foreign object in food from well known retailer

popplestones

My son bought some white chocolate chip cookies form a well known retailer today.
The cookies were found to contain shards of metal.
Can anyone offer me advice as to where to go and what to do from here?
Much abliged for any assistance.

scheming_gypsy

you go to the well known retailer and advise them that there was shards of metal in the cookies. They'll then ask you to send them back so they can check and investigate what's happened

go_cat

And / Or you report it to Environmental health who will also be able to investigate

Were all the cookies affected

Are you sure it is metal?

LMCD

scheming_gypsy wrote: »

you go to the well known retailer and advise them that there was shards of metal in the cookies. They'll then ask you to send them back so they can check and investigate what's happened

Yes - tell them immediately incase something serious happens to someone else - they need them off their shelves asap!!

piglet25

without all the dramatics, if the op's son had have eaten it he could have suffered a cut mouth, or scratched his throat or insides, so its not really very funny. I would be fuming if I found metal in anything my son had purchased to eat, its poor quality control during the manufacture of the product, and i personally would like to know which retailer they were from so I don't purchase any in future x

dreamypuma

piglet25 wrote: »

without all the dramatics, if the op's son had have eaten it he could have suffered a cut mouth, or scratched his throat or insides, so its not really very funny. I would be fuming if I found metal in anything my son had purchased to eat, its poor quality control during the manufacture of the product, and i personally would like to know which retailer they were from so I don't purchase any in future x

You could also get run over by a bus, or be crushed by an elephant. The fact is it didn't happen. Do you also believe that if this was a regular occurrence the retailer would still be selling these cookies?

piglet25

Fair point, but I would obviously avoid those risks as they would make themselves known to me before I stood in front of them - I don't expect to have to search through a cookie to see if it will cut my mouth before I munch it. I would like to avoid this retailers fresh produce on the basis that if there are metal shards found in there food through poor standards then there may well be other contaminents which I wouldn't find particularly tasty either.

dreamypuma

piglet25 wrote: »

Fair point, but I would obviously avoid those risks as they would make themselves known to me before I stood in front of them - I don't expect to have to search through a cookie to see if it will cut my mouth before I munch it. I would like to avoid this retailers fresh produce on the basis that if there are metal shards found in there food through poor standards then there may well be other contaminents which I wouldn't find particularly tasty either.

I think you make an assumption that other retailers are more vigilant about standards than this one. This is one incident from one consumer from one store and one packet of cookies. Hardly a reasonable basis on which to judge a retailer. There are probably many thousands of incidents such as these everyday from a multitude of retailers.

It is likely that a retailer is far more vigilant about hygiene, processes, contamination and the auditing of such like than the majority of it's consumers. The retail and manufacturing industry, is tightly regulated and pours phenomenal sums of money in these matters. The average consumer probably relies on a £1.50 bottle of disinfectant, a Jay cloth and there own unregulated levels of effort in their own home.

arcon5

piglet25 wrote: »

Fair point, but I would obviously avoid those risks as they would make themselves known to me before I stood in front of them - I don't expect to have to search through a cookie to see if it will cut my mouth before I munch it. I would like to avoid this retailers fresh produce on the basis that if there are metal shards found in there food through poor standards then there may well be other contaminents which I wouldn't find particularly tasty either.

You realise retailers don't manufacturer every product instore, right? Some stores use hundreds of different manufacturers, some use wholesalers who get products from manufacturers, some stores sell the same products as other stores produced at the same time as others

I know, I know -- I was surprised to learn this too!

lynzpower

Another crazy thread.

Op call Environmental Health, they are used to investigating this sort of thing. Many of these kinds of situation do lead to recalls so you are not being silly.

The council may have a call centre to take the complaint over the weekend or you should call the council ( where you bought the product, not where you live) and tell them all about it.

Forwandert

Naming the retailer won't make any difference, I remember a recall on biscuits several years ago which was basically the same with a contamination on the product from one retailer, once the incident was reported to the manufacturer via the retailer pretty much every major supermarket in the UK had to do a recall, there was aproximately 20/30 lines of biscuits in stores ranging from Tesco, Asda, co-op and various others, the ranges were everything from value to the higher priced 'top quality' ranges.