Here in the U.S., we have food safety regulations — a lot of them. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for making sure foods (and a bunch of other stuff) adhere to some basic health and safety rules to reduce the likelihood these products will hit store shelves and make a million people sick. So far, so good… but there’s a major food safety system that the FDA uses that, it turns out, is neither standard nor safe — despite its name. [More]
supermarkets
Two Reasons Target Is Having Trouble Selling Groceries
By 8.15.16
Following the crash of the housing market nearly ten years ago, some big box stores that had previously only dabbled in groceries started to give over more floor space to fresh and frozen foods. Walmart shoppers took to the idea of buying their food in the same store they purchase their TV, cleaning supplies, underwear, sporting goods, and just about anything else. Across the parking lot at Target, things aren’t as rosy. [More]
Grocery Association To Vermont Stores: Keep Labeling GMO Foods, But Only If You Want To
By 8.5.16
On July 1, a new Vermont regulation kicked in, requiring simple text labels on foods — even those prepared or packaged in the stores — made with genetically modified (GMO) ingredients. Then on July 29, President Obama signed into a law a bill that overturns the Vermont rules and will eventually (maybe) create a national standard for GMO labeling, leaving Vermont supermarkets unsure of what they should do about all the stuff they just started labeling. [More]
Would You Scan A QR Code At The Supermarket To Read More About Food?
By 8.3.16
Last, the president signed into law a fast-tracked piece of legislation that both overturned existing state laws about labeling of food with genetically modified ingredients and established a vague timeline for eventually putting this information on barcodes that customers can scan with their phones. The question is: Will anyone actually do this? [More]
Man Admits To Stripping Naked And Soiling A Self-Checkout Scanner At Kroger
By 7.28.16
Convenient? Sure. But we will never look at the self-checkout scanner the same way again after an Ohio man admitted to defecating on a UScan-it terminal at a Kroger grocery. [More]
Senate Approves Bill To Outlaw Vermont GMO Labels, Replace Them With Barcodes
By 7.8.16
Even though some of the nation’s largest food producers — including General Mills, PepsiCo, Campbell Soup, Mars Inc., Bimbo, and Nestle — have already updated their packaging to comply with Vermont’s new labeling requirement for foods containing genetically modified (GMO) ingredients, these tiny lines of text may be short lived. Last night, the U.S. Senate voted to approve legislation that will not only outlaw Vermont’s labeling requirement, but eventually (maybe) replace these text labels with something as obscure as a barcode. [More]
Vermont’s GMO Labeling Law Is Now In Effect. Here Are The Labels The Senate Is Trying To Get Rid Of
By 7.1.16
It’s July 1, 2016, which means that Vermont’s controversial rules for labeling certain products containing genetically modified ingredients (GMOs) is now in effect. With both the supermarket industry and agribusiness-backed Senators trying to defeat this law in court and on Capitol Hill, we took a field trip to Vermont this morning to see just what the labels look like in the real world. [More]
Senators Trying To Strike Down Vermont GMO Labeling Law At Last Minute
By 6.27.16
Two years ago, Vermont became the first state to pass a law requiring clear disclosures of foods containing genetically modified/engineered ingredients. A number of packaged food giants — including PepsiCo, Mars Inc., General Mills, and Campbell Soup Co. — have already made the decision to label their products on a nationwide basis in advance of the July 1 start of the new rules. With that deadline approaching, a pair of agribusiness-backed senators have introduced legislation that would kill the Vermont law, prevent other states from enacting similar regulations, and give companies two years to create a label with little to no information. [More]
Going To The Store To Buy Dog Food? You’ll Probably Pick Up Milk, Tuna, And Chocolate
By 5.25.16
While just about anything you’d buy at the supermarket can now be delivered to your house in a reasonable amount of time, there are still some purchases that you must — or at least tend to — make in person: Prescriptions, fresh produce, pet food, among others. Of course, even though you only meant to pick up one or two things, odds are you’re going to add a few items you either remember to buy or are tempted into purchasing once you’re in the store. [More]
New Legislation Tries To Clear Up Confusion Over “Sell By,” “Best By” & Other Expiration Dates
By 5.17.16
Stroll around your favorite supermarket and you’ll see a cornucopia of deadlines stamped and printed on your food. That carton of milk says “Sell By,” the box of mac and cheese says “Best Before,” and the jar of horseradish has a “Use By,” none of which are official or necessarily an indicator of safety or quality, resulting in millions of pounds of food being wasted every year based on sometimes arbitrary dates. New legislation coming this week in both the House and Senate hopes to clear up the confusion over the many expiration date labels you find on food. [More]
FBI Nabs Guy Suspected Of Spraying Mouse Poison On Food At Several Michigan Stores
By 5.4.16
Police in Michigan and the FBI say they’ve got a man in custody who admitted to spraying a mixture of mouse poison, hand cleaner, and water on produce and other unpackaged food at several grocery stores. [More]
Everyone Rush To Giant Before This Amazing Pasta Sale Is Over
By 5.2.16
Pre-packaged pasta sides are a cheap and easy addition to your meal, and they’re even more affordable if you wait for a good sale. When we say a “good” sale, though, that doesn’t mean a sale like this one at the supermarket Giant. [More]
SUV Turns Into Flying Car, Uses Roof Of Giant Eagle Supermarket As Crash-Landing Spot
By 3.8.16
While we haven’t reached the flying-car future of The Jetsons quite yet, that didn’t stop one SUV from crash-landing on the roof of a Giant Eagle supermarket. [More]
Another Day, Another Company Switching To Cage-Free Eggs: This Time, It’s Kroger
By 3.3.16
Hot on the heels of Albertsons Companies’ announcement that it will only source eggs from cage-free hens in all its various grocery store brands by 2025, including Albertsons and Safeway, Kroger, the largest supermarket chain in the country, says it’s doing the same thing, in the same timeframe. [More]
Oregon Police Thank “Anonymous Shopping Cart Guy” For Tripping Up Fleeing Suspect
By 2.29.16
Some heroes wear capes and have an arsenal of tools to fight crime hanging from their fancy utility belts. Other heroes, of the everyday sort, have different weapons at their disposal. To wit: one brave, mysterious shopper known only as “anonymous shopping cart guy” sacrificed his groceries to stop a fleeing suspect in Portland, OR. [More]
Poll: 9-In-10 Americans Support GMO Labeling
By 12.2.15
Last month, the Food and Drug Administration approved the first-ever genetically engineered animal for sale as food in the U.S., but declared that this salmon would not need to carry any label identifying it as a genetically modified food product, much like the many items currently on grocery store shelves made with GMO grains and other ingredients. But the results of a new national poll seem to indicate that most consumers would appreciate having a heads-up about the GMO content of the food they buy. [More]
Walmart Shoppers Surprised To See Flock Of Snacking Birds Camped Out In Store’s Meat Section
By 12.1.15
Of all the places one would expect to see a flock of birds settled down for a group snack, the meat display at your local grocery store is probably pretty far down on the list. To that end, Walmart shoppers in Massachusetts were understandably surprised over the weekend, when at least two customers snapped video footage of a group of live fowl pecking away at packages of red meat. [More]
Survey Says: Supermarkets’ Turkey Giveaways Aren’t That Exciting To Younger Shoppers
By 11.25.15
Getting a free turkey to serve proudly on your Thanksgiving table used to be a source of great excitement for shoppers in the holiday season, and an easy way for supermarkets to attract more customers (who then buy more stuff when they’re in the store). But nowadays there’s a new demographic on the block that everyone’s trying to please, and a free turkey just isn’t going to cut it. [More]
