NFriday wrote:I wasn't trying to put down Twiggs Garden. I was just pointing out the fact that I have a garden at McCormick Garden. One of the gardeners at Twigg's also fixes the wheelbarrows at McCormick, and I just talked to him last week. He is a really nice guy. There are four different community garden sites in Evanston.

Interesting information - you talked to him last week (restaurant rumorville I assume) What if I need to fix wheelbarrow. The guy may possibly create wheelbarrow traffic across McCormick and I will be able to qualify for Subway.

Jewel-Osco, the largest traditional grocery store chain in the Chicago area, plans to launch a delivery service next week — the latest bricks-and-mortar grocery retailer to leap into online sales.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ ... story.html

Overall, I'm okay with my local Jewels (as some people call them, ha ha, but really, I have three locally). But I've learned this past month never to make a debit purchase there again.

I deviated from my usual credit-charge-only policy once in October, because I wanted $100 cash to go with my $77 in groceries. I entered my pin # and later learned I'd gotten duplicate charges of $177 to my debit card. A month later, I am still trying to get the extra $177 back. Be advised, if this happens to you, the store will say there's nothing they can do, you have to call the customer service number printed on the receipt. Be advised also, be sitting down with nothing urgent to do when you call this number, because you will wait a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time to get through to a human who asks why you are calling and puts you on hold so you can wait an additional LOOOOOOOONG time for anyone to come off their break and pick up the call and ask why you're on hold and make you start the whole process over again.

One thing I noticed is, when I called I had to identify what state I was calling from and what store chain I was calling about, which I take to mean that Jewel has outsourced their customer service, apparently to someone's basement in South Dakota where only one person works.

Just called again today and eventually spoke to a human who attributed her inability to solve the problem to, not surprisingly, her powerlessness to provide any customer service (although not in those words) but who promised she will send a message to someone who maybe can do something about it. Someday.

She also pestered me, as did everyone else I spoke to, about getting all my contact information (address, email, and phone nos.), "in case they have any questions," although I am holding the receipt in my hand and have already provided the transaction information down to the second it occurred and the name of the cashier that processed it. Grrrrr.

I would revise my first sentence to say I *was* happy with Jewel overall, but with four other grocery stores within the same radius, I don't plan to spend another dime there until they give me back the money they owe me.

Katie wrote:Overall, I'm okay with my local Jewels (as some people call them, ha ha, but really, I have three locally). But I've learned this past month never to make a debit purchase there again.

I deviated from my usual credit-charge-only policy once in October, because I wanted $100 cash to go with my $77 in groceries. I entered my pin # and later learned I'd gotten duplicate charges of $177 to my debit card. A month later, I am still trying to get the extra $177 back. Be advised, if this happens to you, the store will say there's nothing they can do, you have to call the customer service number printed on the receipt. Be advised also, be sitting down with nothing urgent to do when you call this number, because you will wait a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time to get through to a human who asks why you are calling and puts you on hold so you can wait an additional LOOOOOOOONG time for anyone to come off their break and pick up the call and ask why you're on hold and make you start the whole process over again.

One thing I noticed is, when I called I had to identify what state I was calling from and what store chain I was calling about, which I take to mean that Jewel has outsourced their customer service, apparently to someone's basement in South Dakota where only one person works.

Just called again today and eventually spoke to a human who attributed her inability to solve the problem to, not surprisingly, her powerlessness to provide any customer service (although not in those words) but who promised she will send a message to someone who maybe can do something about it. Someday.

She also pestered me, as did everyone else I spoke to, about getting all my contact information (address, email, and phone nos.), "in case they have any questions," although I am holding the receipt in my hand and have already provided the transaction information down to the second it occurred and the name of the cashier that processed it. Grrrrr.

I would revise my first sentence to say I *was* happy with Jewel overall, but with four other grocery stores within the same radius, I don't plan to spend another dime there until they give me back the money they owe me.

Katie, you would be better served to just dispute the charge with your bank. If the transactions are an identical amount, they will know that most likely one is in error. Most transactions will show up on your account as "pending" until the transaction is verified by the vendor. If you check your account online, you should see both "pending" transactions, however, only one of them should clear. Unfortunately, this usually takes a couple of days. I am not sure if you bank online, but with a lot of banks (Citibank, Chase, PNC) you can check it all online and even dispute the charge online.

Thanks for the advice, really. But I have already talked with the bank* -- the same day I saw the duplicate charges, neither of which is pending; both have cleared. The bank* said they don't dispute debit charges. If I want them to recover this money, I have to authorize them to treat it as a fraud, which will mean cancelling and replacing the card. I was hoping to avoid that hassle, but if Jewel doesn't refund the money within another couple of days, I will call the bank* back and take that step.

I say "bank*" because it's actually a credit union. I don't know if that has anything to do with their limited ability and/or willingness to dispute the charge. Now, if it had been a credit charge, they'd have done it right away, which is another reminder to me pick credit rather than debit in the future.

Hi Katie- Did the double charge show up on your receipt? Go post on Jewel's Facebook page, and hopefully you can get a better response. I think they are pretty responsive on their Facebook page. One time when I had an unhappy shopping experience at my closest Jewel in Evanston I did an online survey, and put down the store, and the manager called me back the next day and apologized. You could always try that too, but I would try Facebook first. The problem with your debit card is why people don't like to use debit to pay online. You can't dispute the charge that was made with a debit card. Hope this helps, Nancy

Hi- I was at the Jewel on Chicago Ave. in Evanston this evening. The only thing the store has going for it is that it is the closest Jewel to me, and also occasionally they have stuff I can actually use on clearance for 75% off. Their produce department isn't as good as either of the Wilmette stores, and a lot of the cashiers are not friendly. They also often never get around to changing the sign when something goes on sale. There were two items I bought today that were on sale, but showed the regular price. I had to scan them to find out they were on sale.

I needed milk tonight, and I was going to buy the Jewel 1% because it is $.50 cheaper. Every single one of the gallons of Jewel 1% milk had an expiration date of today, except for one gallon that expired a week ago. I found other milk that had expired too. I decided I was going to go to customer service to complain, and when I did, the woman told me I could get a gallon of Lucerne milk for the same price. All the Lucerne milk had a least a week to go before it was going to expire. It seems like every time I go there I run into this problem where the Jewel milk is almost ready to expire, but the Lucerne milk is good for at least another week. She was going to report this to the dairy department, but I did not see anybody working in dairy while I was there. I should go back to the store tomorrow to see if the expired milk is still on the shelf. I am tempted to go online and do a survey. I did one for that store a few years ago, and the next day the manager called me up and apologized to me. Thanks, Nancy

NFriday wrote: I should go back to the store tomorrow to see if the expired milk is still on the shelf. I am tempted to go online and do a survey. I did one for that store a few years ago, and the next day the manager called me up and apologized to me. Thanks, Nancy

If you post your experience/complaint on Jewel's Facebook page they will have the customer service rep forward your issue to the store manage of the said store your complaining about.

https://www.facebook.com/pg/JewelOsco/p ... e_internal

Hi- I just posted on Facebook, but I don't see the post. Hopefully the post goes to corporate and it get taken care of. I might do another survey too. A few years ago, this particular Jewel had the lowest survey rating among all of the Jewel stores in the district. It seems like the employees of the store are not happy working there. Thanks, Nancy

I just posted on Jewel's Facebook again because I did not see my post, but then I discovered my post was off to the side with their response. They said they were going to contact the store manager to tell him what happened, and they apologized. I kind of suspect that there was nobody in dairy when I went to CS about this, because she did not immediately page anybody to deal with it and get rid of the old milk. This was about 6:00 pm on Saturday.

What I can't figure out is that unless one of them is on sale, the Jewel milk is always $.50 cheaper a gallon than the Lucerne, and so you assume that the Lucerne milk would be the one with the expired dates rather than the Jewel. It is always the Jewel milk though that has two days to go before it is going to expire unless it is on sale that week, in which case you have a week to go before it expires.

Hi- At Jewel this week, they have open nature air chilled whole chicken on sale for $.49 a pound with a limit of 4. It is normally over $2 a pound. It is a natural store brand. I am not sure how free range the chickens are though. Has anybody tried this? They also have b/s chicken breasts, and thighs. Whole Foods also has whole chicken on sale for $1.79, and they claim their chickens are humanely raised.

Jewel also has Jewel butter on sale for $1.88 and there is a $1 coupon on mymixx for it, and so you can get it for $.88. The coupon on mymixx is good through 12/17. I am sure there is a limit of one at that price. Jewel also has cutie clementines on sale for $3.88 a box. Unfortunately I believe there are only coupons out for halos. There are lots of other good deals at Jewel this week too. The Saturday salad bar is advertised as being $2.99, but I noticed it was $3.49 when I went to the Evanston Jewel store on Chicago Avenue. Hope this helps, Nancy

Nancy,

Are these sales now or do they begin on Wednesday?

Regards,
Cathy2

The sale begins on Wednesday. They also have cheap turkey and ham starting on Wednesday with minimum $25 purchase. I don't know if that includes the turkey and ham or not. They have two pound bags of organic apples for $.99 too, and milk for $1.88. Watch for the expiration date on the milk though. For some reason the Jewel milk always has a shorter expiration date than the lucerne does, even though the Jewel milk is cheaper. The open nature whole chicken is only on sale 12/13-12/16.

NFriday wrote:The sale begins on Wednesday. They also have cheap turkey and ham starting on Wednesday with minimum $25 purchase. I don't know if that includes the turkey and ham or not.

It is a $25 purchase plus the turkey or ham. When they make those types of offers, I buy up to $25 plus turkey/ham. I then do it again on another visit.

At Thanksgiving, I bought two turkeys with one intended for Christmas.

I may buy another turkey to serve in February, when it is particularly cold.

Regards,
CAthy2

NFriday wrote:Hi- At Jewel this week, they have open nature air chilled whole chicken on sale for $.49 a pound with a limit of 4. It is normally over $2 a pound. It is a natural store brand. ... The open nature whole chicken is only on sale 12/13-12/16

Thanks for this heads-up, Nancy. Just minutes ago I was reading a Cooks Illustrated article about why air-chilled chicken tends to taste better than water-chilled chicken. I had noted this $.49/lb sale on my shopping list, but I hadn't noticed that it applied to air-chilled chicken. I'm curious to try it out.

I agree that Jewel seems to have several good sales this week (butter and milk $1.88, bone-in rib roast $4.99/lb, etc.). Some weeks before holidays such as Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, some grocery stores (not just Jewel) seem to me to advertise all the classic holiday cooking/baking ingredients at prices that really aren't sales.

I see now that I forgot to come back earlier and report that my duplicate debit card charge got resolved. The straight path to a solution was, as Nancy and polster suggested, to post to Jewel's Facebook page asking for help resolving the problem. I was quickly contacted by someone who took charge and had my money refunded within, if I remember correctly, less than 24 hours.

Jewel has the wedges of Stella cheese on sale B1G1F starting today, and there is a coupon good for $1 off any Stella product in the big book of savings located at the front of the store. Most cashiers at Jewel don't know this, but you can use 2 coupons on a B1G1F purchase.

Katie I am glad Jewel gave you your money back. I have not been back to the Chicago Avenue store in Evanston to see if the expired milk problem that I posted about on Facebook got resolved by the manager. The only good thing about that store is that it is the closest Jewel to where I live, and on occasion they have stuff that I can actually use on clearance for 75% off. They have not done that for a few months though. For anybody that is into how cocoa though, Jewel has had their Swiss Miss simply cocoa milk chocolate flavor only on clearance for $.98 a box. I just picked up another box on Saturday at the Green Bay Wilmette store. At one of the Jewels I go to they had it out, but they did not have a clearance tag for it. I scanned it though, and found it was $.98, and so I took most of what they had.

Katie wrote:Thanks for this heads-up, Nancy. Just minutes ago I was reading a Cooks Illustrated article about why air-chilled chicken tends to taste better than water-chilled chicken. I had noted this $.49/lb sale on my shopping list, but I hadn't noticed that it applied to air-chilled chicken. I'm curious to try it out.

That price is pretty astonishing for this type of chicken. I actually thought NFriday had dropped a one, ie $1.49 as opposed to $0.49.

Regards,
Cathy2

Hi- I think the chicken is normally $2.29 a pound, and Whole Foods has their whole chicken on sale right now for $1.79. Jewel started selling this chicken in place of Perdue Harvestland a few months ago. If they had the chicken breast really cheap instead, I would jump on this. A whole chicken is a lot for one person though. I occasionally buy the rotisserie chicken at WF, which I love, but it id a lot better the first two days than it is the next 2-3 days. I am going to a potluck on Tuesday though, and I could bring it there. Does anybody have a good way to prepare whole chicken? I saw a crispy version on ATK I might try.

This kind of reminds me of the organic ground beef they had dirt cheap a few months ago, but there is less work involved in preparing the ground beef, and I don't anticipate people running to the store to buy out the chicken like they did the ground beef. Hope this helps, Nancy

I just want to remind people that today is the last day you can get the air chilled whole chicken for $.49 a pound. They have a freebie on mymixx today, but it is not anything I am interested in. They had this last Spring on mymixx, and I took advantage of it then, and I still haven't used it. They are supposed to have a WOD freebie again this Friday. I have no idea what it is. Don't forget that you can get butter for $.88 when you apply the $1 mymixx coupon to your account. They supposedly have 8 ounces of Findlandia spreadable butter on sale for $1.75 too, and there was a $1 coupon in the paper recently. They also have Halos for $3.77, and there is a $.50 coupon on mymixx. I have heard the organic apples they have on sale for $.99 a two pound bag, are small, but it is still a deal.

I might pass on the apples though, because I am spending Christmas with my sister in Michigan, and she always loads me up with apples. She gave me a ton of apples in August when I went home for a family reunion, and somebody else gave me some free golden delicious last month, and so I haven't bought any apples since last Spring. Hope this helps, Nancy

Hi,

I bought eight chickens yesterday. They ranged in weight from 4 to 5.5 pounds. When I was combing through the collection looking for the smaller weight chickens, a guy jumped in to the fray. He was delighted by the price. I reminded him these chickens could sell for far more.

In addition, I bought a turkey and a pork butt at 99 cents a pound. I skipped the ham at 49 cents a pound knowing I'd be back sometime today.

I won't need to buy meat for a while.

Regards,
Cathy2

I was at the Jewel on Chicago Avenue in Evanston this evening. I looked at the chicken, and noticed that it was not Open Nature, but it was Mary's free range air chilled chicken. I decided to spring for one. That is all I have room for in my freezer. It sounded familiar, and I just looked it up, and ATK highly recommends Mary's and Bell and Evan's air chilled chicken. The chicken comes from California. When I searched it, I also came across an article saying the Whole Foods out West also carries it. This group claims that not all of their chicken is free range. I have not read the article yet.

If anybody is looking for an excuse to go to Jewel tonight, this is it. Jewel had two different displays of the chicken, and they they probably had 20 on display, but I did not see anybody else looking at it. People seemed to be more interested in the $.49 ham, which you just have to heat up.

I bought some milk while I was there too, and checked the dates, and some of the milk was ready to expire in two days, but the majority of it had at least a week to go. They were restocking the milk cooler too while I was there.

Jewel has both Halos and Cuties for $3.77, but Halos has a $.50 off coupopn on mymixx. I was going to get some Tabernick frozen soup too. It is B1G1F, and I had some coupons. I love their chicken noodle soup. When I got to the store, I realized that this store quit carrying it. I am sick right now, and I was in the mood for chicken noodle soup. I had to buy Campbell's chunky instead, which is a poor substitute. Hope this helps, Nancy

Hi- I just read the article about Mary's free range chicken. Apparently an animal activist group set up cameras at one of their farms. They apparently have 6o farms, and this particular farm is not certified as having only humanely raised chickens. Both the company and Whole Foods say that all the rest of their farms are certified humanly raised.

I tried at two different stores cross three days to find a few of those chickens. I assumed they were sold out. No big deal, I was mainly going for the 2.00 dasani 8 packs, and the butter. For those who found them - were they just in the open refrigerated case displays with other chicken parts - like Perdue, and Jewel brand?

seebee wrote:I tried at two different stores cross three days to find a few of those chickens. I assumed they were sold out. No big deal, I was mainly going for the 2.00 dasani 8 packs, and the butter. For those who found them - were they just in the open refrigerated case displays with other chicken parts - like Perdue, and Jewel brand?

I was in a Jewel in the city last night. When I asked for a raincheck for the chickens, the manager walked to the back of the store. There were Purdue organic chickens priced at 48 cents a pound. He began to explain how it was just like the other chicken. I told him I needed no explanation, I bought it for the price. He said just about everyone else did, too, then we laughed.

Every stop to Jewel this week is a butter run.

Regards,
CAthy2

At the Chicago Avenue store in Evanston yesterday, they were in their usual place where they keep all of the naturally raised and organic meat. This is where they have the organic beef. They also had a large display of them with probably 15 chickens where they keep the conventional chicken. In both displays they had a large sign. With the exception of one, all of the chickens were at least 4 pounds, and many of them were over 5 pounds. If you would have asked in the meat department, they hopefully would have told you where they were. They were so large though, that even though it seemed like there was s lot of chicken, there were probably only 20 whole chickens. While I was going through them to find one that was smaller, not a single person came up to look at the chicken. They were more interested in the $.49 ham, which you just have to heat up, and a lot of people did not realize what a good deal this was. Whole Foods I think still has whole air chilled fryers on sale for $1.79, which is still a good deal. It is just not a stock up deal like this was. The Mary's air chilled free range chicken that I bought yesterday that WF sells on the West coast, I am sure sells for more than $2.29 at WF.

I did not get any butter yesterday. I don't go through a lot of butter, and I already have 2 pounds of butter that I got on sale right before Thanksgiving. Cathy is going to freak out, but I actually put margarine on my toast, and I don't bake cookies over the holidays BTW- Jewel is having another word of the day freebie this Friday, but I won't know what it is until they post it on Facebook on Thursday. Hope this helps, Nancy

NFriday wrote:Cathy is going to freak out, but I actually put margarine on my toast, and I don't bake cookies over the holidays

I bet I can return the freak by advising I have probably gone through seven pounds of butter in the last few weeks.

I bought two of those chickens on Sunday. I would have bought the limit of four but didn't have enough fridge/freezer storage space. I roasted them both and am using the meat in a few different recipes. One thing I noticed about the air-chilled chickens is how much more pleasant they are to prep than ones that have been water-chilled and are swimming in water inside their packaging. Not only were they easier to handle, they were, not surprisingly, quickly surface-dry and ready to season and roast.

I also bought a couple pounds of butter; $1.88 is a price we won't see very often. I routinely buy butter on sale and keep a pound or two of it in the freezer all the time.

Speaking of freezing, I didn't know til recently that milk freezes well. I put all my milk and half & half in the freezer before a few recent trips and it was fine afterward (although I learned frozen half & half takes quite a while to thaw out again!). I would have bought a gallon of Jewel milk at $1.88 too if I had the freezer space.

I have been thinking lately of buying a chest freezer for the garage. I have the space (a luxury of living in the suburbs), but only one electrical outlet in the garage, and the garage fridge is plugged into it. I've read some info online suggesting that I *could* plug a chest freezer into the same outlet but that it would be better to have an electrician set up a separate outlet on a separate circuit. Well, if I ever get that organized, I'll be better able to take advantage of such sales.

Hi,

I meant to comment on this earlier ...

After seeing the $4.99 per pound rib roasts at Jewel, I finally pulled the trigger. I bought a seven bone roast in cryovac weighing just short of 16 pounds for $83. It went into the freezer for a family event next summer.

At Jewel's butcher counter, I saw they had one-bone roasts (steaks?) at the $4.99 price. I bought one weighing around 2.5 pounds. I slow roasted it at 175 degrees until it reached 125 degrees, let it rest 30 minutes while the oven heated up to 550 degrees. Dropped it back in the oven for a 10-minute crisping.

For Christmas Eve lunch, Mom, Dad and I enjoyed roast beast. Didn't invite anyone else from the family, especially since they insist on turkey for Christmas.

I got what I wanted out of this deal!

Regards,
Cathy2

Cathy,

You might want to check that your freezer is still around 0 degrees if you are going to keep that roast for 6 months. The temp can creep up over time, particularly if it needs defrosting.