NEWTOWN WOMAN'S CLICK-AND-COLLECT ARRIVES IN FRIDGE-SIZED BOX CONTAINING ONE (1) GRAPE
Woolworths says the packaging is "within tolerance". The grape is green.
A Newtown woman who ordered her weekly shop online has taken delivery of a box the size of a bar fridge. Inside was a single grape, three metres of brown paper, and an apology slip.
Recipient Priya Solomon, 34, said she'd assumed the box held the rest of her order. She wheeled it inside on a sack barrow borrowed from next door. "Took me ten minutes to open it. There's a grape in there. One grape. Not a bunch. A grape."
The rest of her shop, Solomon was later informed by email, had been "split across three further deliveries" arriving Thursday, Saturday, and "a date to be confirmed". The grape, she was told, had been prioritised because it was "perishable".
A Woolworths spokesperson said the packaging was "within standard tolerance for single-item dispatch" and that customers could recycle the box kerbside. Asked whether sending one grape in a box you could fit a toddler in was a fair use of cardboard, the spokesperson said the matter was "under review".
Solomon's neighbour Marlon, who runs the coffee cart by the hospital, said he watched the courier wrestle the box for a full minute before giving up and leaving it on the porch. "He looked at me. I looked at him. Neither of us said anything."
The grape is in the fruit bowl. Solomon says she's not eating it on principle.
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Reader Letters
Margaret_F
Honestly this is the peak of modern convenience somehow turning into its own joke. Imagine needing a sack barrow for a grape. What a world!
Garry (Halswell)
Back in my day, you'd walk into the corner store, buy half a dozen grapes, and they'd come wrapped in newspaper, not some bloody fridge-sized monstrosity. This 'click and collect' stuff is a bunch of nonsense if you ask me.
waywardkauri
One hell of a carbon footprint for a grape! When are these companies going to be held accountable for all this waste? It's bloody ridiculous!
pedantic_pete
Technically, the correct term should be 'sack truck' not 'sack barrow'. Makes a difference for us engineering types, you know.
BarryBishopdale
@KiwiConspira Cardboard control? Mate, I think you're off your rocker. It's just a bloody packing fiasco. Chill out.
couchgremlin
Lol, eating that grape is going to be a big moment in history.