You will recall that I am not best pleased with Sainsburys' at the moment; what with them making total arses out of themselves with one of my grocery deliveries, and allowing certain people to excuse themselves from selling booze and morning after pills on the grounds of "religion".However, it seems that I have to feature them again on this site. Maybe it's some form of bizarre PR campaign that their marketing department has dreamt up? They firstly make themselves look like utter knobheads, then change miraculously overnight into an efficient non pc company again??
Anyhoo, this time Sainsburys' are in the dog house for adopting a very Nanny type touchy feely attitude to their uniforms. It seems that the familiar orange and blue uniforms of Sainsburys' staff will be changed to a dark maroon colour.
Nothing wrong with that, is there?
Nothing at all...except for the fact that they claim that it has taken them since March 2006 to implement this change.
For why?
Well, staff have to be told!
In a more sensible company, this communication would take the form of an announcement and some brief discussions with selected members of staff; to ensure that the new uniforms did not make the staff fell like total knobheads.
Sainsburys' have of course bought into the Nanny state big time, and have to do things like uniform changes via a very tortuous process. It seems that in order to change the uniforms, Sainsburys' started a full consultation with staff way back in March 2006. This included, of all things, colleague counsel sessions.
For fark's sake, it's only a uniform!
I should mention one other thing, this story (about the fact that they have been working on it since March 2006) may in fact be utter bollocks, pushed out by the PR men (and women) in Sainsburys'.
Why?
Well you see, Sainsburys' is currently under bid from a Qatari backed firm (Delta Two).
The colour of the Qatari flag?
Oh, that would be white and errrmmmm.......maroon.
Putting all your recent Sainsbury's observations together Ken, in particular those pertaining to booze and contraception, one has to wonder why a Qatari investment group would be so interested in owning such religiously unacceptable company.
ReplyDeleteUnless of course they plan changes.
Purple people eaters at your local Sainsburys
ReplyDeleteWe may be on a losing battle here re Sainsburys. If the company were to remain a purely secular business organisation selling whatever is demanded by the public, including such legal items as alcohol and birth pills, then the firm would have to respond to consumer demand.
ReplyDeleteIf,as it may occur, the company is owned by a theocratic religously dominated state we have our choice to take our shopping £ elsewhere - trouble is that most punters will be unaware of the transfer of power over their most basic needs (food shopping) or could not give a monkeys when they do. Looking forward to halal approved meals in the big S soon.
As a worker for Sainsbury's I would just like to mention that nobody has mentioned how hard the staff work, while trying to make sure the consumer is happy with the service they receive.
ReplyDeleteMost of the staff are hard working & enjoy working in the store. We try to be helpful to everyone whilst upholding the company rules & regulations which sometimes in itself can be hard work.
I think the staff at Sainsbury's deserve a big pat on the back for all the hard work they do!
You need to get a life mate! Why are you so bothered about Sainsbury's uniform?
ReplyDeleteAs a manager for Sainsbury's, I think that the consultation period with staff was very worthwhile and allowed staff to vote for their preferred colour from a large selection. "Maroon" (or Plum as it's officially called) was the favorite among staff at my store and had nothing to do with the approach from Delta Two.
I'd also like to say to Grant that Delta Two were interested in Sainsbury's because we are now a very well run and very profitable company (profits have more than doubled since the 2005/2006 financial year).
In todays society, all businesses have to make allowances for colleagues beliefs and religions. All the other supermarkets (and properly run businesses) are the same!
I agree with seabird9000 and feel that Sainsbury's is now great again because of the hard work of colleagues.