I'm not familiar with Publix (they don't have them out here), nor do I order food from delis. Sure, the deli employees could have asked "you are aware that the turkey is cold, not hot, right?" but seems that the signage never stated the turkey was hot or ready to serve. Ready to eat or fully cooked doesn't mean it is hot.

Just because the OP was ordering the turkey for a work lunch doesn't necessarily mean the deli employees should know she wanted a hot turkey. Some lunch/break rooms have stoves/ovens (though one big enough for a turkey?) or someone could always heat it up at home and then bring it in to work.

That aside, not only did more than one employee know it was for a work function (where they most likely wouldn't have an oven, nor would anyone want to cook it at home and then transport it to work), but the deli manager had been telling them every day to inform customers that the turkeys are cold. That alone puts them at fault.

When Thanksgiving comes around they are going to be overwhelmed with turkey orders, yes. But that means there's a greater chance for misunderstanding and they should be prepared to handle that. It should be common practice to inform customers of something like that, especially around holidays when they're getting tons of orders for it. In most retail environments it's pretty safe to assume that customers are morons and need their hands held. Even if they don't, no harm done.

It doesn't sound like they actually catered the event, just supplied food.

Even refrigerated leftovers are 'fully cooked'

In the context of catering I would expect cooked items to be hot. But it sounds like the OP was just buying the food and supplies from the store.

Now if it was in the context of catering, maybe I'd expect 'fully cooked' to mean hot. But it sounds like the deli was just a supplier, not a caterer.

So the fact it needed to be re-heated does not mean it's 'not done cooking' to me.

Looks like the should have gone with Boston Market.

Or just gotten some sandwich fixings. Nothing wrong with cold turkey sandwiches.

While I do understand the OP's frustration, this seems like a communication error and not maliciousness or fraud on the attempt of Publix. Frankly, including the words FULLY COOKED in all caps does not sway me to her point of view.

This was entirely her error and I am suprised the Consumerist staff does not come right out and say that. She also seems more interesting in writing a dramatic 10 paragraph saga about this than realized she should have asked and moving on.

I have heated them according to directions and they were not "leather", they were not the best turkey on the planet, but very much edible.

Even then people don't listen and freak out when picking them up even when I told them myself that it would be cold.

In my experience people rarely pick up orders when they say they will, we could have an order hot and ready to go for a 10:00 order only to have the customer show up at 12:00 and we have no way to keep all of that hot, especially for multiple customers.

On all signage, it clearly says that the meal is cooked, but given cold.
On every order form, it also says the meal is cold, including the re-heating directions for the turkey.

Every return, customers have admitted they didnt not *read* that teeny little fact.

Even if we wanted to server them hot, with the 50+ orders we got this yea, there is no way we could've *safely* kept that many orders warm for pickup.

I feel so sorry for that publix manager.

That being said, Publix does have the responsibility of making sure customers know what they are receiving. It can be misleading when they serve freshly roasted chickens with hot sides, but the turkey dinner is cold.

Having said that; Wendy is a bad consumer. She ordered something not understanding what she was ordering, then pointed fingers everywhere else when her expectations didn't meet what she was provided, despite the fact that she was provided exactly what she ordered. It's bad behaviour on her part as well as on the part of the store employees. In fact, the only person in this story who did anything right was the manager who tried to make it right by giving her chicken and pumpkin pies.

The store has obviously had this problem before, and should do their best to align expectations. That being said, there are a lot of stupid people in this world. You can try and tell them the simplest of concepts...many times over...and these either aren't listening, or it goes right over their head. This situation sounds like there may have been a bit of "noise" on both ends of the line.

I am surprised that so many people agree with the letter-writer in saying that they should warn that Fully Cooked doesn't mean hot.

The fact she spoke to 3 employees is emphasized over and over, but this is a supermarket deli, not the Four Seasons. They don't have some system in place to track all your customer contacts. Now some supermarkets (like larger Wegman's stores) have catering departments that will handle you just like any other catering company, but expect to pay $10-$25 per person just like you would with any other caterer. You are going to get the same level of service ordering a single bird from the deli counter - that will get you treated like anyone else buying a pre-cooked turkey for the holiday meal.

And because I can't figure how to reply to a reply within a thread, i stick this in here as well. No reputable food preparation operation should every sell your a "nearly cooked" or "Partially cooked" turkey. that is salmonella outbreak waiting to happen. If the bird is not fully cooked, the uncooked part can infect the cooked part, and the whole bird must be heated back up to 180 before serving - which takes a considerable amount of time, and which will make the part that was already cooked close to inedible because it will be dried out.

But I do absolutely see how someone could make the honest mistake of thinking that fully cooked=hot. And I agree with the previous poster who said that another term like "ready to heat" might clear up some confusion.

Also, the overzealous reheating instructions must be a liability thing. It would be very dangerous to partially cook and then cool a turkey--I'm sure the bird was, in fact, fully cooked.

The centerpiece of the traditional holiday feast is a succulent, Publix Deli Fully Cooked Turkey. Ours simply requires heating before serving and comes with four delicious sides; 2.75 lb Old-Fashioned Cornbread Dressing, 2.75 lb Homestyle Mashed Potatoes, 32 oz Gravy and 8 oz Cranberry-Orange Relish. Each side has 4—6 servings. If you would like to add more sides to your meal, view a complete list of available Publix Deli side dishes.

If I purchase it at the meat department, it is okay to be frozen. It doesn't matter if it is labeled fully cooked or not.

As far as the op's "ONE: it is almost fully cooked, aka the directions on it say to heat in the oven at 350 degrees for 90-120 minutes" That's called heating it up. You wouldn't exactly stick the thing in a microwave to heat it up. So it's not "almost" fully cooked, it is fully cooked. If you cook some dinner one day and decide to store and freeze it, it's still fully cooked, just not hot.

Look, it's horrible customer service not to make sure that you're giving the customer exactly what she wants, but Publix and similar-style stores are pretty clear that they are NOT caterers. If she wanted a catered luncheon then she should have made that clear, as the manager stated.

Maybe I over-rely on the internet? Because 2 seconds of googling confirms: "The centerpiece of the traditional holiday feast is a succulent, Publix Deli Fully Cooked Turkey. Ours simply requires heating before serving"

Also, I'm not much more perceptive than Wendy because I misread the poll and voted No when I really think Yes!

If this OP is truly as experienced in event planning as she claims, one would hope he/she realizes that most fully-cooked items are not sold hot. Publix didn't make the OP look stupid in front of the new boss, the OP did.

I watched a deli worker try to pack some pasta salad into a container and the task seemed to have the complexity of disarming a bomb. It also took nearly ten minutes and we were the only people at the counter. The workers that have a grasp of their job will have it done before they are done asking you if you need anything else.

Why this week could be a nightmare for a deli manager is quite understandable.

I won't shop anywhere else. If my husband wants it cheaper, he's the one that has to go to the Wal*mart or the Kroger. I refuse.

It still boggles my mind of reheating a whole turkey at cooking temps for a couple of hours. Just... no. No one should do that.

I guess the OP should take it as a learning experience.

If your getting a turkey from the deli you expect it to be cooked and hot. We have bought either the turkey or the whole meal that comes with sides around Thanksgiving a couple of different years from Hyvee without a problem or needing to cook the turkey yourself when you get home.

The deli sells a TON of fully cooked, but cold things.

However, fully-cooked does not, and hasn't ever, meant hot.

There were two mistakes made here.
1. she did not specifically clarify she needed everything hot. The employee at Publix not asking should have raised a red flag if she was that experienced
2. the store did not ask if she needed everything hot or cold

However, fully cooked in a DELI certainly implies hot. When I purchase cooked food in a deli, I expect it to be ready to serve and eat. A whole cooked turkey is meant to be served and eaten hot, thus I would expect it to be hot.

Good on that manager for not only making sure the OP had something hot but calling up the previous orders to make sure they knew what they were getting.

Ba dum bum.

I can still give the OP the benefit of the doubt if she hasn't ordered something like this before. The deli counter can be confusing when you generally have rotisserie birds lying around. I'm more inclined to say that the OP should have asked, but since the burden on the store to say "it's cold" is low, it might be a good thing to start doing. But she got a cooked bird, as advertised. Publix was very kind to try and make up for the OP's confusion. Not required (in my mind), but good business.

If the manager is telling them to let people know it'll be a cold bird then yes, they should be doing that.

I don't understand the "de-boning" fee. She didn't ask for a 'de-boned' turkey, just a hot one.

Also, if it says that it should be heated for a long time in an oven, that could be confusing...is it really fully cooked or, as the OP says, almost fully cooked? If it's like the Costco chickens we get, it's theoretically fully cooked and doesn't require reheating but we have had Costco chickens that actually weren't 100% cooked at the thigh joints (big pain in the butt when we were in a hotel with nothing but a microwave). So we take that label to mean "almost cooked" and always cook ours more.

I don't think the OP should have had to ask if it was hot or not because there's a reasonable expectation that a turkey meal comes ready to serve, since most places do it that way. The store should have made it clear.

If the customer said they were coming in at X time to get the turkey, then I can see how it might make sense for the store to heat it up beforehand. But I think they should mention it, because even if it's the norm at the store, some people have no idea what the norm is.

I'm trying to picture the logistical challenge of timing various customer orders based on turkey size, expected pickup time and oven capacity to be able to offer everyone a hot turkey even with advance orders, or at least how to form a large enough array of heat lamps to keep a few dozen 14 lb. turkeys hot.

The employees def. should have told her what she was getting. But I can also see that some (not all) people who have retail jobs can not really care.

I stopped going to my local Quiznos because the people there are not too.... bright.