I sent out a few emails this week praising companies for their food products. I wrote to Kellogg asking if they are planning to expand their Organic Morningstar line to include the Twin Cities. Their form letter response told me to buy them online. Not so much with the helpful.
On the other hand, my GoOrganic! coupons arrived yesteday - yeah! Amy's Kitchen wrote me a very nice email and said they'll send me information and coupons. Stonyfield Farm sent me a nice email as well. I guess that illustrates the difference between conglomerates and small businesses.
My family is visting this weekend, so we cleaned the house like mad last night. Everything is in its place and sparkling clean...my favorite. I haven't planned much for meals, though. Maybe I'll look up recipes today. It's just so hard to want to cook when it's 95 degrees!
My new pepper rotted on the vine. I suspect that there wasn't enough calcium in the soil, so I added bonemeal. It's also super hot on the deck, so maybe the plants aren't too happy with that, either. I don't have anywhere else to put them, though, out of the reach of hungry rabbits. The tomatoes are doing great!
I have taken the bus to work almost every day so far this month, and SO has picked me up from work most nights. It's great! I'm still on the same tank of gas from May. 
emailing companies
July 13th, 2006 at 01:37 pm
July 13th, 2006 at 01:53 pm 1152798829
I debate about emailing stonyfield, my main beef is they arn't in our local store, I hate having to go to the other one... but I never know what to say..I am not to good at writng...
July 13th, 2006 at 02:20 pm 1152800438
You might want to email Stonyfield and tell them you like their products and would buy more of them if they were offered at the specific store closer to you...ask if they plan to sell through that store...maybe ask if they have any coupons they could send you.
July 13th, 2006 at 07:00 pm 1152817203
Last summer I had a problem with my over a year old Crockpot. I emailed Rival. They emailed back and asked if it was possible to send a digital photo. I did, and the response was they would replace the broken metal heating casing. They sent a brand new Crockpot!
Also last summer I emailed Alfred Dunner about a pantsuit I had purchased that said it was washable, but the colors ran. I had to pay postage to mail it back in, but they replaced it with a comparable pantsuit.
This summer I bought a bottle of yeast for my breadmaking. It didn't make the dough rise. I emailed Fleischmann's. Within 24 hours I received a nice email saying they would send me a coupon for a new bottle and a booklet with tips and recipes. Within 3 business days I received it.
Too bad all businesses aren't as good as the ones I have listened and the smaller ones you gave kudos!
July 13th, 2006 at 08:05 pm 1152821142
A two line email: love it, hate it, can't find it, can't afford it...quite often I will simply tell the organic companies:
"I just found your products in our local stores! I've heard that they are wonderful, and would really like to try them. Do you have any coupons available? Thank you...name, address, email."
Or something along those lines. Simpler is better.
Think of it this way...small companies can't afford to pay for the newspaper coupon subscriptions, or the blinkies, or all those other things. Little Crow Foods has actually stopped providing any coupons except by personal request. Why? They don't get enough redemption to pay for the cost of printing and distributing.
So...when you contact them to ASK for a coupon, 1, they know you are the "target customer", because you are actually interested in purchasing their products, 2, if you use the coupon, even if it's a FREE item, it's one moving off the shelf, which helps indicate to the grocer that someone wants to buy the product, so they should continue stocking it, and 3, if they believe in their products they believe you will continue to purchase it if you like it.
The big companies, that's a different story...they receive over 4000 requests for coupons a day, and they don't NEED your business as much as the smaller companies do.