Undercover Bloggers

The other day I had a stand-out great experience at a new grocery store. For years I have been a lazy and happy online shopper, but our family's recent entrance into the world of Gluten Free has exposed the limitations of my beloved Online Shopping (with a rubbish GF range).

So I thought I'd give the brand new New World in Mt Roskill a go. And oh boy, I am a convert. This is a shiny new store with acres of gluten free goodies in all the right places (GF pasta with the other pasta, GF cookies with the other cookies etc; all highlighted with a bright green sticker). Lovely.

And the staff! They are all smiley and shiny happy people. They actually help you if you ask. Or even if you are just standing looking confused some on-the-ball staff member is likely to drop what they are doing and steer you in the right direction.

Simoney! I hear you saying. You promised you would not become a review blog! Who is paying you to say all this??

Nobody. I promised to not become a review blog, and I won't. Just bear with me until I get to the point, OK?

On my third expedition to my new shopping hang-out, I was hunting for my favourite GF bread (Venerdi), not having any luck. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a crisp white shirt emblazoned with the New World logo, and so I turned to the wearer and asked, "Excuse me, can you tell me where the Venerdi bread is??"

This well-turned out gentleman promptly scoured the appropriate shelves, and then went off to the back room, returning waving a loaf.

"We've been cleaned out after our tasting on Saturday," he explained.

We chatted for a moment on the merits of Venerdi GF bread (yummy) vs the other stuff (polystyrene) and he invited me to drop any suggestions for products I'd like to see in the suggestion box. {Stay with me, I'm getting to it}.

Then as I was lining up at the checkout, this gentleman re-appeared with yet more bread and... a loaf of the in-store baked stuff.
"Would you like to try it?" he asked.
"Er, no I think I'll just stick with the Venerdi..." I replied.
"Take it. You can have it for free," he said, and instructed the (smiley shiny happy) checkout operator not to scan it.
"Wow, thanks! That's very kind of you!" I gushed, as he walked away with a smile and a wave.

Russ cutting the Ribbon

"Do you know who that was???" asked the checkout lady. I shook my head, no.

"That was our store owner! He's great! We all just love working here... oh and has anybody ever said that you look a bit like Julia Roberts??" {I kid you not. That's what she said. Ha!}

Wow. So now I know why the staff are all so enthusiastic, service oriented and helpful. It comes down from the Top.
And the bread, by the way, is actually Yummy. I made it into garlic bread for Miss Fab tonight and YUM! Not like polystyrene at all. She gobbled it up and so did I.

Now to come to my point at last...
This lovely shopping experience gave me an idea {oh yes, here we go...}
You see, that Store Owner (whose name is Russ Wilkinson) and his staff had no idea that I am a blogger. They didn't be nice to me because I would give them a good review. I caught them in the act of being Great.
I was an Undercover Blogger.

And there have been other times, when the service is so terrible, and the experience so shocking, that I have just had to blog about it. Like this time at Cafe Tabou in Kingsland. I caught them in the act of being totally crap. They didn't know who they were messing with. I was an Undercover Blogger.

As are we all.
We have between us the power of our influence. We have readers. People listen to us.
And I thought, why not combine our Power and Influence and give the Undercover Bloggers a combined voice?

Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?

My idea is to create a new blog with many contributors, up and down the country. A kind of index or knowledge bank steering us towards the great places and away from the bad.

Have you ever blogged about any really great or really terrible experiences in shops/cafes/family attractions or other places?? We could kick things off by uploading all our past stories, creating a directory of where's good and where's not. Maybe even a matching Facebook Fan page {I'm really into those at the moment, have you noticed?}

It would hopefullly grow to the point where we get a bit of a profile, you know, like that TV programme "Target".

Where cafe owners and store managers will think twice before being rude or unhelpful.

"That woman over there taking all those photos of the coffee... do you think she could be.... An UnderCover Blogger???!!!"

It could happen!
Yeah. This could be lots of fun.
So I am throwing out the invitation to jump on board. I don't want this to be just me. In fact if there's no interest I'll just flag it. This is a blogging community venture. Or nothing.

Sarah from KMB is very supportive of the idea and has offered us space to advertise on the KMB site. She also said she could make us some cute little stars (or cupcakes??) for a rating system on each post.

Of course all contributors would be able to link back to their blogs. And HEY! if you are not already a blogger, there's nothing to stop you joining in and becoming a contributor here!

So. What do you think? Want to be an Undercover Blogger? I'll make a pretty button and everything.

Ooooh and then we could send an email to the people we have just written about (good or bad) and say: "You have been Blogged!"

Come on, doesn't that sound like fun? Getting revenge for that really bad coffee and shoddy service??

Let me know your thoughts and whether (or not) you would like to be a contributor on The Undercover Bloggers team. But if I hear nothing, well, I will just quietly bury this idea and go back to my day blog. Sigh.