Mars chocolates to the rescue!

On Oct. 4, I bought a bag of m&m's with peanuts from the United Dairy Farmers store #138 at 5540 Dixie Hwy., Fairfield OH 45014. Nothing unusual for me except that this was the first time I had bought this particular candy at this store. The first m&m was okay, but the second tasted stale. It was fairly clear that most of the few m&m's that I ate were stale. The date code was 101, so I looked this up on the Internet and found that the m&m's in this bag were manufactured the first week of 2011, almost two years earlier. The good news: I didn't get sick from the stale peanuts.

At this point, I had two choices: Complain to UDF or to Mars. The sad thing is that UDF is not the company it used to be. Staffing at many stores is being cut below the minimum I would expect. They just built a beautiful new store in Norwood (4344 Smith Road, Norwood OH 45212) but neglected to include public restrooms. (When I'm traveling and stop for gas, I usually need to use the restroom. Don't try that at a UDF.)

My concern was that if I called UDF, nothing would happen. So I called Mars using the toll-free number on the back of the bag and talked to a nice person who checked the date code and agreed that that bag should not have been on the shelf and that she would take care of the situation. The next week, I received the well-written letter and coupons in the mail.

Two weeks later, I found myself back in UDF store #138 so I thought I would check the m&m's with peanuts on the shelf. The date code was now 220 (manufactured May 13 to May 19, 2012), which is well within the shelf life of this product.

I would like to thank Mars for being so courteous to me on the phone and sending me the great letter. The coupons are a unexpected bonus.