What is going on with Woolworths’ fresh baked cookies?

A FACEBOOK post praising these cookies has gone viral. But while they look tempting and delicious, there’s a problem with them.

Woolies can’t compete with Coles’ ‘Ultimate Choc Chip’ fresh baked cookies. Picture: Supplied

OPINION

DEAR Woolworths, we need to talk about your cookies.

You know, the fresh-baked ones that you placed squarely in my line of vision at the entrance to your store, labelled “Dreamy Chocolate”.

Having previously been introduced to the taste sensation that is the Coles Bakery chocolate chip cookie, I picked up a five-pack of your version of the treat.

What ensued was a shock to the senses.

Biting into the “dreamy” concoction was like entering a culinary nightmare.

Your cookie was strangely lacking in flavour, yet somehow sickening at the same time.

The doughy texture left me wondering if a small child had been let loose in the kitchen, or if the thermostat was off in your oven.

A friend came over for dinner and I asked her to perform a taste test. She was unable to finish a single cookie.

I brought the packet to work to get rid of the offending baked goods and handed one to a colleague, who reported that it tasted “dusty” and “like it’s not cooked properly”.

The experience was disappointing, to say the least.

I realise my assessment is not shared by all: one of your former employees last week posted a rave review to your Facebook page, which has since gone viral, with commentators dubbing it “a marketer’s dream”.

I am concerned for his tastebuds.

More worrying is the impact your inferior cookie recipe may be having on your chances of winning the supermarket war.

There’s a reason Coles’ fresh-baked “Ultimate Choc Chip Cookie” was voted Product of the Year 2017 in its category by the Consumer Survey of Product Innovation, an annual Nielsen poll of more than 14,000 Australian shoppers.

To be honest, I’m not sure what’s so innovative about them, apart from the fact they taste so. Damn. Good.

So when a product masquerading as an identical copy made its way into my shopping basket, the anticlimax was shattering.

It’s honestly enough to send me scurrying to Coles, adding 20 minutes onto my journey home.

A clue to what makes their choc-chip cookies so much more delicious comes in a blurb the retailer put out after its Product of the Year win.

“We have taken our famous Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookie and taken it a step further to make it even more indulgent,” Coles said.

“Made with real Australian butter and real chocolate chips, we reckon they’re the best tasting you can buy. It is the only in-store cookie with an incredible 40 per cent chocolate chips.”

By contrast, the Woolworths version is made with compound chocolate, margarine and palm oil — with “natural butter flavouring”.

Sorry, Woolies, but that just doesn’t cut it, and I suspect you already know what this means.

Coles chief executive John Durkan revealed during an investor briefing day in June that its fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies had become “one of the top sellers in the category” as a result of the overhaul.

Mr Durkan also said that in-house bakeries would be a key plank Coles’ strategy to win the $90 billion grocery war, with the retailer now in the process of converting an extra 180 stores to include bakeries in order to deliver on its fresh bread promise.

This means that sales of its cookies, already on an upward trajectory, are likely to increase.

So, Woolies, it’s time to get your act together.

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