I have five pretty nice groceries stores, a Target and a Walmart Super Center, all equidistant from me, all with fairly similar selections for items I require, so I really don't have to shop around for anything but price. Needless to say, Big Y doesn't beat anyone in price and offers similar customer service, so I only stop in when I'm running errands in the Ellington area. We stopped in today, a little bit after noontime so we could do some urgent shopping and recycle our containers and plastic bags. When we got into the three machine bottle area, there were two guys who had enough returns for a frat party, and the third machine was not working. I used the buzzer/speaker intercom on the wall to summon the service desk and, when a young girl answered, I told her the third machine was broken/not working and asked her if she could please send someone to fix it. I did hear her call for help in the bottle room, but no over ever came. My fiance then suggested we split up to save time (both football and UConn basketball on TV today, ahem!)- one of us do the shopping, one do the recycling. I volunteered to do the recycling, since I had a long coat on. I called the service desk again, a while later, as it was 33 degrees in the room (literally- by my coat's LL Bean thermometer), and the two guys were going to be at it for a while still. The same girl answered and wearily said "I already called someone." I replied with "And can you please turn the heat on in here? It's absolutely freezing and every time somebody walks by the double door, they open." She said "Uh-huh" and hung up, cutting off my thank you midsentence. After a while, the two guys finally finished up. I asked them to please ask for help and heat (about which they also complained) when they cashed in their receipt at the service desk, to which they heartily agreed. I started my large recycling job, when a guy with a small bag walked in. I told him to take cuts, as he was elderly and it was freezing in there. He was quick, and said "Thanks VERY much, it IS cold in here!" I implored him to beseech the service desk for some heat and a repairman. He said he certainly would! I continued my recycling, but let yet another very small job person cut in. When I started up my recycling again, my fiancé came in and asked why it was so cold in there. I asked him, too, to call for help and heat, as my hands were so cold they'd gotten stiff, so he buzzed the service desk. The same young lady at the service desk answered, again repeating that she DID call someone, but that she'd do it again. I called out, telling her there was no heat in the room, that it was freezing. She snarkily said back quite loudly: "There IS no HEAT in there!" and hung up. Really??! After we packed it up, got into our car and then drove away, we saw a bespectacled young man walking outdoors to the bottle room's separate entrance, with no jacket on at all (Big Y should provide one, as the bottle room has a totally separate entrance you're required to walk outside to, and you get dirty and sticky changing the recycling bins).
In the bottle room, there's a thermostat centrally mounted about 9' up on the wall, and, I'm no HVAC specialist, but there's an open grate in the ceiling that looks pretty much like a heat grate. Stores are required by law to provide a recycling area for the bottles and cans they sell, but do people have to recycle them in outside temp air? That's absolutely ridiculous in the wintertime, and probably why, every time I come there to recycle, most people have weeks worth of recycling- they don't want to do it that often in an unheated room.
Big Y should fix the entrance doors to the bottle return room so that, in the wintertime, they're "press for entrance" style doors- like handicapped entrances, and control the heat with a motion sensor operated thermostat, that only calls for heat when the room's occupied (like the blowers used at their entry points in the chilly fall, when their entry doors are wide open). It didn't take a rocket scientist to know that's how they could save big bucks on the heating bill for that room. So, Big Y: please fix your bottle machines more promptly, change the bottle room's door openers, and HEAT THE BOTTLE RETURN ROOM!!! We customers deserve better than an unheated room to help you fulfill your recycling requirement. You should be HELPING us recycle, not making the experience hellishly cold. Thank you in advance! read more