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Kroger Implements Action Plan After Customers Complain of Flies

LEXINGTON, Ky. - An outbreak of flies at a Lexington grocery store has led to the creation of a small watch group pushing for improvements.

Margaret Verble says she has shopped for years at the small grocery store in the Chevy Chase neighborhood and started noticing several flies, especially in the meat department. She organized a meeting of fellow customers that calls itself Kroger Watch on Romany.

“Bill Farmer, our councilman, brought a picture he’d taken of a dead fly on a package of meat. Everybody there just went around the table and talked not just about the flies but about the condition the floors are in, about the condition of the produce.”

Verble says staff at the store told her the flies were becoming a problem because of the store’s HVAC system.

Luke Mathis, Environmental Health Supervisor for the Lexington-Fayette County Health Department says an inspector was also called in to investigate.

“His decision was, yes there was a significant amount of flies. It wasn’t at the level that immediate action needed to be taken but it was at the level that remedial actions needed to be taken by the establishment.”

Those actions include pest control and making sure doors to loading bays are shut when not in use.

Kroger Spokesman Tim McGurk says management has responded and taken steps to address the problem.

“Our food safety director has been in the store, developed an action plan, a cleaning and sanitation action plan that has been implemented. It included a professional cleaning inside the store and out.”

Kroger says it re-sanitized the deli and meat cases and has ordered additional fly grids. 

The Romany Rd Kroger underwent a follow-up inspection by the health department this week with no major issues.

Verble says Kroger Watch will continue to monitor the store and submit comments to the company.

Lexington native Brenna Angel anchored local morning newscasts for WUKY through May 13. She joined the station in March 2010 after previously working for WHAS-AM in Louisville.