Countdown has issued an apology and pledged to enhance its pest control measures following a customer’s discovery of mice droppings at the Eastgate supermarket.

The incident occurred on April 26th, when the customer and her children were shopping for groceries in preparation for the new school term.

The customer noticed a damaged box on the shelf and upon further inspection, found that it had been chewed on by mice.

The smell of ammonia alerted her to the presence of mouse urine and droppings throughout the aisle.

“I think it’s horrible to see something like this, especially with the cost of living, and it’s just a huge health and safety issue,” the customer said about the incident.”

“When I smelled the ammonia and started pulling everything off the shelves, I found that there was a huge infestation of mice poo and obviously pee.

I notified the manager straight away and showed him where I had found the infestation, and he called for cleaners to come and clean it up and said it would all be thrown away,” she added.

Despite the clean-up, the customer found traces of mice droppings further along the aisle where cereal products were placed.

 “It’s pretty obvious they aren’t doing their health and safety routines checks.

Something should really be done about it,” she said.

A Countdown spokesperson told Chris Lynch Media “food safety and hygiene is our absolute priority, and we have comprehensive pest management plans in place in all of our stores, including Countdown Eastgate.”

“As part of this plan, we use external providers who address any pest issues as they arise, and also do proactive work to prevent pests emerging in the first place.

At Countdown Eastgate this includes monthly visits from an external pest management provider who looks for possible emerging issues.”

The spokesperson said “in March, our provider identified that there was a need to increase our pest management with the change of seasons, and we’ve been working closely with them for the last two months to manage any pest activity.

“Following this customer raising their concerns with our team, we’ve continued with an intensive cleaning process and we’re continuing to work with our pest management provider to eradicate any further pest activity.

We sincerely apologise to this customer for any distress their experience has caused, and we would like to assure them that we take any issues like this very seriously.”