Back in August, we told you about how some Safeway employees were mysteriously and suddenly transferred to different stores as management was becoming more demanding about checkers asking for donations.

We hear from our Safeway mole, that things did not stop there.

As you may as well already know, the Safeway crusade of the month is breast cancer research. (For those heavy-drinking ladies out there – score!) Safeway stores are festooned with pink balloons and pink credit-card-swiper cozies. How pretty.

As plans were being made a few weeks ago to launch this most recent Sex and the City breast cancer-themed drive, the district manager informed store managers that it is a job requirement for all Safeway employees to ask for donations. According to our insider, this is absolutely untrue.

The district manager also informed store managers about what they can do with the donations. “Huminna-wha?” you might ask. Aren’t all proceeds supposed to go to the charity? Apparently not. Store managers, at their own discretion, are allowed and encouraged to take donations and invest them back into Safeway if they feel it will result in additional revenue.

Examples after the jump

For example, if you give your hard-earned $50 to Safeway for breast cancer research, the store manager can take your $50 and buy Safeway hot dogs and buns and sell them to customers (we’ve seen this in action), hoping to make more than they spent on the food. Not so bad, right? Wrong. Often times, the store ends up spending more money on these Safeway products (e.g. hot dogs) than they make selling them (who even wants a Safeway hot dog?). Thus, less money ends up going to the charity.

Another option for store managers is to reward employees who solicit the most donations in week with $20 or $50 Safeway gift cards. Nice, isn’t it? Not really, when you consider that the gift cards are bought with donated money. And when you factor in the number of participating Safeway stores and the fact that these drives can last for up to three months, that’s a lot of your donated money going back to Safeway, not to breast cancer research.

Safeway, is covering their asses on this a little by saying, “Proceeds go toward breast cancer research,” or something to that effect. (It doesn’t say, “All proceeds…”)

So, next time you’re in line at Safeway and the checker asks you for a donation, consider sending a check directly to the charity or participating in a Race for the Cure event. And always, always be nice to said checkers. It’s not their fault.