I apologise. I know that I’m banging on about this, but I’ve just had a response to my latest attempt at communicating with them. What’s getting to me now is not so much their insistence that they are in Clapham, but the fact that they don’t really know where they are and are having huge difficulties in communicating on the subject.

Back on the 1 October they told me that they were in Clapham.

I replied:

Thank-you very much for your reply. Unfortunately I’m not sure that you have fully covered my points.

I’m loathe to suggest this, but might the general store manager be wrong in this instance?

I’ve only lived here for 13 years, so it might be I’m wrong (I’ve no idea how connected he is with the area). However, I suspect that he probably isn’t quite as connected as one of my near neighbours who has lived within a few hundred yards of the store (even when it was a railway yard) for the best part of 80 years, she is adamant that the area is Battersea.

Plenty of others are making a similar mistake. Wandsworth council, which covers the area, seemed to think that SW11 is Battersea when they passed a motion on the subject in 2008 (link opens a PDF of the motion).

And Asda itself isn’t perfect. Back in 2008 you changed your name to reflect the area it is actually located (link). Even today your website still seems to think it’s the Clapham Junction store in Battersea (link).

It seems that there are an awful lot of people that need correcting on this issue!

I know a few people have had responses from one of your colleagues acknowledging a mistake has been made. But I also had an offer from one of your PR people to write a blog post about it on Your Asda and see what sort of response it got; although if we’re letting blog posts rather than geographical fact decide the outcome I think I might see about running a campaign to get it rebranded as Narnia, or possibly Hoth.

Might you be able to double check on the issue?

Today I got a response:

Dear Mr Cousins,

Thanks for your further email sent to my colleague Will Hayton. I’m replying to you on his behalf.

I am very sorry if you find the advert misleading as this was never our intention regarding the location of our Clapham Junction store.

The store is called the Clapham Junction store because it is just next to the Clapham Junction stop on the rail network. However, I have passed on your comments in this matter to the marketing team. They will be able to bear this in mind when planning any future adverts showing the store name.

Thank you for taking the time to bring this matter to our attention. If you require any further assistance please do not hesitate to contact me.

Kind Regards

Kelvin Edet
ASDA Service Team

And where do you go from there? Not only are they failing to acknowledge the facts, they now seem to think their store is called ‘Clapham Junction’ (and it wouldn’t be a problem if it was). Possibly the tactic is to keep the incompetence going until I give up or die, whichever happens sooner.

They should never underestimate the determination of a pedantic man. (Which probably means they’ll keep it going until I die.)

2 thoughts on “Asda and borderline obsession

  1. I submitted a comment on the asda website saying the store had been rebranded wrongly, and I also received a reply from Kelvin, and its absolutely identical !! Apart from the first line about Hayton, its literally word for word the same! I shall send a scathing reply…

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