FORUM

Visiting the Intermarche in Ceret this (Sunday) morning, we spotted a large rat running about. I informed a member of staff who just shrugged and said they tell someone tomorrow. Well it was just before closing time so perhaps he thought the rat would leave of its own accord.

Maybe the sighting has to be ratified!

I'm phlegmatic about the rat - they're an ever present hazard. It was indeed the shrug that failed to fill me with confidence.

I have since checked with my pal who's a Director of "that posh UK supermarket chain". They have a regular "monitoring and control" contract with ? Rentokill and would call them out immediately.

Where there's one rat there's many and it doesn't seem quite right to let them clamber all over the fruit and veg for the next 18 hours just because it's closing time.

Last year, I was about to buy some cranberry juice from the English products in that supermarket when I noticed that the price label was stuck over the sell by date. When I checked, they all had the dates covered - and they were all well out of date so it had clearly been done deliberately. I went to the customer service desk and once the girl came off the phone, and finished a bit of a chat with another lady behind the desk, she listened without interest and told us that it was nothing to do with them as the English products are stocked up by an English person!

I suggested that the responsibility was probably with the supermarkets and she followed me reluctantly to the shelf, checked I was telling the truth, and took a couple of them back with her. Don’t know what happened next as I was no longer included in the discussion. Stood around for a short time, wondering if I should follow it through but in the girl didn’t come back so I went home for a glass of wine instead of a glass of cranberry juice!

The trouble is that it is so INCONVENIENT to actually make sure that things are done properly.

I once saw some mice, staff was equally pas intéressé

Don't buy any unwrapped or fresh fruit & veg in Céret IM. they got rid of all the wild cats, now they have a plague of rats they're finding it very difficult to get rid of.

Daughter worked in the Asian place in mas guerido few years ago ( think it has been taken over since ), loads of stuff out of date but still being sold. Occasionally somebody would bring something back and daughter would just shrug as she could do nothing about it anyway. She actually took some stuff off the shelves and was told to put them back.
Moral of story is to always check sell by dates wherever you go.
As for mice and rats well they are everywhere ( as well as cockroaches) even if you don't see them. I worked in a cafeteria in Portet sur Garonne years ago and walking the corridors out the back was pretty scary at times as I am not very brave when it comes to meeting any of the latter😂.

tia wrote: As for mice and rats well they are everywhere

Agreed, no need to be paranoid. Just wash any fresh fruit and cook your vegetables. Remember they have probably been handled by unhygenic customers as well!

Russell

The large Carrefour in Ille sur Tet has had some resident sparrows for years.

... at least you knew it was fresh food on the hoof, why didn't you try and catch it - they are great on the barbecue stuffed with chestnuts. If you were a little concerned as to where it's barcode was - just lift the tail.

It's official: I am done with Intermarche Ceret. It's the most convenient for me but I shall not darken their doors again.

Tired and in a rush, I picked up a packet of one of our usual staple cheeses. On getting home I discovered that it was grey and about to grow legs. Turning the pack over I found that the usual large square sell-by label had been soaked then scraped off.

I shared this observation with a few local friends who related even more alarming stories about the same store which I shan't repeat as they count as "hearsay".

I don't suppose it's official company policy but it is said that reducing food waste (by obscuring sell-by dates) would help maximise a particular store's profit margin, and that would help the manager (especially if he was new and young).

Enough said. Not a cent more from me for them.

One problem could be the way they are organised. Unlike a normally structured company they are a sort of franchise operation with individual outlets or small groups independently owned and run.

http://www.mousquetaires.com/les-mousqu ... roupement/

Russell

Webdoc wrote:It's official: I am done with Intermarche Ceret. It's the most convenient for me but I shall not darken their doors again.

Tired and in a rush, I picked up a packet of one of our usual staple cheeses. On getting home I discovered that it was grey and about to grow legs. Turning the pack over I found that the usual large square sell-by label had been soaked then scraped off.

I shared this observation with a few local friends who related even more alarming stories about the same store which I shan't repeat as they count as "hearsay".

I don't suppose it's official company policy but it is said that reducing food waste (by obscuring sell-by dates) would help maximise a particular store's profit margin, and that would help the manager (especially if he was new and young).

Enough said. Not a cent more from me for them.

Don’t cut off your nose to spite your face: just take it back. It depends on the cheese: if I want a camembert, say, for early consumption, I look first at the discounted bin. I have the opposite problem with my local Intermarché: they are often out of stock of things I want.

Russell is right of course about their being a franchise operation (and I think not the only one). But that seems to mean that they carry more local stuff than they otherwise might. And there are other things to like: they are unusual in making most of their own-brand goods themselves (including, apparently, the largest single fishing fleet in France).

And I sympathise with anyone trying to run a supermarket down here: their clientele must vary wildly in size, and in what they want, depending on the season. And at this time of year, even from week to week, depending on the weather.

It's not just my experience that provokes me to avoid that particular store, but the other reports I have received from reliable sources that I won't repeat. It goes way beyond penny-pinching. There are several other supermarkets within just a few km and I'm happy to go a bit further than put up with what I have seen and heard.

And yes I believe it is a franchise.

On my last visit there I was surprise to see an end-of-aisle promotion for a mineral water selling for 9 euros something per litre. On closer inspection i found it was imported from Hertfordshire of all places. Now there's optimism for you.

Webdoc wrote:On my last visit there I was surprise to see an end-of-aisle promotion for a mineral water selling for 9 euros something per litre. On closer inspection i found it was imported from Hertfordshire of all places. Now there's optimism for you.

My nearest huge one, in Argèles, has taken to selling various qualities of English cheddar cheese. The expensive one, at €20-something a kilo, seemed to be (and still is, to me) pretty silly, but is very acceptable cheese, and not like anything else you get here. The red one makes good Welsh rabbit at about €9 a kilo.