Taken Away
Posted in Miscellaneous on November 24th 2003 by Randy Reichardt:: A few days ago I lamented Safeway’s decision to stop serving Italian wedding soup as one of their deli products. Last weekend, I went to Staples, wanting to purchase a few Easy Stick double-sided adhesive cartridges, and a couple Staedtler Lumocolor 313 Superfine pens. I could find neither product, and ensuing discussions with a Staples staff member proved fruitless. Short answer: they don’t carry these items anymore.
For years I wore the Reebok Newport walking shoe. Simple, straightforward, basic shoe, about $60Cdn, heckuva deal, as they say in Minnesota. A few weeks ago, I visited a shoe store where in the past, I purchased these shoes. I couldn’t see any about, so asked a clerk for help. I might as well have been staring into the eyes of a chicken – no such shoe exists, there is no Reebok Newport Classic anymore. Reebok still makes the Classic, but there is no Newport.
For many years, my mother sold nutrimetics. The line of men’s products was called Bavarian, and I really, really liked the soap and aftershave. A few years back, nutrimetics stopped producing the Bavarian line, and replaced it with another family of products that in my estimation, didn’t come close to its predecessor.
A new word needs to be coined or invented, in the English language, to describe when this happens. The definition of the word would read something like: when a product or service one likes, uses and purchases regularly, is suddenly withdrawn from market and made no longer available, resulting in feelings of anger and frustration for the consumer.
