The Metro supermarket chain has decided to put a Star of David back up over its display of Passover products at its franchise in Westmount, following several angry phone calls by local customers.
On Sunday, the store manager received a complaint from a customer that a religious symbol had no place in the aisles of the supermarket. The customer also took a picture that he sent to French-language media in Montreal.
So the head office for Metro, which owns 600 stores across Quebec and Ontario, told the store manager to remove the symbol.
Marie-Claude Bacon, the director of corporate affairs for Metro, said the company executives reversed their decision when it received at least a dozen calls from customers who explained the Star of David is an important symbol for the Jewish Community this time of year.
“We didn’t mean to offend anyone,” Bacon said. “We’re here for all our customers, so we decided to put back the Star of David realizing we made a mistake.”
This is the 10th year that the store, which counts many Jewish customers among its clientele, makes a special display to showcase the matzo, kosher chicken soup and latkes pancake mix that will be served at Passover, which this year runs from April 18 to 26.
It is the first time it has received any complaints, said franchise owner and manager Graham Fletcher.
Many of his clients were still irate about the whole debacle Wednesday afternoon.
(Source: The Montreal Gazette)
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11 Responses
So let me see if I get this:
1. Store puts Star of David over its Kosher LePesach merchandise.
2. Some Jews object to the star, store takes it down.
3. Some other Jews object to the removal of the star, so the store puts the star back.
Sounds like this store (is it owned by gentiles, Jews, or all of the above?) is trying hard to accommodate us Jews, but some of us keep making it harder for the store.
And who is the director of corporate affairs for the store? A guy named Bacon? Let’s hope none of us Jews ask for him to be fired, or quarantined from the Kosher aisle.
that city was completely inhabited by enormous numbers of indians. they killed all of them and built right on top of them.., i don’t think they have the right to complain about anything.
nfgo3,
Where does it say in the article that the customer who complained was Jewish?
nfgo3-I did not see any reference to the ethnicity of the initial complainer.
#1 IT WAS NOT A JEW THAT COMPLAINED IT WAS PROBABLY SO FRENCH ANTI SEMITE AS YOU CAN TELL…THEY FELT THE NEED TO SEND A PICTURE TO THE FRENCH MEDIA
Where does it say that a Jewish customer complained?
sorry nfg03, please guide me through this article, and show me where it says “some Jews object to the star”.
“the store manager received a complaint from a customer that a religious symbol had no place…..”
I’m not going to pile on 🙂
Note that this was initiated by a SINGLE customer. Yes, he involved the likely anti religious French media and the chain probably didn’t want to deal with negative press, BUT this was initiated by a single person. The next time someone asks to write or call for something important, don’t shrug it off and say “I’m just a single person, who is listening”. They are listening, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. One complainer against, a bunch making more noise for, and the store put it back.
im from montreal…
the person who complained, obviously NOT a yid, most probably french or other, anti-Semite
and Marie-Claude… is most likely not a guy.
Interesting. our symbol denotes the omnipresence. Their symbol the hanging of their jewish so called savior. I wonder what the symbol of the third religion is?
To all my numerable but unnumbered critics: You are right, I was wrong. Thanks to most of you for being polite about it. And of course, special thanks to No. 8 for not piling on. And if No. 9 is write about the gender of French names, a special apology to Ms. Bacon. (If No. 9 is wrong, there is no Ms. Bacon in this story.)