Haagen Dazs pulls weight trick on consumers
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E-mail China.org.cn, October 11, 2012
Who could imagine that even Haagen Dazs, the Rolls-Royce of ice cream brands in China, would cheat its consumers on the scales?
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Consumer reports have reached the Shanghai-based China Business News that the single and double scoops of Haagen Dazs ice cream they bought, were frequently found to be below standard weight.
According to the investigation carried out by the reporter from China Business News across several Haagen Dazs stores in Shanghai and Beijing, the reported weight problem does actually exist. Take the double scoop of Matcha and vanilla flavored ice cream the reporter ordered at a Haagen Dazs store in Shanghai's Pudong District for example. The standard weight is set at 155 grams. However, when the reporter weighed the ordered ice cream on the store's electronic scales, the net weight after removing the cup and the plastic spoon was only 137 grams, a difference of up to 18 grams. A double scoop of ice cream costs 59 yuan (US$9.33 ) in this place. In this case, the consumer was paying 6.85 yuan (US$1.08) for air.
After his findings, the reporter emailed General Mills (China), the company responsible for the China's Haagen Dazs sales, to inquire about the weight problem. The company however was not available for any comments. Yet when the reporter bought different ice cream coups from random Haagen Dazs stores in Shanghai and Beijing, the problem seemed to be less evident than initially assumed; the sales people appeared to have been very attentive to the weighing requirements.
Cost control was said to have been the reason behind the cases instigating consumer complaints. According to an anonymous source working in the food marketing industry, Haagen Dazs and other ice cream stores maintain a strict cost accounting system.
The weight of the ice cream scoops basically depends on the salesperson, but the fussy management aspect of the brand's operations leaves room for improvement in the weight department.
"To increase gross returns, the stores want to get as many scoops as possible from every ice cream bucket," the anonymous source explained.
According to Haagen Dazs Company regulations, its ice cream weight allows for a margin of error of roughly five grams. If the scoops weigh less than that, the company will make up for the shortage; if the scoops weigh more, the company won't ask the customer to hand back the additional ice cream.
"For a brand like Haagen Dazs, it is not necessary to make profit by pulling weight tricks," Zheng Xueqin, deputy director and chief researcher with the China Brand Research Institute, told the reporter. "The problem actually reflected that there are loopholes in the chain's business management process."
"Even ordinary brands will make sure to give the consumer the correct and honest measure," Zheng said, "It was wrong for Haagen Dazs to even have such a problem. It will no doubt taint its brand image."
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