4 ms·

A packaging mistake for a single truckload of butter is now a signal of something "fucking wrong" with a company who otherwise has a pretty stellar track record

by phil21 2y ago

A packaging mistake for a single truckload of butter is now a signal of something "fucking wrong" with a company who otherwise has a pretty stellar track record of consumer protection? A packaging mistake that likely happens many times over by lesser brands and products but is never caught because they don't have the same amount of exposure and customer base as Costco? The recall makes sense for stuff still on the shelves. It's a bit silly, but rules are rules. Pull it and stuff it in different packaging, or pay a crew of a couple folks in each store to pull it out of the boxes and donate to a local food kitchen. The FDA telling people at home to throw it away - after they are made aware of the issue in the first place or they wouldn't have known to be told to throw it away - is utter ridiculousness and the government workers here should absolutely know better. They are undermining their authority and don't even realize it. This will be used as a very effective tool against the institution in the future. It was a stupid tone-deaf call. They could have simply worked with Costco and put out a generalized notice to the public to be aware of the situation. Nuance matters. This is an unnecessary own-goal by a government agency that doesn't need such things at the moment. It has done more damage to public health than it will ever have hoped to gain - which would be correctly estimated at zero.

simoncion 2y ago
> The FDA telling people at home to throw it away... Are they? I was unable to find any evidence of this: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42153441 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42153441>. If you can find an official statement from the FDA that recommends (or orders) folks at home to dispose of the recalled food, I'd appreciate it.
- phil21 2y ago
  TFA lists it as a quote. If the author made it up without taking that statement from the FDA that would be on the author. It's not very ambiguous. > The FDA has shared specific steps to help consumers handle this recall safely. First, check the product codes on your butter containers and compare them to the codes in the recall notice. If you have one of the recalled batches, the FDA advises not to eat it under any circumstances. Instead, throw it out to avoid any health risks. For any questions or possible refunds, reach out to Costco through their customer service team. Edit: It is certainly curious that this looks like boilerplate language. I do wonder if it originates from an FDA spokesperson, or if the author copy/pasted a previous press release from Costco? Another article[0] explicitly states the FDA did not make any recommendations to consumers, but mentions the quoted statement and sourced it from foodsafety.gov as a general recommendation for "recalled products". Looking like the author completely made up the quote out of whole cloth by copy/pasting boilerplate generalized language while implying it was a directly related to the issue at hand. Nice catch! [0]https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/2024/11/13/costco-butter-recall-issued-for-missing-contains-milk-statement-fda/76226713007/ https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/2024/11/13/costco-b... Edit 2: Can't reply directly due to ratelimiting - but yes, you are absolutely correct that the FDA has not urged anyone, or even explicitly recommended it be thrown away. The above was my independent sleuthing before seeing your followup. Others did far better. I don't share the opinion this was "lazy telephone" by a reporter though - this was outright deliberate making things up to generate a narrative. Either there was a phone call/e-mail by a FDA rep these articles are quoting, or they are simply trying to generate outrage on purpose. There is no game of lazy telephone that can explain word choices such as "FDA urges" and the like to appear out of whole cloth.
  - simoncion 2y ago
    If you haven't visited that link I provided in the last five minutes, I urge you to do so. In that thread, a fellow has done some decent detective work. It looks like the article author (and/or editor) has played lazy telephone, and the FDA issued no such statement.
    - pixl97 2y ago
      Don't worry the bullshit the author made up will be seen by 40 million people on tictok and not a single one of them will read the actual FDA release. The information super highway is a race to the bottom human ignorance.
  - simoncion 2y ago
    > Can't reply directly due to ratelimiting... It USED to be the case that you could click the direct link to a comment to get the reply box to appear when the little "reply" link is refusing to show up. That might no longer be true, but it's worth a try next time you run into this. > ...this was outright deliberate making things up to generate a narrative. Oh, that's not an unreasonable assessment. > There is no game of lazy telephone that can explain word choices such as "FDA urges" and the like to appear out of whole cloth. If one site reports it, then other sites repeat it, that totally qualifies as "lazy telephone", IMO.
simoncion 2y ago
> A packaging mistake for a single truckload of butter is now a signal of something "fucking wrong" with a company who otherwise has a pretty stellar track record of consumer protection? Honestly? Yeah. There are a lot of little things you need to make sure happen correctly to produce and ship safe food that's fit for human consumption. If the QA for the package redesign failed to notice that the legally-mandated allergen field is missing from the package, what else is company QA letting slip through the cracks? [0] Also, I don't know if you've ever worked for a company that had a management change that destroyed the company's ability to continue to ship a proper product, but I definitely have, as have folks I've known. By the time folks outside the company notice, the rot is usually bad, bad, bad. Additionally: Remember that "a signal of something fucking wrong" is not the same as "something is fucking wrong". People and organizations are known to send out worrisome signals and still be fundamentally sound. But in the area of food safety, it's the job of the FDA to notice these worrisome signals and go look to see if something is currently fucking wrong with the company. [0] Or if those labels are manually applied, the same question holds.
- phil21 2y ago
  > it's the job of the FDA to notice these worrisome signals and go look to see if something is currently fucking wrong with the company. Fair points, but this recall looks to be vendor-initiated from the actual FDA website itself. Found via previous sleuthing in our discussion downthread. The FDA is simply adding it to it's database as it does, and the media picked it up from there. It's unlikely we'll ever be told if this was found via customer complaint, or via an internal QA process. The one point also that I meant to make earlier, is that these products are likely contracted out. I wonder how many creameries Costco outsources their butter production to? I know other Kirkland products are simple rebrands, so I would assume the case is the same here as well.
  - simoncion 2y ago
    > I wonder how many creameries Costco outsources their butter production to? I know other Kirkland products are simple rebrands, so I would assume the case is the same here as well. That's a good question. The rumor I heard says that Costco plays super, duper hardball with companies that aren't willing to pay the low, low price Costco wants... using tactics such as waiting until a vendor's product nears the point of becoming unsellable as leverage. If that rumor's true, well, Costco may contract with very many creameries and serve as a "retailer of last resort" for them. If the packaging is 'Kirkland' branded, and was provided by Costco, I wonder what fuckup happened so that the allergens section was omitted from the packaging. It'd be fucking dumb for that label to have to be manually applied. [0] So... was this a packaging printing error? If so, who was responsible for the QA? > ...this recall looks to be vendor-initiated... That may be a signal that the creamery caught the error and recalled the shipments. It might ALSO be the case that Costco caught the error and demanded the vendor recall the shipments. I don't think we have the data required to determine who deserves the credit for that action. [0] But things that are fucking dumb happen all the time, so that's not proof that that's not what's up.

by phil21 2y ago

simoncion 2y ago

> The FDA telling people at home to throw it away... Are they? I was unable to find any evidence of this: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42153441 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42153441>. If you can find an official statement from the FDA that recommends (or orders) folks at home to dispose of the recalled food, I'd appreciate it.

phil21 2y ago
TFA lists it as a quote. If the author made it up without taking that statement from the FDA that would be on the author. It's not very ambiguous. > The FDA has shared specific steps to help consumers handle this recall safely. First, check the product codes on your butter containers and compare them to the codes in the recall notice. If you have one of the recalled batches, the FDA advises not to eat it under any circumstances. Instead, throw it out to avoid any health risks. For any questions or possible refunds, reach out to Costco through their customer service team. Edit: It is certainly curious that this looks like boilerplate language. I do wonder if it originates from an FDA spokesperson, or if the author copy/pasted a previous press release from Costco? Another article[0] explicitly states the FDA did not make any recommendations to consumers, but mentions the quoted statement and sourced it from foodsafety.gov as a general recommendation for "recalled products". Looking like the author completely made up the quote out of whole cloth by copy/pasting boilerplate generalized language while implying it was a directly related to the issue at hand. Nice catch! [0]https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/2024/11/13/costco-butter-recall-issued-for-missing-contains-milk-statement-fda/76226713007/ https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/2024/11/13/costco-b... Edit 2: Can't reply directly due to ratelimiting - but yes, you are absolutely correct that the FDA has not urged anyone, or even explicitly recommended it be thrown away. The above was my independent sleuthing before seeing your followup. Others did far better. I don't share the opinion this was "lazy telephone" by a reporter though - this was outright deliberate making things up to generate a narrative. Either there was a phone call/e-mail by a FDA rep these articles are quoting, or they are simply trying to generate outrage on purpose. There is no game of lazy telephone that can explain word choices such as "FDA urges" and the like to appear out of whole cloth.
- simoncion 2y ago
  If you haven't visited that link I provided in the last five minutes, I urge you to do so. In that thread, a fellow has done some decent detective work. It looks like the article author (and/or editor) has played lazy telephone, and the FDA issued no such statement.
  - pixl97 2y ago
    Don't worry the bullshit the author made up will be seen by 40 million people on tictok and not a single one of them will read the actual FDA release. The information super highway is a race to the bottom human ignorance.
- simoncion 2y ago
  > Can't reply directly due to ratelimiting... It USED to be the case that you could click the direct link to a comment to get the reply box to appear when the little "reply" link is refusing to show up. That might no longer be true, but it's worth a try next time you run into this. > ...this was outright deliberate making things up to generate a narrative. Oh, that's not an unreasonable assessment. > There is no game of lazy telephone that can explain word choices such as "FDA urges" and the like to appear out of whole cloth. If one site reports it, then other sites repeat it, that totally qualifies as "lazy telephone", IMO.

simoncion 2y ago

> A packaging mistake for a single truckload of butter is now a signal of something "fucking wrong" with a company who otherwise has a pretty stellar track record of consumer protection? Honestly? Yeah. There are a lot of little things you need to make sure happen correctly to produce and ship safe food that's fit for human consumption. If the QA for the package redesign failed to notice that the legally-mandated allergen field is missing from the package, what else is company QA letting slip through the cracks? [0] Also, I don't know if you've ever worked for a company that had a management change that destroyed the company's ability to continue to ship a proper product, but I definitely have, as have folks I've known. By the time folks outside the company notice, the rot is usually bad, bad, bad. Additionally: Remember that "a signal of something fucking wrong" is not the same as "something is fucking wrong". People and organizations are known to send out worrisome signals and still be fundamentally sound. But in the area of food safety, it's the job of the FDA to notice these worrisome signals and go look to see if something is currently fucking wrong with the company. [0] Or if those labels are manually applied, the same question holds.

phil21 2y ago
> it's the job of the FDA to notice these worrisome signals and go look to see if something is currently fucking wrong with the company. Fair points, but this recall looks to be vendor-initiated from the actual FDA website itself. Found via previous sleuthing in our discussion downthread. The FDA is simply adding it to it's database as it does, and the media picked it up from there. It's unlikely we'll ever be told if this was found via customer complaint, or via an internal QA process. The one point also that I meant to make earlier, is that these products are likely contracted out. I wonder how many creameries Costco outsources their butter production to? I know other Kirkland products are simple rebrands, so I would assume the case is the same here as well.
- simoncion 2y ago
  > I wonder how many creameries Costco outsources their butter production to? I know other Kirkland products are simple rebrands, so I would assume the case is the same here as well. That's a good question. The rumor I heard says that Costco plays super, duper hardball with companies that aren't willing to pay the low, low price Costco wants... using tactics such as waiting until a vendor's product nears the point of becoming unsellable as leverage. If that rumor's true, well, Costco may contract with very many creameries and serve as a "retailer of last resort" for them. If the packaging is 'Kirkland' branded, and was provided by Costco, I wonder what fuckup happened so that the allergens section was omitted from the packaging. It'd be fucking dumb for that label to have to be manually applied. [0] So... was this a packaging printing error? If so, who was responsible for the QA? > ...this recall looks to be vendor-initiated... That may be a signal that the creamery caught the error and recalled the shipments. It might ALSO be the case that Costco caught the error and demanded the vendor recall the shipments. I don't think we have the data required to determine who deserves the credit for that action. [0] But things that are fucking dumb happen all the time, so that's not proof that that's not what's up.