I saw this article on news.com.au - Gross supermarket trend has Coles, Woolies and Aldi shoppers fuming
What do you do?
For the record, I never replace broken eggs but instead open a new carton and only buy it if all eggs are unbroken.
Do You Replace Broken Eggs in a Carton?
kyle on 15/11/2024 - 09:24
Last edited 15/11/2024 - 09:32 by 1 other user
Last edited 15/11/2024 - 09:32 by 1 other user
Poll Options
- 80Replace broken eggs with unbroken ones from another carton
- 650Never replace broken eggs and only buy a carton if all eggs are unbroken
- 8Something else (comment below)
Comments
- 1
- 2
If you're thewing them, that's probably why so many are broken!
thew thew thew…
Is that like a Hawk Tuah thang?
If possible I put the faulty carton of eggs to the side so the next person doesn't have to go though it again.
I do this but go an extra step and leave the lid open so it can be seen by staff.
I do this but go an extra step and attach a post-it note with a warning so it can be seen by staff and other customers.
@Bruceflix: I do this but go an extra step and step on the eggs so the staff can clean up on the aisle.
@OzzyOzbourne: I go the extra step and bring my chicken and demand it lay eggs to replace the ones that were broken
I used to do this, after I went through 3 or so cartons where it always have a broken one. I thought why not just swap, it's the same brand, and I am not going to waste anymore of my time.
To get to the other side?
I'll eggsplain - they cracked up from telling jokes
eggcellent!
I'll eggsplain - they cracked up from telling
jokesyokesFTFY
I'm not shelling out for a cracked egg
I'll eggsplain - they cracked up from telling
jokesyokesyolksFTFY
@GregRust: Treading on shells hoping no one would notice that. Sometimes, even the best of us end up with a scrambled message. I'll make sure to hatch better words next time
I saw a woman the other day swapping out a whole carton… Taking an expensive branded egg and doing a complete swap out for a home brand box, so I am not surprised that people swap out broken eggs.
If i open a box and an egg is broken, I put it back and get another box, OR I find someone and let them know OR I will take it up to the counter and hand it over letting them know it has broken eggs in the box.
How shitty is that? (The woman I mean)
What would be the point of that? An egg is an egg.
And if it's about free range, etc. then she's having the opposite effect by attributing the sale to the cheaper supplier.I think the point was that she was swapping out more expensive eggs for the cheaper ones, the 'pint' for her was to steal a dollar or two. (image the poor bastard who bought the swapped out carton of 'good eggs'). As for egg quality if you've had you're own chooks or bought eggs from someone who has you'd know the difference. :) Happy and healthy chook produce way better eggs that the poor buggers who live miserable lives stick in tiny cage in a dark shed with no room to move.
In that case the woman should be happy to pay for the better treated chickens
@FezMonkey: Indeed. Some people are never happy though and I'm pretty sure stealing eggs doesn't help. :)
if you've had you're own chooks
Can't say I notice a big difference, except for freshness. Freshly laid eggs are impossible to peel when hard-boiled, so you need to rest them for a week or so.
Of course there are other reasons to keep your chickens happy :-)Try a sprinkle of baking soda while boiling
This was a popular claim a few years ago, but tests have shown that adding bicarb makes no difference to the ease of peeling, and may actually lead to worse eggs.
Kenji López-Alt ran all sorts of tests using more than 700 eggs. The conclusion for bicarb was: "Some variables had little to no effect. Adding small amounts of vinegar, baking soda or salt to your water is pointless. None offer advantages for peeling, while at the extremes, vinegar and baking soda produce off-flavors and colors (ghostly blue egg whites!)." His overall conclusion, incidentally, is that the best approach is either to steam eggs or to start them in already-boiling water.
Here's another test: "What didn’t work? Salting made no difference in peel-ability and didn’t affect the flavor, either. Which was actually better than the baking soda, which made no difference in peeling but left the eggs with a noticeable sulfur smell."
And another: "Overall, the baking soda did not make a consistent, noticeable difference in how easily I could peel the eggs."
And another: "The baking soda didn’t make any difference. There were a few eggs that were really easy to peel, but no consistency, and in general they were just about as difficult to peel as the control group."
@PeterA07: Pressure-cooker steamed eggs is a real solution: https://www.hippressurecooking.com/cracked-soft-medium-and-h…
@bargaino: On the fat end of the egg get something like a table spoon and lightly tap it till U hear a snap. With the membrane broken it's easier to peel
An egg is an egg.
Yep. There is no processing or anything, it's basically out of the chooks butt and into a carton (maybe a quick wash). I dont get it. I could almost understand swapping, say 85g eggs into a 55g egg box to pay less but get bigger eggs, but they were both similarly sized eggs.
And it cant be about "saving the chickens" and only wanting to eat free range rather than caged eggs, because someone would still be eating the caged eggs.
What would be the point of that? An egg is an egg.
Eggs do come in different sizes, though.
A carton contains both smaller and larger eggs, so a dishonest person could swap them out, taking all the bigger ones and leaving the next person with a carton full of duds.
Would probably trigger the weight sensor at self-serve… maybe?
@Chandler: That would be so funny…. I wonder how long it would take to work out what was going on… would the customer confess?? haha
Did you tell a staff member? I would have.
I'd have taken video of it too…That is theft.
Yes, I said to the staff member… "See that lady over there with the beard and the baggy green cap… She swapping eggs!"
It would make a great You Tube video.
Yes, but you're not the police
Citizen’s arrest
Is that what we call price gouging now ?
Agree. It's just like, in the old days, swapping a more expensive price tag for a cheaper one.
shame they cant seal cartons of eggs with a tamper proof seal…. you get what you get then
Quick bit of shrink wrap?
then after you pay and open the box you realise there's 3 broken eggs so it's tough luck for you?
hence why I said shame
however its a news.com.au article so I bet its happened like 5x and they are trying to create some fake outrage, I've never personally seen any evidence of what the article is describing at any of the three supermarkets listed
I guess they need to rethink egg packaging.
clear, sealed cartons
people would come back demanding refunds for broken eggs
Taking an expensive branded egg and doing a complete swap out for a home brand box
same.. the person i saw did it with 2 cartons!
imagine buying that expensive branded eggs carton :(
you should have reported to front desk. this is unfair for the person who buys the swapped box thinking they are more better :(
At that point it isn't shitty behaviour it is just blatant theft.
This is the Ozb way
I suppose you could do this with a lot of things too. For the longest time I've never understood how/why bread is only sealed with a little plastic (paper) bread tie. What's to stop people touching or spitting inside the bread and closing it again?
That woman could totally swap a fancy loaf of bread into a generic colesworth branded bag too.
Easy to say 'get a new carton' when eggs are plentiful.
When there is/was a shortage, there'd often be (at least) two cartons with broken eggs in them. I'd simply replace the broken egg/s from one carton with a good one from the other and only leave then (now only one) broken behind. My version of broken is only 'cracked' or slightly and not dripping everywhere or will result in mess if I were to remove it.
Dumping the broken eggs onto the shelves is another issue.
Farmers markets or other local suppliers.
Not always an option - many times I'd go to Coles, Woolies and Aldi (all are located in at my local area) and all would be out only to find a few broken cartons at one of them.
What do they do with the broken cartons though? I combine the good eggs into one remaining carton and then that's one less carton that (presumably) gets thrown away.
I don't leave mess like that article implies, and all the eggs get swapped within the same type/weight etc.
If you had no other options could you show the checkout person and they might take some dollars off to account for the smaller number of usable eggs?
Has anyone done this? I did it for another product when it wasn't sealed properly (well I didn't ask, she offered to discount it)
Checkout people hate people like you
We don't discount, if you don't want it don't buy it. What's to stop people damaging items and asking for discounts
Stop holding up the queue, you're not getting a discount.
Problem is its exceptionally rare that a checkout operator would have the authority to discount. I'd say be lucky to be 1 in 5,000 checkout operators might.
There's always plenty of stock of the expensive eggs. Home brand eggs sell out quickly and sometimes only a couple of cartons are left, usually with broken eggs, so I swap out those ones.
Why not just buy the box of expensive eggs, if there's a full one?
Makes sense to switch around when there are broken ones in all remaining boxes, it's good for the store and good for you. But if there's plenty of expensive ones, you're dumping broken ones in a more expensive box and taking more expensive eggs, when you could just buy a full, normal box. It costs the store money.
Maybe the store should do a better job keeping the product people actually want stocked then…
Forcing people to buy the higher priced version of a product because they only ordered limited quantities of the cheaper version is just a sneaky price increase, nobody should stand for that. Don't tell me a billion dollar company is so inept that it can't keep their own homebrand products on the shelf.
Same
What do you prefer?
A - supermarket throws out one carton of 12 broken eggs
B - supermarket throws out 12 cartons of eggs with one broken egg each, meaning 132 perfectly fine eggs goes in the bin.C- supermarket gives the unbroken eggs to local food bank or employees.
gives
Not in the supermarket dictionary.
It should be though, especially if they opt for 'throw it out' instead.
Ideally, they don't throw it out, but rather donate it to a food bank!
or let the staff take them for pennies
Most do donate them, but they are then 'written' off, and the supplier wears the cost.
So, option B would mean yes, 132 perfectly fine eggs are donated, but the supplier also wears the cost of 12 cartons of produce, not Colesworth.
C - No good eggs are going in the bin, the supermarket workers can swap out the broken eggs.
Or flavour and scramble the eggs then sell them out the front of the store as egg sandwiches. Maybe a bit of bacon, tomato..
Supermarkets have bins in the fresh produce section, for discarded/damaged fruit and veg.
It stands to reason they should provide a bin for broken eggs, since it's a serious issue, and can lead to potential salmonella spread, as well as the wasted boxes of mostly intact eggs.
Then you'll have people just throwing whole cartons of eggs out because 1 egg is cracked
I overheard an Aldi employee saying they donate them to charity/food bank can't remember if he said which or if true, but note the operative word here is donate so they would claim the cost back as a donation,more cost effective than just throwing out
I take the carton of eggs to the counter, ask for a discount. I usually get 30-50% off, depending on the mood of the manager. Bought $9 free range from woolies and paid $6 as one broken in there.
Great idea
Post that as a deal… "12 pack of eggs, usually $9, but now $6 @ Colesworth (Requires egg breakage)"
or
"Get a $9 carton of eggs for $6… Big retailers hate this one simple trick…"
Last time in woolies I didn't have to ask. The guy on the checkout checked, saw one was broken and asked if I'd prefer a new carton of eggs, or a 50% discount.
I took the discount.when has a checkout person ever checked out the carton of eggs!?
My local Aldi does this, I have since stopped checking myself :)
probably checking that the correct eggs are in there… might be same store @pegasus and "that woman" shop at
@SlickMick: I know they were really shitty about people asking for discounts a while back with the big salmonella excuse, so I stopped asking years ago , maybe people were breaking eggs on purpose, I believe this is also why staff get bugger all discounts also.
Maybe this is why the staff these days treat you like dirt if you buy reduced items .
Since the bigpanic the power dynamic seemed to have shifted from customer service to don’t abuse the staff by talking to them, to just pop your boot and be gone.
No longer are young people employed as casual checkout operators, just core supervision and pick n packers.
It has that Aldi warehouse feel except the aisles are much smaller.
Which supermarket can you do this?
It's in my comment bud. I do it at woolies
Haven't tried Coles.Does it work at self checkout?
@Poor Ass: Of course not.
Managers discretion. You have to ask a staff member, who will check with the manager, who will then decide the price. It's random and all down the that person.
I ordered eggs from Uber in the past and the driver didnt even check if the eggs were broken. So I got some broken eggs.
Totally understandable. Shopping list said a carton of eggs and you got a carton of eggs. They don’t get paid enough to go the extra mile.
My mother always opened the carton and checked, and wiggled each one around. We were poor though and paying for an egg you can't eat would have been financially devastating.
I thought everyone does this regardless of their finances?
It's not just the cost. There's nothing worse than discovering the last egg is broken when you're halfway through making breakfast.
Oh I know, when you gearing up for waffle time and the last egg is actually broken and spoiled at the bottom.
Yes exactly, annoys rich and poor alike.
We do the same. We’ve had a couple of dud eggs in the past.
- 1
- 2
Nope, Check the eggs and if any are broken I put thew carton back and grab different carton and repeat the process.