms are not family friendly? They prevent unwanted pregnancies and STDs….seems like a good idea to educate your children about them!
Hi Stephanie,
Thanks for your comment. My view is that, on sensitive topics like sex, parents are the best people to decide what info their kids are ready to hear, when to discuss it, and from what perspective. Placing condoms in a family-friendly lane fails to respect parents and children because the ability to select that appropriate timing is compromised. Placing condoms at eye level and in full view not only makes it likely that kids (of all ages) are likely to see them, but also invites questions–and no matter what you think about the wisdom of introducing kids to condoms, I think most people would agree that the grocery store aisle is not the best place to have that conversation. In general, can’t we agree that there should be places where kids don’t have to deal with the details of adult sexuality prematurely?
In my experience, life with children is full of unexpected teachable moments like that. Ideally, you just roll with them– better to give a child a frank answer to a question as it comes up than to go hiding from anything that could possibly provoke a question.
My first exposure to condoms was finding a used one on a beach with my cousins. Seeing them in a grocery store is a relatively benign way in comparison.