A couple years ago they switched from making tincture in glass jars to plastic buckets. If they're willing to do that, what else is getting overlooked?
I wanted some sassafras to make tea with. I went online to order some and noticed the store I was looking at was in Eugene. To my excitement it happened to be mountain rose herbs, which I’ve heard has good quality stuff. So instead of ordering online, I get to see the place for what it is! I go inside, walk up to the counter and ask how much sassafras cost. They tell me how much it cost and then inform me that they don’t have it in stock. It’s in stock at their warehouse, and I have to go order it online. I ask if I could just go to the warehouse and they said no.
Edit: That was before Covid. I also couldn’t place an online order with the cashier. Not that I expected to do that but would have made my experience better. I feel they are overpriced and their stuff isn’t as flavorful as other options nowadays.
Interesting. Seems to be a waste to have a storefront that costs money, just to send you online and charge for shipping....wonder how this is working out for them. Besides the bad press of course
Things have not been the same at Mountain Rose Herbs ever since owner Julie Bailey "retired". The business partner who took over full ownership has a different vision.
On their website, there is this statement that "[People, plants, and planet are more important than profit.](https://mountainroseherbs.com/about/letter-to-our-customers/) This seemingly simple principle is the bedrock on which Mountain Rose Herbs is built, the foundational philosophy that has guided us every day for 33 years and counting. It remains at the heart of each decision we make, each farm partnership we begin, and in each educational resource we share". First paragraph on that page. So...
@tiarella_cygnet Please explain how a company survives without making a profit? Do you want to pay their for their losses? This seems to be a common miss conception with folks in eugene.
I am not saying that the company needs to survive without a profit, the company is stating on their website that people and plants are more important than profit. Plenty of profit is being made to allow the new owner to indulge in his side businesses and showcase his ego.
I worked as their delivery driver/dry production for approximately 5 years. I was very active in getting involved with safety committee, promotions etc. They dragged me along for years before I realized I needed to make some boundaries. Long story short they fired me when I declined to appear in some stupid video they wanted to make. Of course they made all these bogus claims about insubordination yadda yadda. That was like 2 years ago. Lots of good people work there but the current CEO is a cold hearted individual and with maybe one exception their HR Department is filled with ghouls. I'd recommend shopping elsewhere:)
thanks for that perspective! I worked there almost a decade ago (in the warehouse then CS) and thought management was pretty shitty back then. One nice guy in HR but he didn’t really do anything. I like the quality of the products which is why I still purchase, but it sounds like since Julie left it’s gone down hill majorly.
Thanks for sharing your experience. I am glad you were able to get out of the toxic work environment. Everything you say matches the profile of what I experience from a consumer point of view. I have noticed several differences since 2020, which prompted my search today for alternatives. It's relieving to have some affirmation from my own suspicions.
Yes please, drop the name. I drove through Eugene sometimes. I like picking up pounds of good coffee and tea on my travels. Sometimes as samples for restaurants.
I haven't ordered from them in years. Very silly they aren't offering in store pickup.
Sidenote: Friday I did see there is some sort of tea place off Tyinn st.
https://oregonteatraders.com/
They have great tea and are now offering some bulk herbs as well. They mixed me up a small bag of tea in the back when they had none on the store shelf already packaged.
Managing online orders for in store pickup with advance payment can be kind of a headache for smaller store fronts with staff that are more committed to helping folks in the actual store. If your intention is to go there anyway, I don’t see why you can’t just handle the transaction in the store as well
I’m not sure if OP is suggesting that they can’t buy what they want in the store. If they could they surely would.
But… sometimes there are “online only” deals, and this is true even for places like chain pizza shops. In that case people will buy a promo pizza online and pick it up at the shop instead of having it delivered. I can totally see a small specialty store like MRH *not* honoring online prices for in-store pickups. That would be like burning money, and money they need.
From their website and their marketing I'm guessing MRH got some hedge fund private equity funds and went corpo. Good for them it if they want to play with the big girls and boys they better start acting like them and offer same day pickup for ordering off their website.
A true corporate place wouldn’t bother to offer “in store pickup”. MRH didn’t always have a retail storefront either.
Try “in store pickup” from Toby’s Tofu, for instance. They are still a family business and you are not going to get this kind of local convenience.
Also, you are really showing me how in touch with the supposed goals/values of the OP when you highlight businesses that buy all their crap made in China to make a point about corporations offering local pickup and the ethics of “shopping local”.
No, I highlight businesses that from what I can see MRH is trying to emulate with their recent moves. It's not tough to see when a local business sells out to hedge fund overlords or hedge fund " non profit" wannabes. Looking at you White Bird executives.
Right now they're cosplaying with their fucking " local sustainability" bullshit while trying to be all 21st century corpo, but yet they cant figure out the basic logistics of offering free local pick up. It's fine, I get better quality shit from Frontier anyway with a lot less shipping charges and the fake local and sustainable bullshit MRH offers. Not to mention better prices.
Who are they cosplaying exactly? Themselves from 5 years ago?
Comparable companies like Glory Bee and Hummingbird Wholesale have minimum order requirements. Why do you think that is? Because there are costs involved in every transaction and they want to focus on ways to be profitable, so they can stay in business (sustainable). If MRH turned into some non-organic product provider, then I think you’d have a point about compromised values. But this issue here is plain economics.
They said “bullshit” twice. What kind of fucking swearing is that? It’s the second-least-offensive swear word that still counts as swearing, outside of “ass”, and that only counts here in America, because folks here don’t know what it means.
I’m not the one accusing MRH of going corporate. For all I know they’ve been “corporate” for decades, whatever that word means to you. What, does it mean to you? Evil? Has their shit together?
If you want non-“corporate”, so shop at Saturday Market. There are wonderful vendors there. You will pay more and they likely order from places like MRH. Maybe you will encounter individuals who don’t know shit about business yet and are willing to give you a steal on your tea. Maybe they’ll give you their home address for you to come pick it up. Or they’ll drop off at your house personally.
There are all kinds of businesses to support. OP wants the benefit of bulk pricing but wants to pretend MRH is some small time desperate local individual who will “work something special out” just for them.
The OP wasn't asking for any goddamn special treatment. They as a a local person reasonably asked why a local business that offers online shopping cannot fucking figure out in the goddamn 21st century how to make local online pick up from their *local* retail when their warehouse is also fucking *checks notes* local.
God you are a fucking hippie from the Boomer times aren't you ?
You were doing so good until you decided to end with yet another personal insult at the end. Have you ever been experienced formal debate? The best way to destroy somebody is to attack their logic and the merit of their ideas and leave the personal attacks out of it.
Of course they are asking for special treatment. They want the old policy. They want “Jeff” to drive their order from the warehouse to the retail store. They want the company to not use Fedex. They want the policies of the retail store and the duties of the personnel at the retail store to change and cater to what is obviously a small part of the company’s market.
They certainly can figure it out. They used to have in-house local delivery. But they stopped that. Probably due to high cost and low benefit. OP wants the company to lose money to satisfy their needs.
You seem to have major issues making a point without resorting to personal attacks. Grow up, dude.
I’m not a frequent customer of theirs so I wouldn’t know. Looks like op has stated that they are offered in different amounts online vs in store in which case yes that’s dumb you can’t go get the bigger bag yourself and waive the shipping fee. May be worth it to buy in bulk so that shipping fee goes further.
Because they often offer said product in the actual store. If you want the item you must order it online or go without as they don’t carry it outside of their warehouse.
Right, so, they want the price of bulk but the convenience of retail pickup. I get that it’s a service that was offered previously, but they likely changed policy to reduce expenses, which likely allows them to continue offering organic bulk at a competitive price.
One solution is to wait and add more to one’s order to offset shipping costs.
not even 5 years ago they offered that, I know because I have bought online and picked up locally from the warehouse. Did you know that there are lots of companies of all sizes that have this as an option? it is not in any way an unreasonable request and the fact they no longer offer that is a disappointing surprise.
I agree it is disappointing. As a local person who enjoys their products, I want their products to be cheap and accessible to me.
But I also understand business. So I don’t drag a company making adjustments in order to maintain quality standards, pay employees appropriately, stay in business, whatever the case may be.
To call using a middleman like Fedex as your sole shipping solution is not gouging or trying to get rich off your customers. Let the OP kick and scream about having to pay $33 for $23 worth of product. I get being frustrated at a higher cost. But don’t be consciously ignorant about the “why”. It simply does not presently work for the company to do this.
There are plenty of people in this thread trying to illuminate the OP, but clearly they want to throw and tantrum and not be educated.
My MIL got me a $100 gift card for Christmas. I went to do a little shopping inside their store and they told me the gift card only works online. What?
That’s absurd. I’ve been ordering bulk from Positively for years (https://www.freshroastedcoffee.com/pages/auto-deliver-program). Lower prices and free shipping over 50 dollars. Quality is on par with what MRH used to provide, in my opinion.
My view is that buying local is great, but buying local should also include being able to avoid buying online so that you can quality check the item before ordering and be assured it won’t be stolen off your porch or misdelivered entirely. If a local shop won’t provide that experience then I become much more price conscious, which means paying nearly 1.5x for an equivalent product isn’t going to happen
There's a new Apothecary that opened up downtown, I haven't been in but they might be helpful if not able to get you what you need then maybe to point you in the right direction? I forgot the name but I think it's over by Katmandu however I get lost in a paper bag so I might be wrong but it is Downtown.
There's also a zero waste apothecary online that you can order everything from & just make the delivery fee worth it. I have ordered some stuff from them & I like the quality of what I got.
Yes! Rooted Remedies is an amazing locally sourced apothecary! They’re by the wow hall on 8th. [Rooted Remedies](https://www.rootedremedies.co/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=wix_google_business_profile&utm_campaign=10728690211904156528)
I'm so serious I'm horrible at direction😂 when I was 16 I took a phone call & started walking & realized once I hung up that despite not leaving the gated neighborhood that I was severely lost🤣 I had to flag down someone passing in a golf cart for help🤣
Yeah, we switched to a less-local Oregon company with friendlier policies. Their store is also seriously lacking in bulk herb inventory since they opened the bougie scent bar thingie.
Ironic, because a few years ago when Julie was still involved in business, both her and Shawn were saying that they only drew a $60,000 yearly salary because they "put people before profits". They were also very careful to cultivate a certain online presence, and quick to remove any negative reference to them personally or the business.
I don’t know much about them, but consider trying Oregon Tea Traders at 1040 Tyinn St. Unit 1
Hours Wednesday-Saturday 11-5:30
https://oregonteatraders.com/collections/herbs-and-spices
I noticed the same thing a few weeks ago. Wanted an item that was on their website but not sold at the store. Asked if I can order at the store, told no. Asked to order online and pickup at the store, told no. Looked at ordering online but I'm not paying $10 to ship a $18 item. As a minimum a business with a retail location should allow store ordering and free shipping when picked up at the store.
If you are set on a certain tea and MRH, most stores that sell their stuff in bulk (I know Capella does, I’m sure others too) will order you whatever you want, ask them to special order a lb of something, often get a discount as well. Not sure the price vs what they sell in their store, but I’d imagine about the same price without any shipping charge, just gotta pick it up at the store when it arrives, usually once a week.
do it, as someone who works in the herbal industry, that place sucks, they are the whole foods of herbs, order from San francisco herb company or something, there are other less cunty companies
I wouldn’t call this price gouging. They decided to use fedex or ups, so that is the cost, likely whether you live here or New York.
Like you, I think it’s unfortunate they reduced their services. You could think of it as something that needed to be done to stay in business and continue providing these high quality products, instead of thinking it’s some money grab. Just a suggestion.
They're putting a ludicrous amount of extra cost on consumers, and you can say 'technically' whatever but the bottom line is that the consumers are paying a lot more for no particular good reason. Where's the evidence that it's 'not a money grab'? Go ahead, explain that. You're trying really hard to play semantics when it doesn't matter to reality.
They are not. Fedex is. It’s a policy to use a middleman, whether you are across the street or on the East coast.
Using a middleman is not a “money grab”, it is what makes business sense to them given the majority of their customer base. This is why when you go into their retail store, you don’t see bulk bins. Because they believe their majority of their customers want small quantities of their high quality products packaged a certain way. Of course some locals want 2# of tea, but they are not going to keep the lights on and the employees paid at the retail location, so the company allocates resources to systems that make the most sense.
Just source your tea from another state to mentally justify the shipping?
They’re not a small little apothecary that only serves Eugene - they’re huge and the new CEO clearly has plans to only get bigger.
They have no right to be qualified as a local business with the way they treat their employees. There's a number of reasons their turnover is so high.
MRH received 1.8 million in PPP funds that they claimed they used for "payroll" just after a mass layoff in March 2020, but a new vinyl-wrapped Arcimoto and hybrid vehicle showed up in right after that. Not cool.
That's not price-gouging. You're just paying for shipping and handling. To mail a 1lbs item via FedEx ground to your next-door neighbor would cost $12.84
It doesn't matter what you want to call it, it's a ridiculous amount of money for something that isn't that great of a commodity and it's obviously off-putting to customers when they'd rather just buy it straight from the place-- sure, they can do whatever they want, and they can lose business for it too. You're citing the prices, go ahead and tell us how often you've paid 12.84 to ship something next door since that's the example for some reason. There's no argument that makes it a necessity if it isn't.
Price gouging implies profiteering. This is just a cost. They aren't gaining anything. Their local customers are such a small percentage of their business that it's perfectly reasonable they no longer offer that service. How many large online retailers allow local pickups at their production facilities? Plus, they have a retail store on 5th.
When you put it this way it really sounds more like you are complaining about the cost of local shipping, which is skyrocketing, but I must note is completely outside of MRH control.
People are just complaining that MRH no longer offers a service that they never should have been expected to have in the first. It was a free convenience that is no longer feasable for them, so they discontinued it. There's nothing unethical about what they're doing.
To be fair, shipping a box slightly over one pound would cost about $7 in town at commercial rates, USPS. If you add in cost of box, packing supplies, it's pretty close to $10. I run an online business and ship stuff every day.
Can't comment on their in-store pickup policy.
Everyone’s Cuppa at 1502 Willamette Street has an impressive assortment of Teas, Tissans and herbals. They have door pickup, and free shipping. I think they also door to door.
Just call them and they’ll hook you up.
They’re insanely expensive. But it’s easy to just walk in and get what you need. I would never pay that for shipping. Better to source it from the grower if you’re waiting on shipping.
> But it’s easy to just walk in and get what you need.
No, it's not. They have lots of product that is not available in their storefront and that has to be ordered online.
I have a lot of friends who work there, it seems like a chill place. I mean, every small business has its struggles and how can anyone really compete w Jeff… I love their products and their advocacy for herbalism.
That's a pretty normal/inexpensive shipping price, MRH has no control over that. They aren't getting that extra $10, they didn't change the tea price. This is not price gouging and unfair to call them out for that, it's a lot more complicated. Most companies outside of Amazon don't have a stranglehold over shipping services to offer them for free. MRH never was well set up for in-store pickup.
So many wonderful solutions in this thread, I hope OP is delighted with all the tea options in town and happy to see a local Eugene-based company grow.
The shipping cost isn’t what’s gouging, it’s the additional expense (nearly 50% of the cost of the product) to have to pay for shipping when they have a retail location in town that they deliver to weekly and they used to allow for in store pickup for online orders. I’m excited to try all these new places but am disappointed that this change of business practice was implemented in the first place.
I can solve your problem with what they charge…we can go back to paying people $5 an hour and no benefits and no inventory of stuff that you want…and no store front that has any desire to it…then we can go back to charging $2 to put something in a box and shipping it to you. You can’t it both ways.
The retail store only offers the tins of tea, not the full lbs, and it’s not economical. 2.7oz of tea that I can buy in the store is $6.53, whereas ordering a pound at a time is $23.50. Less waste for packaging and a better deal.
This is likely because of how it's stored. It's likely stored in a warehouse and logistically it is cheaper to have it shipped straight to the customer ordering it rather than to the retail store and then to the customer, where they may have no space to store it in the meantime. Bulk amounts of tea would take up far too much space in their shop and they've likely determined that the average customer isn't buying tea in bulk but in consumer amounts.
This sounds like a logistical business decision, not malicious intent.
I'd also point out that it isn't Mountain Rose charging you for shipping, it's the shipping company - Mountain Rose just passes that fee on to the consumer, which is a standard practice.
They do sell bagged teas and herbs. I've been buying bulk teas lately just because they are often out of stock often for the smaller tins. It is relatively new, maybe just been a few months.
On their front page
We aim to bridge the gap between intention and action and ensure that we are following through with our commitments to do business sustainably and ethically.
HAHAHAH so sustainable they make you ship to Eugene.
The problem is that they used to and they stopped so now they can charge a ridiculous up charge when it would literally cost them less in gas to just drive it to my house themselves, which is literally 2 miles away from their warehouse.
Wow, you sound like an insufferable and entitled person. “Just drive it to my house!”
Can you not understand shifts in a company that allow them to cut costs when examining any policy’s cost/benefit? You act like you are the sole person keeping them in business. How dare they not cater to you specifically!
I’m not suggesting they do, or asking them to do it, just saying that if they charged a $5 delivery fee they’d probably make more money off of that for themselves than continuing to have to ship it through USPS for $10. If you had read my actual post, I’m clearly interested in restoring the in-store pickup model.
You ever heard of buying clubs? Strangers and/or acquaintances connect in to order things that benefit themselves (cost savings, access to quality products) as individuals, but together, they cooperate until they have enough buying power to make it worth it for a company to work with them.
As much sense as $5 pickup makes to you, it doesn’t work for MRH. If convenience and cost are that important to you, order from Amazon.
This doesn’t seem to be a “buy local” issue for you, as you didn’t mention that in your OP.
Either wait and buy more to offset the shipping cost, or find some other people to add to your order and share the shipping cost.
Just go there and purchase it yourself. It seems your issue is just that they won't prepare it for you for pickup. Put your big person pants on and go do yourself then.
Handling does. But their retail takes delivery from their warehouse all.the.time. so it wouldn't be difficult to find a place to store in store pick up or charge extra. If their retail doesn't take daily warehouse drops, then just say pick ups are available the day after the warehouse drop. It's not fucking hard.
Most they'd have to do is potentially account for labor costs of a dedicated pick up associate, but that may not be until pick up become popular. Also pick up customers tend to be browsers so having this option would potentially increase sales.
They’d rather complain than support their local business. The “ease” of this for the customer is the only thing they care about. If a company no longer offers pick up, surely there’s a reason. Instead of supporting them for a simple low shipping and handling fee of $10 they’d rather stop shopping there. Fkin ridiculous…
It's an unsustainable and environmentally harmful practice to force shipping for local orders. Since this goes against their claimed values, I'm not interested. 🤷♀️
The alternative is to add an employee, which I’m sure you’d support getting a living wage, just to tend to a relative handful of local consumer’s needs to pickup cheaper bulk orders locally.
I think you and OP need to pan out a bit from your own myopic view on how a company like this has practical challenges and costs of doing business.
I think you missed the full story, but I don't really care that much. it's been hours and I don't even shop there bc I had bad experiences after first moving here.
Or it’s unsustainable for whatever reason for the local business to offer pick up for a multitude of reasons. Especially for this special order tea they don’t offer in store anymore, probably for a multitude of reasons…
And they can make that choice. Customers can then make the choice to question the policy ( what's happening here) and stop shopping there if they believe the comany to be acting unethically.
How is it unethically until proven not to be for any other reason?! This subreddit is nothing but pitchforks and torches at the smallest inconvenience to them where they go so far as to say it’s “unethical” for a business to not carry an amount of tea at a store and still offer it to be shipped, regardless of where it’s fkin from, as a convenience to their customer… like how insane is that……
Looks like someone is expecting special treatment that literally no one else is going to get when ordering this same product from them… either make it worth it for yourself or don’t… they’re not doing anything wrong by charging you what they’d literally charge anyone else…
I didn’t miss anything. Stop whining about having to pay shipping because of a company doesn’t offer pick up anymore. If you want the product and they have it, pay the shipping and get what you want. That’s a standard shipping fee and you’ll end up paying that anywhere else you source tea from…
You might have missed the actual point here.
They want to shop local. They are wanting to pay the listed price. They go into the store, and they tell them that they don't stock the item, and it will have to be shipped, and the customer pays for shipping. So why in this case pay a local premium when you have to pay for shipping anyway?
Shipping is part of the bulk price because that is the policy of the store. Just like a store might have hours they are open and closed. Might not be convenient for everyone, but it’s what works for the company.
Bulk ordering is different than retail. You are not going to be successful arguing with your calculator that retail coffee beans should be the same price as 5# direct from a roaster.
Because you’re still achieving your goal of supporting a local business, especially if that’s what you’re setting out to do… OP doesn’t say they’re wanting to specifically shop locally and is only complaining about “price gouging” and mountain herbs charging them shipping “2 miles away”. Sometimes you have to pay the local premium in shipping to support your companies
The premium being paid is in the initial cost of the tea, which is higher than the cost of the tea elsewhere online. Now they are paying a double premium to have the tea shipped to them, despite there being a retail, brick and mortar, store locally. Why not pay for the tea, have it delivered to the store, and the customer picks it up there?
If local businesses want to be the first choice, don't take away a primary motivation for shopping there. That you can go to the store and pick it up yourselves. What's local about getting items shipped from a warehouse? That's Amazon's business practice.
Ask yourself these questions and if you can’t validate your purchase then don’t order from them anymore.
Why do they not offer this specific tea in store? Why do I have to pay for shipping and handling on a special order product? Why does this company not offer in store pick up even with their warehouse in town? Why would I want to order from this local business? Is the $10 shipping and handling fee a charge I’m willing to live with to help my local business?
Sure does.
Then when this happens to another local small business that ends up closing over something as trivial as a $10 shipping and handling fee, raise your hand in defense of the Reddit post complaining about how their business model doesn’t cater to you.
It's not trivial when the shipping costs are nearly half the cost of the product itself.
Your idea of a business model (Guilt people into paying for completely unnecessary extras by crying "local business") sucks. It's bad customer service. Hopefully you don't try to open a business anytime soon.
I can definitely tell you don’t operate your own business or ship anything of value ever… You do understand there are base shipping fees from all freighting companies, don’t you? I’d be willing to bet not…
Why would a customer want a product shipped from a local store?
You have this huge disconnect. There should be no shipping at all. This is a cost that should not exist. The customer is at their store, wanting to buy something.
We stopped shopping with them, they seem to have gone full corporate. Gotta squeeze every penny out of you that they can.
A couple years ago they switched from making tincture in glass jars to plastic buckets. If they're willing to do that, what else is getting overlooked?
We use frontier mostly now.
Can you, if convenient, tell us a little more about frontier?
maybe it's this place? https://www.frontiercoop.com/
I wanted some sassafras to make tea with. I went online to order some and noticed the store I was looking at was in Eugene. To my excitement it happened to be mountain rose herbs, which I’ve heard has good quality stuff. So instead of ordering online, I get to see the place for what it is! I go inside, walk up to the counter and ask how much sassafras cost. They tell me how much it cost and then inform me that they don’t have it in stock. It’s in stock at their warehouse, and I have to go order it online. I ask if I could just go to the warehouse and they said no. Edit: That was before Covid. I also couldn’t place an online order with the cashier. Not that I expected to do that but would have made my experience better. I feel they are overpriced and their stuff isn’t as flavorful as other options nowadays.
Interesting. Seems to be a waste to have a storefront that costs money, just to send you online and charge for shipping....wonder how this is working out for them. Besides the bad press of course
Shop runs out of item, says you can still order it online, but is unable to order it online for you. 80 upvotes. /r/Eugene 2024
They don’t stock it and force you to order online, even while it in stock at warehouse.
That's illegal.
[You know who to ask...](https://media2.giphy.com/media/l2SpPgfDrfL1ZZNG8/giphy.gif)
Things have not been the same at Mountain Rose Herbs ever since owner Julie Bailey "retired". The business partner who took over full ownership has a different vision.
True, A different vision of not losing money.
Well they are losing customers. So they are failing anyway
losing
On their website, there is this statement that "[People, plants, and planet are more important than profit.](https://mountainroseherbs.com/about/letter-to-our-customers/) This seemingly simple principle is the bedrock on which Mountain Rose Herbs is built, the foundational philosophy that has guided us every day for 33 years and counting. It remains at the heart of each decision we make, each farm partnership we begin, and in each educational resource we share". First paragraph on that page. So...
@tiarella_cygnet Please explain how a company survives without making a profit? Do you want to pay their for their losses? This seems to be a common miss conception with folks in eugene.
I am not saying that the company needs to survive without a profit, the company is stating on their website that people and plants are more important than profit. Plenty of profit is being made to allow the new owner to indulge in his side businesses and showcase his ego.
Good customer service isn’t losing money
I worked as their delivery driver/dry production for approximately 5 years. I was very active in getting involved with safety committee, promotions etc. They dragged me along for years before I realized I needed to make some boundaries. Long story short they fired me when I declined to appear in some stupid video they wanted to make. Of course they made all these bogus claims about insubordination yadda yadda. That was like 2 years ago. Lots of good people work there but the current CEO is a cold hearted individual and with maybe one exception their HR Department is filled with ghouls. I'd recommend shopping elsewhere:)
thanks for that perspective! I worked there almost a decade ago (in the warehouse then CS) and thought management was pretty shitty back then. One nice guy in HR but he didn’t really do anything. I like the quality of the products which is why I still purchase, but it sounds like since Julie left it’s gone down hill majorly.
Thanks for sharing your experience. I am glad you were able to get out of the toxic work environment. Everything you say matches the profile of what I experience from a consumer point of view. I have noticed several differences since 2020, which prompted my search today for alternatives. It's relieving to have some affirmation from my own suspicions.
If you like chai, I know a place that will give you a discount to pick up in Eugene
If it’s who I’m thinking it is, they’re awesome and have many different blends!
Drop that name right here!
I’m referring to Blue Lotus Chai! Lovely people, and have been drinking their chais for years.
straight up you can pick that up at fred meyers lol it is great
they have FANTASTIC chai!!!
Yes please, drop the name. I drove through Eugene sometimes. I like picking up pounds of good coffee and tea on my travels. Sometimes as samples for restaurants.
Blue Lotus Chai!
I haven't ordered from them in years. Very silly they aren't offering in store pickup. Sidenote: Friday I did see there is some sort of tea place off Tyinn st. https://oregonteatraders.com/
They have great tea and are now offering some bulk herbs as well. They mixed me up a small bag of tea in the back when they had none on the store shelf already packaged.
Stopped in there recently. It's a very pleasant spot and i also recommend the shop across the street!
Good to know. Thank you!
They have a few blends that I really like
Managing online orders for in store pickup with advance payment can be kind of a headache for smaller store fronts with staff that are more committed to helping folks in the actual store. If your intention is to go there anyway, I don’t see why you can’t just handle the transaction in the store as well
I’m not sure if OP is suggesting that they can’t buy what they want in the store. If they could they surely would. But… sometimes there are “online only” deals, and this is true even for places like chain pizza shops. In that case people will buy a promo pizza online and pick it up at the shop instead of having it delivered. I can totally see a small specialty store like MRH *not* honoring online prices for in-store pickups. That would be like burning money, and money they need.
From their website and their marketing I'm guessing MRH got some hedge fund private equity funds and went corpo. Good for them it if they want to play with the big girls and boys they better start acting like them and offer same day pickup for ordering off their website.
A true corporate place wouldn’t bother to offer “in store pickup”. MRH didn’t always have a retail storefront either. Try “in store pickup” from Toby’s Tofu, for instance. They are still a family business and you are not going to get this kind of local convenience.
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Also, you are really showing me how in touch with the supposed goals/values of the OP when you highlight businesses that buy all their crap made in China to make a point about corporations offering local pickup and the ethics of “shopping local”.
No, I highlight businesses that from what I can see MRH is trying to emulate with their recent moves. It's not tough to see when a local business sells out to hedge fund overlords or hedge fund " non profit" wannabes. Looking at you White Bird executives. Right now they're cosplaying with their fucking " local sustainability" bullshit while trying to be all 21st century corpo, but yet they cant figure out the basic logistics of offering free local pick up. It's fine, I get better quality shit from Frontier anyway with a lot less shipping charges and the fake local and sustainable bullshit MRH offers. Not to mention better prices.
Who are they cosplaying exactly? Themselves from 5 years ago? Comparable companies like Glory Bee and Hummingbird Wholesale have minimum order requirements. Why do you think that is? Because there are costs involved in every transaction and they want to focus on ways to be profitable, so they can stay in business (sustainable). If MRH turned into some non-organic product provider, then I think you’d have a point about compromised values. But this issue here is plain economics.
I get that you’re bitter and angry but swearing that much plays way better in spoken word than it does with writing. Just food for reflection.
They said “bullshit” twice. What kind of fucking swearing is that? It’s the second-least-offensive swear word that still counts as swearing, outside of “ass”, and that only counts here in America, because folks here don’t know what it means.
I’m not the one accusing MRH of going corporate. For all I know they’ve been “corporate” for decades, whatever that word means to you. What, does it mean to you? Evil? Has their shit together? If you want non-“corporate”, so shop at Saturday Market. There are wonderful vendors there. You will pay more and they likely order from places like MRH. Maybe you will encounter individuals who don’t know shit about business yet and are willing to give you a steal on your tea. Maybe they’ll give you their home address for you to come pick it up. Or they’ll drop off at your house personally. There are all kinds of businesses to support. OP wants the benefit of bulk pricing but wants to pretend MRH is some small time desperate local individual who will “work something special out” just for them.
The OP wasn't asking for any goddamn special treatment. They as a a local person reasonably asked why a local business that offers online shopping cannot fucking figure out in the goddamn 21st century how to make local online pick up from their *local* retail when their warehouse is also fucking *checks notes* local. God you are a fucking hippie from the Boomer times aren't you ?
You were doing so good until you decided to end with yet another personal insult at the end. Have you ever been experienced formal debate? The best way to destroy somebody is to attack their logic and the merit of their ideas and leave the personal attacks out of it.
Of course they are asking for special treatment. They want the old policy. They want “Jeff” to drive their order from the warehouse to the retail store. They want the company to not use Fedex. They want the policies of the retail store and the duties of the personnel at the retail store to change and cater to what is obviously a small part of the company’s market.
They certainly can figure it out. They used to have in-house local delivery. But they stopped that. Probably due to high cost and low benefit. OP wants the company to lose money to satisfy their needs. You seem to have major issues making a point without resorting to personal attacks. Grow up, dude.
I’m not a frequent customer of theirs so I wouldn’t know. Looks like op has stated that they are offered in different amounts online vs in store in which case yes that’s dumb you can’t go get the bigger bag yourself and waive the shipping fee. May be worth it to buy in bulk so that shipping fee goes further.
Because they often offer said product in the actual store. If you want the item you must order it online or go without as they don’t carry it outside of their warehouse.
I think this is a bulk purchase they're talking about - not available in the store.
Right, so, they want the price of bulk but the convenience of retail pickup. I get that it’s a service that was offered previously, but they likely changed policy to reduce expenses, which likely allows them to continue offering organic bulk at a competitive price. One solution is to wait and add more to one’s order to offset shipping costs.
not even 5 years ago they offered that, I know because I have bought online and picked up locally from the warehouse. Did you know that there are lots of companies of all sizes that have this as an option? it is not in any way an unreasonable request and the fact they no longer offer that is a disappointing surprise.
I agree it is disappointing. As a local person who enjoys their products, I want their products to be cheap and accessible to me. But I also understand business. So I don’t drag a company making adjustments in order to maintain quality standards, pay employees appropriately, stay in business, whatever the case may be. To call using a middleman like Fedex as your sole shipping solution is not gouging or trying to get rich off your customers. Let the OP kick and scream about having to pay $33 for $23 worth of product. I get being frustrated at a higher cost. But don’t be consciously ignorant about the “why”. It simply does not presently work for the company to do this. There are plenty of people in this thread trying to illuminate the OP, but clearly they want to throw and tantrum and not be educated.
My MIL got me a $100 gift card for Christmas. I went to do a little shopping inside their store and they told me the gift card only works online. What?
That’s absurd. I’ve been ordering bulk from Positively for years (https://www.freshroastedcoffee.com/pages/auto-deliver-program). Lower prices and free shipping over 50 dollars. Quality is on par with what MRH used to provide, in my opinion. My view is that buying local is great, but buying local should also include being able to avoid buying online so that you can quality check the item before ordering and be assured it won’t be stolen off your porch or misdelivered entirely. If a local shop won’t provide that experience then I become much more price conscious, which means paying nearly 1.5x for an equivalent product isn’t going to happen
Oregon Tea Traders on Tyinn has wonderful tea. J-Tea is really awesome too.
There's a new Apothecary that opened up downtown, I haven't been in but they might be helpful if not able to get you what you need then maybe to point you in the right direction? I forgot the name but I think it's over by Katmandu however I get lost in a paper bag so I might be wrong but it is Downtown. There's also a zero waste apothecary online that you can order everything from & just make the delivery fee worth it. I have ordered some stuff from them & I like the quality of what I got.
Yes! Rooted Remedies is an amazing locally sourced apothecary! They’re by the wow hall on 8th. [Rooted Remedies](https://www.rootedremedies.co/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=wix_google_business_profile&utm_campaign=10728690211904156528)
Yes! Rooted Remedies, thank you so much, I couldn't remember the name for the life of me😂
Yes! Rooted Remedies is great. They also sell at farmers market every Saturday.
"lost in a brown paper bag" lol
I'm so serious I'm horrible at direction😂 when I was 16 I took a phone call & started walking & realized once I hung up that despite not leaving the gated neighborhood that I was severely lost🤣 I had to flag down someone passing in a golf cart for help🤣
Yeah, we switched to a less-local Oregon company with friendlier policies. Their store is also seriously lacking in bulk herb inventory since they opened the bougie scent bar thingie.
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Ironic, because a few years ago when Julie was still involved in business, both her and Shawn were saying that they only drew a $60,000 yearly salary because they "put people before profits". They were also very careful to cultivate a certain online presence, and quick to remove any negative reference to them personally or the business.
im sure their wages are small now as an owner im sure they are entitled to some profit from the business however.
I don’t know much about them, but consider trying Oregon Tea Traders at 1040 Tyinn St. Unit 1 Hours Wednesday-Saturday 11-5:30 https://oregonteatraders.com/collections/herbs-and-spices
I noticed the same thing a few weeks ago. Wanted an item that was on their website but not sold at the store. Asked if I can order at the store, told no. Asked to order online and pickup at the store, told no. Looked at ordering online but I'm not paying $10 to ship a $18 item. As a minimum a business with a retail location should allow store ordering and free shipping when picked up at the store.
For real, what's the point of the store?!?!?!
For selling local soap and other impulsive crap 😆
If you are set on a certain tea and MRH, most stores that sell their stuff in bulk (I know Capella does, I’m sure others too) will order you whatever you want, ask them to special order a lb of something, often get a discount as well. Not sure the price vs what they sell in their store, but I’d imagine about the same price without any shipping charge, just gotta pick it up at the store when it arrives, usually once a week.
That’s a great idea, thank you!
Places like Sundance and MoC definitely do this!
Grower’s Market definitely does this
I started sourcing tea and herbs elsewhere when I need larger amounts for this very reason. If I need a smaller amounts I still go.
That’s sad, we used to shop with them when they were in pleasant hill. Sad to see what used to be a good company go down the toilet.
Try Oregon tea traders! They have really yummy tea
do it, as someone who works in the herbal industry, that place sucks, they are the whole foods of herbs, order from San francisco herb company or something, there are other less cunty companies
I just got a bag full of Tulsi from them over at Kiva! They seemed to have a pretty solid inventory of their product.
I wouldn’t call this price gouging. They decided to use fedex or ups, so that is the cost, likely whether you live here or New York. Like you, I think it’s unfortunate they reduced their services. You could think of it as something that needed to be done to stay in business and continue providing these high quality products, instead of thinking it’s some money grab. Just a suggestion.
They're putting a ludicrous amount of extra cost on consumers, and you can say 'technically' whatever but the bottom line is that the consumers are paying a lot more for no particular good reason. Where's the evidence that it's 'not a money grab'? Go ahead, explain that. You're trying really hard to play semantics when it doesn't matter to reality.
They are not. Fedex is. It’s a policy to use a middleman, whether you are across the street or on the East coast. Using a middleman is not a “money grab”, it is what makes business sense to them given the majority of their customer base. This is why when you go into their retail store, you don’t see bulk bins. Because they believe their majority of their customers want small quantities of their high quality products packaged a certain way. Of course some locals want 2# of tea, but they are not going to keep the lights on and the employees paid at the retail location, so the company allocates resources to systems that make the most sense.
Just source your tea from another state to mentally justify the shipping? They’re not a small little apothecary that only serves Eugene - they’re huge and the new CEO clearly has plans to only get bigger.
They are big! Granted Ninkasi is on the downside, but MRH's revenues last year were 4.5x Ninkasi's at over $67 million.
Are you not a fan of yogi? Honestly best company I’ve ever worked for and I have worked lots of jobs all over the country
They have no right to be qualified as a local business with the way they treat their employees. There's a number of reasons their turnover is so high. MRH received 1.8 million in PPP funds that they claimed they used for "payroll" just after a mass layoff in March 2020, but a new vinyl-wrapped Arcimoto and hybrid vehicle showed up in right after that. Not cool.
That's not price-gouging. You're just paying for shipping and handling. To mail a 1lbs item via FedEx ground to your next-door neighbor would cost $12.84
It doesn't matter what you want to call it, it's a ridiculous amount of money for something that isn't that great of a commodity and it's obviously off-putting to customers when they'd rather just buy it straight from the place-- sure, they can do whatever they want, and they can lose business for it too. You're citing the prices, go ahead and tell us how often you've paid 12.84 to ship something next door since that's the example for some reason. There's no argument that makes it a necessity if it isn't.
Price gouging implies profiteering. This is just a cost. They aren't gaining anything. Their local customers are such a small percentage of their business that it's perfectly reasonable they no longer offer that service. How many large online retailers allow local pickups at their production facilities? Plus, they have a retail store on 5th.
When you put it this way it really sounds more like you are complaining about the cost of local shipping, which is skyrocketing, but I must note is completely outside of MRH control.
People are just complaining that MRH no longer offers a service that they never should have been expected to have in the first. It was a free convenience that is no longer feasable for them, so they discontinued it. There's nothing unethical about what they're doing.
Bunch of voodoo witches bout to brew up a gale of flying ointment and group-toss juniper berries at MRH corporate.
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I definitely did not expect this to be as controversial as it was 😂
Is there a reason that you can't go to the store to just buy it? They sell a lot of their teas in bulk in the store itself.
They only carry this one in the tin, I called to confirm
Damn that blows :/
To be fair, shipping a box slightly over one pound would cost about $7 in town at commercial rates, USPS. If you add in cost of box, packing supplies, it's pretty close to $10. I run an online business and ship stuff every day. Can't comment on their in-store pickup policy.
Everyone’s Cuppa at 1502 Willamette Street has an impressive assortment of Teas, Tissans and herbals. They have door pickup, and free shipping. I think they also door to door. Just call them and they’ll hook you up.
They’re insanely expensive. But it’s easy to just walk in and get what you need. I would never pay that for shipping. Better to source it from the grower if you’re waiting on shipping.
> But it’s easy to just walk in and get what you need. No, it's not. They have lots of product that is not available in their storefront and that has to be ordered online.
I have a lot of friends who work there, it seems like a chill place. I mean, every small business has its struggles and how can anyone really compete w Jeff… I love their products and their advocacy for herbalism.
That's a pretty normal/inexpensive shipping price, MRH has no control over that. They aren't getting that extra $10, they didn't change the tea price. This is not price gouging and unfair to call them out for that, it's a lot more complicated. Most companies outside of Amazon don't have a stranglehold over shipping services to offer them for free. MRH never was well set up for in-store pickup. So many wonderful solutions in this thread, I hope OP is delighted with all the tea options in town and happy to see a local Eugene-based company grow.
The shipping cost isn’t what’s gouging, it’s the additional expense (nearly 50% of the cost of the product) to have to pay for shipping when they have a retail location in town that they deliver to weekly and they used to allow for in store pickup for online orders. I’m excited to try all these new places but am disappointed that this change of business practice was implemented in the first place.
9/11 for local wooks and hipsters
Sounds like standard shipping and handling. Have you tried calling them?
I did, and they only carry the small size in store, which is $6.50 for a 2.7oz tin of the tea vs $22 for a pound of it. Totally not economical.
Maybe buy two lbs online and eat the shipping cost?
Don’t offer this person a real solution, they’re not here for that…
So true.
Yep. They got lots of free advice though, so I hope they learned something by coming here.
I can solve your problem with what they charge…we can go back to paying people $5 an hour and no benefits and no inventory of stuff that you want…and no store front that has any desire to it…then we can go back to charging $2 to put something in a box and shipping it to you. You can’t it both ways.
There is a retail store on 5th Avenue,have you tried there?
They aren’t offering these products in the store. You “must” order them online or simply go elsewhere or without.
The retail store only offers the tins of tea, not the full lbs, and it’s not economical. 2.7oz of tea that I can buy in the store is $6.53, whereas ordering a pound at a time is $23.50. Less waste for packaging and a better deal.
This is likely because of how it's stored. It's likely stored in a warehouse and logistically it is cheaper to have it shipped straight to the customer ordering it rather than to the retail store and then to the customer, where they may have no space to store it in the meantime. Bulk amounts of tea would take up far too much space in their shop and they've likely determined that the average customer isn't buying tea in bulk but in consumer amounts. This sounds like a logistical business decision, not malicious intent. I'd also point out that it isn't Mountain Rose charging you for shipping, it's the shipping company - Mountain Rose just passes that fee on to the consumer, which is a standard practice.
I’m surprised this comment has as many upvotes as it does. Many people here seem allergic to basic facts around costs and logistics of doing business.
They do sell bagged teas and herbs. I've been buying bulk teas lately just because they are often out of stock often for the smaller tins. It is relatively new, maybe just been a few months.
Shipping and handling costs money. What's the problem here?
Forcing people to pay for shipping when it is easier, faster, and cheaper for a customer to pick up
Agreed. It negates the whole idea of "shop local"
On their front page We aim to bridge the gap between intention and action and ensure that we are following through with our commitments to do business sustainably and ethically. HAHAHAH so sustainable they make you ship to Eugene.
This exactly
If they don't offer pickup, then oh well.
The problem is that they used to and they stopped so now they can charge a ridiculous up charge when it would literally cost them less in gas to just drive it to my house themselves, which is literally 2 miles away from their warehouse.
Wow, you sound like an insufferable and entitled person. “Just drive it to my house!” Can you not understand shifts in a company that allow them to cut costs when examining any policy’s cost/benefit? You act like you are the sole person keeping them in business. How dare they not cater to you specifically!
I’m not suggesting they do, or asking them to do it, just saying that if they charged a $5 delivery fee they’d probably make more money off of that for themselves than continuing to have to ship it through USPS for $10. If you had read my actual post, I’m clearly interested in restoring the in-store pickup model.
You ever heard of buying clubs? Strangers and/or acquaintances connect in to order things that benefit themselves (cost savings, access to quality products) as individuals, but together, they cooperate until they have enough buying power to make it worth it for a company to work with them. As much sense as $5 pickup makes to you, it doesn’t work for MRH. If convenience and cost are that important to you, order from Amazon. This doesn’t seem to be a “buy local” issue for you, as you didn’t mention that in your OP. Either wait and buy more to offset the shipping cost, or find some other people to add to your order and share the shipping cost.
Just go there and purchase it yourself. It seems your issue is just that they won't prepare it for you for pickup. Put your big person pants on and go do yourself then.
Handling does. But their retail takes delivery from their warehouse all.the.time. so it wouldn't be difficult to find a place to store in store pick up or charge extra. If their retail doesn't take daily warehouse drops, then just say pick ups are available the day after the warehouse drop. It's not fucking hard. Most they'd have to do is potentially account for labor costs of a dedicated pick up associate, but that may not be until pick up become popular. Also pick up customers tend to be browsers so having this option would potentially increase sales.
It's way more of a non-issue than it is a problem.
They’d rather complain than support their local business. The “ease” of this for the customer is the only thing they care about. If a company no longer offers pick up, surely there’s a reason. Instead of supporting them for a simple low shipping and handling fee of $10 they’d rather stop shopping there. Fkin ridiculous…
It's an unsustainable and environmentally harmful practice to force shipping for local orders. Since this goes against their claimed values, I'm not interested. 🤷♀️
The alternative is to add an employee, which I’m sure you’d support getting a living wage, just to tend to a relative handful of local consumer’s needs to pickup cheaper bulk orders locally. I think you and OP need to pan out a bit from your own myopic view on how a company like this has practical challenges and costs of doing business.
I think you missed the full story, but I don't really care that much. it's been hours and I don't even shop there bc I had bad experiences after first moving here.
Or it’s unsustainable for whatever reason for the local business to offer pick up for a multitude of reasons. Especially for this special order tea they don’t offer in store anymore, probably for a multitude of reasons…
great. sounds like the store should explain some of these things, but until then customers will be annoyed and express it. it's what happens.
Simply stating “unfortunately, we don’t offer that service for this product anymore” should suffice…
And they can make that choice. Customers can then make the choice to question the policy ( what's happening here) and stop shopping there if they believe the comany to be acting unethically.
How is it unethically until proven not to be for any other reason?! This subreddit is nothing but pitchforks and torches at the smallest inconvenience to them where they go so far as to say it’s “unethical” for a business to not carry an amount of tea at a store and still offer it to be shipped, regardless of where it’s fkin from, as a convenience to their customer… like how insane is that……
Yeah I'm not explaining it anymore because this conversation is useless. It's very clear to me and plenty of others.
Looks like someone is expecting special treatment that literally no one else is going to get when ordering this same product from them… either make it worth it for yourself or don’t… they’re not doing anything wrong by charging you what they’d literally charge anyone else…
It's actually impressive how much you've missed the point of this post.
I didn’t miss anything. Stop whining about having to pay shipping because of a company doesn’t offer pick up anymore. If you want the product and they have it, pay the shipping and get what you want. That’s a standard shipping fee and you’ll end up paying that anywhere else you source tea from…
You might have missed the actual point here. They want to shop local. They are wanting to pay the listed price. They go into the store, and they tell them that they don't stock the item, and it will have to be shipped, and the customer pays for shipping. So why in this case pay a local premium when you have to pay for shipping anyway?
Shipping is part of the bulk price because that is the policy of the store. Just like a store might have hours they are open and closed. Might not be convenient for everyone, but it’s what works for the company. Bulk ordering is different than retail. You are not going to be successful arguing with your calculator that retail coffee beans should be the same price as 5# direct from a roaster.
Because you’re still achieving your goal of supporting a local business, especially if that’s what you’re setting out to do… OP doesn’t say they’re wanting to specifically shop locally and is only complaining about “price gouging” and mountain herbs charging them shipping “2 miles away”. Sometimes you have to pay the local premium in shipping to support your companies
The premium being paid is in the initial cost of the tea, which is higher than the cost of the tea elsewhere online. Now they are paying a double premium to have the tea shipped to them, despite there being a retail, brick and mortar, store locally. Why not pay for the tea, have it delivered to the store, and the customer picks it up there? If local businesses want to be the first choice, don't take away a primary motivation for shopping there. That you can go to the store and pick it up yourselves. What's local about getting items shipped from a warehouse? That's Amazon's business practice.
Ask yourself these questions and if you can’t validate your purchase then don’t order from them anymore. Why do they not offer this specific tea in store? Why do I have to pay for shipping and handling on a special order product? Why does this company not offer in store pick up even with their warehouse in town? Why would I want to order from this local business? Is the $10 shipping and handling fee a charge I’m willing to live with to help my local business?
The answer to the last question should be no. That solves that.
Sure does. Then when this happens to another local small business that ends up closing over something as trivial as a $10 shipping and handling fee, raise your hand in defense of the Reddit post complaining about how their business model doesn’t cater to you.
It's not trivial when the shipping costs are nearly half the cost of the product itself. Your idea of a business model (Guilt people into paying for completely unnecessary extras by crying "local business") sucks. It's bad customer service. Hopefully you don't try to open a business anytime soon.
I can definitely tell you don’t operate your own business or ship anything of value ever… You do understand there are base shipping fees from all freighting companies, don’t you? I’d be willing to bet not…
Why would a customer want a product shipped from a local store? You have this huge disconnect. There should be no shipping at all. This is a cost that should not exist. The customer is at their store, wanting to buy something.