Real Canadian Superstore
Reviews and Complaints

I am 14 years old, South Asian and a resident of Oakville, Ontario. ​

Representing myself and my family in this situation.

My family has been shopping at The Real Canadian Superstore for as long as I can remember.

Each visit we usually spend 200+$ CAD and redeem a large sized "gift-box".

These usually contain an assortment of shampoos/body washes or snacks and are located near a door to the location's elevator.

We visited today - (7:40 - 8:30 PM November 11th, 2022), again. Not expecting anything out of the ordinary to happen.

While I was browsing along the aisles of this store, The time came for my mom to check out.

Per usual, she was told to pick up her “free-gift”- An M&M’s gift set and pointed to the usual spot of redemption. She went to the usual spot near the door to the elevator.

When I met with her she was curiously looking at the boxes of items that were with the M&M’s.

There were primarily the same boxes of M&M’s and lots of packages of identical oreo boxes.

Me - Completely new to the situation, looked at the size of the M&M box and thought it was much smaller than the usual “free-gift” you get when you spend 200 dollars. With all the identical oreo packages I thought that they were also eligible to take. So I placed the oreo on top of the M&M box and placed it in our shopping cart. I told my mom “I think we're supposed to take these two.”

We had no idea this box of items was a donation bin. It was an honest mistake and if informed politely we would have kindly gone to the correct location and put the items back. A sane, respectful and more effective approach of informing us about our mistake would have been: “Hey, That's the donation bin, why are you taking things out of there?”. This would have easily led us in the direction of figuring out our mistake.

Instead an aggressive white lady pulls up and extremely harshly yells at us “ARE YOU SHOPPING FROM THERE?”. My mother was confused and replied “I'm taking the free gift.” This woman did not listen to a word we said. She continued yelling “THAT'S FOR HOMELESS PEOPLE I'M OFFENDED DON’T SHOP FROM THERE.” So on and So forth. We were trying to explain but she was speed walking over churned by emotions to get a manager.

I knew exactly what would happen. From the glare in her eyes to the pin sharpness of her blaring voice, I knew how this would end up. This happens to me time and time again. She took one look at the situation and jumped to an immediate conclusion. Based on a few words that I said and the way we looked. I was traumatized. I could feel the shiver from my teeth to my legs.

Anyone can say what they want about this incident but I do not owe “proof” of profiling to anyone. In a society like this we should have more insight on situations like this.

The lady went to get a manager, not even giving us a chance to explain what happened. By the time the manager arrived my mom was obviously agitated and caught off guard by the woman and raised her voice. But of course, My mother was the one who was told to calm down.

The manager blindly but subtly, took the woman's side as we were still in awe of how someone would accuse us of stealing with little to no information on the situation.

The woman and manager barely let us speak and made us have to yell to talk over them. The woman took so much pride and acted high and mighty for the sake of “the homeless” when really she could have done the same with just informing us. All she did was escalate things to an insane extent and assume by the way we looked and acted that we would steal from a food drive.

The manager very rudely said “The Free-Gifts eligible for redemption have not been here for a loooong time.” Completely ignoring my mothers whole point of how she was un-formed, Mis led by the cashier and how the woman so quickly assumed we had means of shop-lifting from the *Homeless*. (Who in their right minds would do such a thing) He then told us to go to the end of the store and pick up the free-gift there instead.

After the manager said that the white woman starts *apologizing* for *our* “horrible behavior” she also twists our word in front of the man making it seem like we were lying and making up stories. The manager accepts her apology as if she could tell nothing but the truth and we were just people who try to steal from homeless food drives.

Nothing could have made this woman be so indefinitely sure that someone in their right mind would steal from a food drive for homeless people than exterior presumptions based on the way we act or look. (AKA. Racial profiling).

The manager should have used critical inference skills to see why she might think that and go to such far lengths.

It's absolutely heartbreaking that as a minority I feel unsafe and unprotected by management to go to yet another place in this town.

Misled, Misjudged and Mis-treated. Out of this store I walked out a new person. Knowing that this situation will be the first of many in my life due to stereo-types, assumptions and profiling.

Enclosed please find a picture of a pack of Top Sirloin I purchased from Safeway (shawnessy store in Calgary) yesterday, please take a close look at the price of your top sirloin and you should feel shame about your pricing, especially after the pandemic started, the NDP raised a question about who benefiting from the huge increased of the beef price, those dairy farmers said they didn't make any more money and the NDP MP urged to investigate.

To be honest, I shopped at Superstore for 28 years and I eye witnessed how Superstore taking advantage of both Pandemic and the crisis in Ukraine to raise the price so frequently blaming on supply, the pace superstore raised the price was so alarming something I found out I go back there two weeks later the price were up, not only a few percentage but 15 to 20 percents in very short period of time.

Do they really need to investigate? no, you just look at the profits of Loblaw during the last two years you probably know the answer.

I already shopping at Safeway, Co Op and Walmart and only shopped at Superstore for the deals. Superstore used to be the cheapest among all fours now is the most expensive one.

Someday, it will come back to burn your business.

Hello,

I’ve had the most unpleasant experience while accompanying a friend to shop at superstore in Windermere Edmonton yesterday.

My friend picked a box of 5kg chicken legs back attached which was in the flyer for sale at $12 but was priced at $33.03. She showed the flyer to the sales attendant who directed her to the customer service center who also directed her to the manager on duty Debbie.

That was the genesis of the problem. Debbie picked another box priced at $12 and was adamant that the deal on the flyer was for that box, not for what my friend had earlier on picked. My friend insisted the description was the same so couldn’t understand why there was an issue with the one she had picked. Long story short, Debbie grudgingly decided to override the price to sell at $12 and made a comment in a very condescending and disrespectful tone that that was the last time she would do that for my friend because my friend was fond of doing that. My friend was surprised and asked Debbie whether she knew her or had encountered her before. Debbie was unbelievable with her rude responses. In my attempt to cool things down, she turned her wrath on me. What a surprise! For a store manager to openly disrespect and speak rudely to customers is something I cannot fathom. I honestly hope she did not behave like that towards us because we’re blacks and she’s white. I told her she’s very rude and speaks disrespectfully. I’m not sure if that’s an attitude that superstore endorses but if that’s the case, I’ll be more disappointed.

I advise that as a retail chain, one of your core values should be communicating with candour and respect. And that core value should be ingrained in all employees including managers so that this doesn’t happen again. Superstore is my go to store for my groceries. I spend a fortune each year at superstore but at this time, I’m so angry and feel shamed by the manager that I will not be going to superstore anymore until this issue is resolved. After all, there are other equally good and competitive retail chains out here.

To emphasize, Debbie must be called to order.

From an aggrieved customer.

I lost my wallet inside the store on November 2022. My husband and I we tried so hard to find it and we couldn’t. We informed the front desk and they told us that they will call us once they will find it. Hours later we come up with an idea to check their camera.

We called and spoke with the manager he told us that we should call the rcmp to accompany us while accessing their camera. We called the rcmp they told us they cannot help with this situation. Called back the manager again and told him the rcmp cannot help us he said he will call us again because he’s going to phone their district. We are still waiting for his call.

I have $400, credit card and health card of our kids inside the wallet. I’m planning to use that $400 to buy us groceries that is good for the whole month.

I’m so disappointed of the lack of cooperation from superstore. I felt like they are OK for our kids not to eat the whole month.

I betcha if they call us they’re going to make it look like it’s our fault and still won’t allow to access on their camera.

Very disappointed on how people this bigger business shows no concern at all!

Hi, there were issues with the pumps on October 23 and my transaction would not go through. I kept trying and it kept failing (NOT an issue with my card!).

However, 2 of the transactions ($15 each) showed up in my bank account as pending, and I ended up getting charged an NSF fee, even though I never ended up getting the fuel.

Why did this happen?

The location was Signal Hill in Calgary, AB. The time was around 4:00 - 4:30 PM.

Every time I go to Cain's Independent Grocer 49-700 Tranquille Rd (1815) in Kamloops, BC V2B 3H9 the store will not price match Real Canadian Superstore flyer prices unless they are shown an actual physical paper flyer. I use your internet flyer. Is there a difference between the two and if not why do I need to show them the paper flyer?

Are they in any way affiliated with you?

Lorne

Its simple 3 of the last 4 times you are out of Chapmans IceCream (Vanilla). The reason is its a better value than the other brands with quality taste. Briers Has have 10 times the quantity but double the price. I went to customer service and they aren't interested.l guess 1 can buy it elsewhere but Superstore is where I shop.Who's getting paid off by Briers Ha Ha. Just interested why you cant order more.

Erick Nystrom Thunder Bay [protected]@gmail.com

On the morning of Monday Oct 3, 2022, at 11:50 am, my husband and I were shopping at Superstore at 3185 Grandview Hwy, Vancouver. While at the diary section (where you display the butter and cheese), suddenly a heavy and huge cardboard sign, which was hung dangling overhead by wires from the ceiling, fell off and landed on the floor right in front of us, missing us by a mere couple of inches. As the sign was heavy and fallen from a significant height, it hit the ground in an earsplitting thud, sounding like a firecracker explosion. We were extremely lucky it missed us, albeit barely, or else we could easily be killed or severely injured by its impact. But the incident left me and my husband totally shaken, for days, and with recurring nightmares. I have to say Superstore was also extremely lucky that no one was injured this time. However, unless Superstore takes immediate action to remedy this unsafe and dangerous installation, a repeat incident might easily result with disastrous consequences. Thank you in advance for your attention to this matter.

As evidence, I have attached here 2 related photos. One shows the fallen sign on the ground, and the other the ceiling where the sign was hung from.

Sincerely,

Audrey Yan

i have purchased honey crisp apples and at approx $2.00 an apple i would expect them to taste like honey crisp apples, totaling $12, they taste like chemicals?.

also i was in a rush and purchased a 3 pack of farmer market english cucumbers. i should know better. ever since you thought you would save the world by not wrapping single cucumbers to put in three pack the cucumbers go bad within 2 days. i am so tired of returning produce to superstore.

I would like to file a formal complaint regarding an incident with your employee Adriano this morning at 9:30am at the Real Canadian Superstore located on 3185 Grandview Hwy.

I was strolling my cart around the frozen ice cream section when I had to stop because Adriano had boxes blocking the aisle. I waited there as there was a small area to pass but he was standing in the way. He moved back 1 foot and told me to pass, but I mentioned to him there wasn't enough space as I would run over his foot with my shopping cart. He insisted that I move and commented "What's the matter, don't you know how to turn a cart?" I said that there wasn't enough room, and I would report him because he was rude. He defiantly said to go ahead so I did.

I spoke with Chevy the manager and request we all talk about the incident in person but he said that he would talk to Adriano in the back in private with his supervisor instead.

I don't like how this was handled as Adriano will probably just get a slap on the wrist and won't learn a thing. I would have preferred that he take ownership of his error and apologized in person. Can you look into this matter and get back to me.

Glen Kent

I use pc master card, with a spending of about thousand dollars, often more, every month. This morning excited, as my plan was to purchase a Ninja Air Fryer, a gift for my daughter. After my research, I found it at a less expensive price than superstore, so I went out to Superstore, checked the model number and was elated to find it in stock…went to customer service to price match this item and was told they would not price match. Only groceries. I do not shop at Superstore, any more as the prices are too high and I am a senior on a fixed income, but I still use my pc master card for all of my purchases. Of course, the reason for shopping at Superstore, for this item, was to use my points on my purchase. I do all my grocery shopping at Walmart, since the Pandemic, and now am wondering if I should switch my MasterCard to Walmart, as then I could have used my points to purchase the air fryer at Walmart. By the way the same item was less in price at most other stores. Superstore is taking advantage of the sad times we are in…

The last 3 pkg on NN low salt bacon have been sour. Bought and put in freezer.

So tried the Smoke House purchased 4 pkg. Again into the freezer. 2 so far have been sour.

So unless they come from the same shipper or it is your Vernon, BC location is not keeping them properally cold.

I live 35 km away. And spend alot. Find the reason and fix it. Let me know

I always notice the cashiers in Real Canadian Superstore Calgary always in hurry, the buyer or costumer is not finish yet packing the items or stuff in the plastic bags, then the cashier asking to pay the item right away.

Most of the time because the costumer is in hurry to pack, some item are damage or broken.

And some item they forgot to put in their grocery bag and left the store.

Not all costumer are young and healthy. Some of them are old and sick/ recovering from surgery and or having disability.

I wish to complain about poor customer relations due to a decision made by 'Head Office'.

My complaint is in regards to the Superstore located on Harvest Hills Blvd in Calgary AB.

During the COVID lockdown it was decided to close the east access doors to this store and utilize only the west doors. The COVID lockdowns are long gone and yet I was told the 'head office' has decided to permanently make these doors inaccessible to your patrons. This begs the question why?

This store, as well it's parking lot, was designed and built with two access door locations and now only west door location is open.

1) The current decision as it stands now has effectively made the east half and the adjacent 'overflow' parking lot useless to patrons.

2) The east half of the parking has the most handicap parking stalls which are now usually empty and useless to patrons.

3) The limited handicap stalls on the west half of the parking lot are at a premium and as such are full most of the time.

4) The west half of the parking lot is the smallest portion of the parking and with west access doors the only option, all these parking stalls are at a premium and usually full which is causing people to wait in their vehicles for a stall to empty, which creates a chaotic, frustrating grid lock situation.

5) The truck unloading bay is in this portion and makes it an almost untenable situation for deliveries

Over the past seven months, I left over seven applications for a position at the superstore in Surrey. I applied online and dropped my resume off but I never got a response. There were several positions online and even a sign in the store. I can help but feel like my resume was overlooked because of my race. From my name, it is obvious that I am non-Indian/Asian.

There is no equity, diversity or equal opportunity at this company. And that is sad in this day and age.