Albert Heijn

Grocery store chain Albert Heijn is converting two AH To Go minimarts into totally cashless locations. The staffed cash registers at the two AMC hospital shops will disappear from Monday.

While more traditional payment methods will remain at the AH To Go stores for the time being, they are introducing an innovation to the public that allows customers to tap their phones against the products. The charges will take about ten minutes to be processed. So far, Albert Heijn is only supporting Android phones, but plans to expand this to iOS and Windows.

Animal welfare organization Wakker Dier announced the five nominees for its "liar liar" award for 2018 - an annual online election the organization holds to draw attention to companies deceptions about animal welfare. This year's nominees are Jumbo, Campina, Rabobank, ECOstyle and last year's winner Albert Heijn.

Albert Heijn wants to stop using plastic bags in its fruit and vegetable departments. The Dutch supermarket chain will start experimenting with alternatives in 10 stores this summer, a spokesperson for Albert Heijn said to RTL Nieuws.

"Reducing plastic has had our attention for some time", the spokesperson said. "The so-called loop bags at the cash register have become thinner and smaller, so we save about 10 percent of plastic, and containers with soft fruit now have plastic foil as a lid instead of a hard plastic lid."

Dutch supermarket chain Albert Heijn is facing criticism about client profiles that new employees have to learn. The profiles include a black woman with a child to represent clients who buy cheaper products, and a white man as a "Premium client". The Netherlands Institute for Human Rights and a number of anti-discrimination organizations call the profiles stigmatizing and stereotypical, NOS reports.

An attempted supermarket robbery at Albert Heijn on Hildo Kroplaan in The Hague was foiled on Wednesday evening when 38-year-old Melissa Frieser chased the robber off, Omroep West reports.

Albert Heijn re-implemented measures in the sale of baby formula as the demand is increasing again. According to the supermarket, traders across the country are buying up Nutrilon 1 to 5 and shipping the formula to China, NOS reports.

Albert Heijn branches are therefore limiting the purchase of formula to two cans per customer. Baby formula can also only be bought at the service desk - there is a note on the shelves telling customers to go to the desk for baby formula. The supermarket chain hopes that this will ensure that the product is always available to Dutch customers. 

German supermarket chain Aldi is removing all eggs from the shelves across the country because of fipronil found in eggs from some Dutch poultry farms, the supermarket chain announced on Friday. According to Aldi, this is a "precautionary measure", ANP reports.

Food products imported from the United States and sold in Dutch stores often don't comply with European laws and regulation, Foodwatch announced after investigating 86 such products sold by Albert Heijn, Jumbo and Jamin, among others.

According to the watchdog, none of the products fully complied with EU laws. "We already suspected that there are problems in the supervision on these types of American import products, but that not one product from a sample of over 80 products fully complied with European regulation is really scary", Foodwatch said in a statement. 

The attempted robbery of an Albert Heijn grocery store led police to fire gunshots in the apprehension of some suspects, and the shutdown of a long stretch of the A16 highway after a police chase involving another suspect. Rapid responding police units foiled the crime in ’s-Gravendeel, a small Zuid-Holland town outside of Dordrecht.

Officers raced to the scene, after a commotion woke people in the neighborhood around 3 a.m. on Monday. Residents wanting to know what was going on were told to immediately return indoors.

Cynthia Harms' pet birds fell dead to the ground while she was cooking with Albert Heijn's promotional non-stick pans. They died of Teflon poisoning, she claims on Facebook. The supermarket chain is investigating the matter, but stresses that the pans are safe when used normally, Albert Heijn wrote in a response on Facebook.

A spokesperson for the supermarket chain told the Telegraaf that they received complaints about the pans and birds from two customers.

Over 700 supermarkets in the Netherlands opened their doors on Christmas Day, a new record, according to openingstijden.nl. On Boxing Day today more than 2,800 stores are open, AD reports.

With some 700 stores open, Christmas Day looked like a regular shopping Sunday, according to the site. Last year only about 400 stores were open on Christmas and in 2014 only 200.