Vander Veen's The Dutch Store — Local services in Wyoming

These guys totally screwed up my Christmas order. I placed an order for chocolate letters (12 as I recall). The order process with their website went just fine. All items were listed in stock and shipping was quoted. I placed this early enough that ground shipping was selected. I placed the order on December 11 and clicked send...then the incompetence commenced. First...I never received any confirmation of shipment so I called them on the 18th to make sure things were progressing. They told me that the shipment HADN'T EVEN BEEN PACKED UP YET. The lady even was looking for sympathy that she had "two stacks of orders before she could get to mine". This was fully a WEEK after my order had been placed. She then told me that it could not be at my place by Christmas! No communication was received by these guys without calling them whatsoever. I inquired about overnight shipping. I was told it might get to me if I paid $71 (!). It is Christmas and I had to have the letters, so agreed to pay this but this should not be my expense. This is a fail on so many levels. You NEVER blame your customer for your inability to deliver. You COMMUNICATE when you have issues (had they called me, maybe I could have selected expedited shipping rather than very expensive overnight.) Any responsible company would either hire temp staff, pay for faster shipping or work round the clock to make it happen. Never make your incompetence your customer's problem Never put your customer in the position of having to pay $71 in shipping or tell them you can't deliver in time for christmas when the order was placed TWO WEEKS before Christmas. This is essentially blackmail. The only positive thing I can say is that the order did arrive complete...although they were not smart enough to ask if 2 day shipping would be preferred as they got it out on the 20th and could have softened the shipping extortion. Run...don't walk...to any other online retailer of Dutch food products. These guys...

The closet place to me where I can order frozen Dutch snacks with confidence! We’re a six hour drive one way makes it tough just to get my cravings. Lived 2 years in Soest, Netherlands 76-78 and really got hooked on the “fast food “ or snack bar/ frites stands as well as the herring and sate. No American fast food restaurants around at that time and really didn’t miss them. A few times a year we would drive to Arnhem which had a McDonalds! But you couldn’t beat the frite stands and automotieks which were everywhere, some within a couple minutes walk from my house. Anyway, Vander Veens carries the best available kroketten, frikendel, mustards, frite sauce and mayonnaise. I make my own frites, curry ketchup and sate sauce!! Just waiting for a little colder weather to order. They pack the frozen items with ice packs but just making sure! Well worth the wait. I can make kroketten but not frickendel! So we splurge occasionally and have a feast along with stampot. And...

We love Vander Veen's! We live on the east side of the state and normally order our Dutch goods from them online but decided we had the time to make the 2-3 hour drive and visit in person. My husband, who grew up in the Netherlands, found all sorts of goodies to buy. I had a question about if a cook book was in English or Dutch, but it was fully sealed and the employees happily took the shrink wrap off one of their stock books to open it up and look inside for the answer . I offered to take the open cookbook but they said it was no problem, they would keep the open one out so people could look inside. If you have a question about a product they will find an answer for you. Great customer service and good selection of Dutch products hard to find most places...