Waitrose

Dear Sirs,

I am writing, regretfully, to make a complaint about one of your 'takeaway' salad pots. I have been a long-standing and loyal customer of yours, partly because I have always found your products and customer service to be of very high quality, and also because the only supermarket any nearer is Aldi and frankly I try to avoid that nest of grinning pygmies and inbred cretins as much as possible. Tesco is not too much trouble to get to but I do find that it is frequented by the kind of people who like to smack their children in public. Generally, I am not opposed to a spot of corporal punishment in the right situation, but I don’t see why I should have to listen to the sound of other people’s obnoxious spawn at top volume while I’m trying to do my weekly shop.

Regardless of Waitrose’s various triumphs over other emporia, unfortunately today I experienced an overwhelming sense of disappointment and dismay. My good lady-wife, Agatha, who is somewhat of an enthusiast for healthy, wholesome food, bought me a salad ‘to-go’ for lunch because we were running late for our Monday afternoon bridge game. I must admit I am not usually a fan of lettuce and such, considering it more the sort of sustenance as might be taken by a rabbit or some other fluffy and essentially useless creature, but generally I find those from the Waitrose quite flavoursome. Unfortunately, I have now been put off this healthsome lunch option forever as on this occasion I found a 2 inch long splinter nestling amongst the greenery. For me, the experience brought back grisly memories of my tortured childhood. As a pupil of St Ubald’s School for Young Gentlemen, I was frequently the victim of senseless and unprovoked attacks of bullying. I was small for my age and a late developer, and young boys can be very cruel. However, I did find that my small frame was particularly well-suited for tree-climbing and I spent many hours wedged up high among the school foliage. Although not particularly comfortable, the conditions were preferable to being beaten to a bloody pulp by my boisterous ‘rugger-bugger’-type schoolfellows, but unfortunately hiding from my well-muscled foes was not without its own dangers. I was continually being splintered and Matron, who had a face like a meat sandwich, was very unsympathetic. She would never let me peel a splinter out by myself, bit by bit so it didn’t hurt, but always whipped it off with excruciating efficiency and a cry of ‘grow some balls, you wet nelly!’ For reasons I’m sure you can understand, the memories have stayed with me and finding a splinter unexpectedly in my salad brought them crashing down with such a severity that I had to retire immediately to lie in a darkened room. Subsequently, I missed my bridge game.

This sort of hygiene breach is simply unacceptable and I am distraught that I have had to experience such lax standards in your hitherto highly-regarded grocery store. In Lidl, perhaps, it can be expected, but certainly not in Waitrose. A long time ago you took on the mantle of setting the standard in British groceries and now, lamentably, you have chosen to throw your reputation down the lavatory.

I most sincerely hope you rectify this problem before other loyal customers are turned away from your brand forever. 

Yours in anguish,

Derek Haselhurst-Horton