"You can get ANYTHING at Trader Joe's" slogan made reality !

Entrance of Phoenix Trader Joe's

Where they met...

While shopping at the Phoenix, AZ Trader Joe's (4821N 20th street) this summer, I've found this (great !) customer letter from Ms Gail Petersen to Mr. Winans, "Store Captain" exhibited just close from the cashier. Worth reading ...

"Dear Mr. Winans,

On October 14, 2007 I was shopping at the Town & Country Trader Joe's - a beautiful Sunday afternoon. That shopping trip changed my life forever. I met the man I will be marrying, on October 18 this year (2008), that Sunday at your store. Our eyes caught one another a couple of times and we spoke briefly in the checkout line (the one under the Palm tree) - further conversation in the parking lot led to an exchange of business cards and the rest is history.

This is a second marriage for both of us - we will have a family with four grown children (two girls and two boys). As we have gotten to know one another we realized that we have lived or worked just a couple of miles apart over the last 13 years, know more than a few people in common and have sisters that live just five miles apart in Los Angeles. Alan is a fourth generation Arizonan and I have lived in Phoenix since 1960 - but what it took was a simple trip to our favourite grocery store to bring us together and we would like to thank you.

We shop at Trader Joe's every week and always go to the checkout line under the palm tree. We share our story with the checker and anyone else who is willing to listen. We will be buying the flowers for the bouquets for the wedding at your store and plan to stop by between the wedding at the church and our reception to take a photo under the Trader Joe's palm tree that brought us together 12 months ago.

I am a professor at Arizona State University's College of Nursing & Health Care Innovation and Alan Hock, my fiancé, is a defense attorney in private practice and pro tem judge. We have shared our story with many of our colleagues and friends - and now all of our 'over fifty ' single friends shop at Trader Joe's with the hopes that our joke, "You can get ANYTHING at Trader Joe's" will also become their romantic reality.

Our thanks to all of you who make Trader Joe's such a wonderfully unique shopping experience !"

Gail Petersen

A dream of happy customer letter !