Changing formulations
Posted: February 18th, 2018, 5:35 pm
What do you do when a product you've used happily for years changes behind your back, and becomes unfit for purpose?
That's just happened to me with a Sainsburys' own brand detergent, which I've been using happily since May 2013[1]. I opened a new bottle of it this morning, and found that they've changed the formulation, and now it stinks the place out.
Seems I'm not the only one with this problem. Sainsburys' own page at https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/shop/gb/gr ... -washes%29 shows several reviewers from Jan/Feb this year complaining specifically about the change. One reviewer in particular (mrsjh) - shown as a "top 25 contributor" at Sainsburys' site - gives it a one-star "never again" review on Feb 9th, after giving it (the old formulation) a positive four-star review just nine months earlier.
If this were a different brand I were trying for the first time, I'd just take it on the chin and never buy it again: I can bring the stink down by setting the washing machine to run three extra rinses[2]. But when it's masquerading as the same product I know and trust, I call that serious misrepresentation. I've just today had words with Customer Services. A bit of online research at Which? tells me my next port of call should be Trading Standards, but I thought I'd pause here to vent en route.
[1] That's when I moved here and Sainsburys became my local supermarket.
[2] The last time I tried a different liquid - the bio version of the same Sainsburys own brand stuff - I did exactly that. That's the only time I've tried a different detergent since May 2013, not least because the experience of that smell put me off experimenting with detergents I haven't tried.
That's just happened to me with a Sainsburys' own brand detergent, which I've been using happily since May 2013[1]. I opened a new bottle of it this morning, and found that they've changed the formulation, and now it stinks the place out.
Seems I'm not the only one with this problem. Sainsburys' own page at https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/shop/gb/gr ... -washes%29 shows several reviewers from Jan/Feb this year complaining specifically about the change. One reviewer in particular (mrsjh) - shown as a "top 25 contributor" at Sainsburys' site - gives it a one-star "never again" review on Feb 9th, after giving it (the old formulation) a positive four-star review just nine months earlier.
If this were a different brand I were trying for the first time, I'd just take it on the chin and never buy it again: I can bring the stink down by setting the washing machine to run three extra rinses[2]. But when it's masquerading as the same product I know and trust, I call that serious misrepresentation. I've just today had words with Customer Services. A bit of online research at Which? tells me my next port of call should be Trading Standards, but I thought I'd pause here to vent en route.
[1] That's when I moved here and Sainsburys became my local supermarket.
[2] The last time I tried a different liquid - the bio version of the same Sainsburys own brand stuff - I did exactly that. That's the only time I've tried a different detergent since May 2013, not least because the experience of that smell put me off experimenting with detergents I haven't tried.