Demand Kroger Continue Its Senior Discount Program

Kroger, a national food chain, is about to "retire" its Senior Discount Program on June 22, 2017. This program offered a 5% discount on all items purchased by Senior Citizens on one day a week. For many Senior Citizens, this has been a godsend and has been a big help to their overall budget. Many Senior Citizens, if not most, live on very limited incomes. The savings from a 5% discount could amount to the difference between buying healthy foods or not, buying a medication or not, etc. In Louisville, KY, for example, there are even buses that pick up Senior Citizens from Assisted Living and other Senior facilities to take them to and from Kroger on Senior Discount Day. That's just how important this program is to a Senior Citizen's budget.

Kroger has said their reason for discontinuing this program is because they're lowering prices on over 3,000 items - mostly "corporate brands", which specifically means the Kroger brand. These are mostly boxed, packaged, and canned items, which many Senior Citizens may not buy due to health problems and concerns - e.g., too much salt for those with heart and kidney problems, too much sugar for diabetics, etc. Even the Kroger brand frozen chicken is loaded with salt and shrinks to about 1/3 the size after cooking, making it an unwise purchase for anyone wanting to reduce their sodium intake and getting a quality food product.

There is no guarantee or assurance that Senior Citizens will benefit from ANY of these price reductions. Instead, it seems like it's more about Kroger wanting to promote their "brand" of products, and there's nothing wrong with that, but to pay for the cost reduction, they're throwing Senior Citizens under the bus. It's not much different than the federal government paying for tax cuts for the extremely wealthy by making cuts to programs that help the elderly, poor, and disabled. Kroger wants to promote their brand; to do so they are making cuts in prices to their Kroger branded products, and to pay for those cuts, they're doing away with the Senior Citizen Discount Program. And that's just wrong.

Please join me in demanding that Kroger remain a good corporate citizen by retaining their Senior Citizen Discount Program, and not throw Senior Citizens under the bus in order to pay for their price reductions on their Kroger brand food items. Allow Senior Citizens to keep their 5% discount on the items they need and want to purchase. Please ask Kroger not to take away something that makes such a big difference to a Senior Citizen's budget.

Thank you.