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Luxury organic grocery story Erewhon is the hot new thing in California these days. While the grocer was first founded as a single store in 1966, it rose to fame in recent years after a large investment from private equity and quickly became the chic place to buy all your organic grocery needs in the LA area. But for all its insane prices and fancy branding, even Erewhon couldn’t shake the reality that, at its core, it was just a grocer. The Santa Monica location of the small chain was forced to close recently after an infestation of cockroaches.
The Los Angeles Times reports that the Santa Monica location closed its tonic bar after an infestation of cockroaches was found in the facility.
“We deeply regret that a roach was found in our tonic bar,” said a spokesperson for Erewhon in a statement to The Times. “We sincerely apologize for this lapse in our standards.”
Although the Times also reports that multiple cockroaches were found at the store. Now, normally, that wouldn’t be that big of a deal. But the issue comes when you contrast the infestation with Erewhon’s branding as a luxury grocer.
The store features items such as an organic turkey cranberry sandwich for $17.50 and organic broccolini with garlic confit for $20 per pound. So when news broke that the store had roaches, social media users wasted no time busting out the jokes.
“Oh what, so the $20 smoothies aren’t accessible to everyone,” one per jokes. “Were they grass-fed / pasture raised,” asked another. While others were a little less playful and quicker to call out the brand.
“And (they) got the NERVE to charge $20 for a single day strawberry!!! Where is that “influencer” who said it was worth it,” asked Twitter user @805ChefTiff.
Which is to say, you can either have cockroaches or charge insane prices for basic grocery staples. But you can’t get away with doing both.
Content shared from brobible.com.