2023-09-11 06:20:17
“This product has seen its weight drop, and the price charged by our supplier increase. » From this Monday, September 11, this type of label topped with the hashtag #shrinkflation (“réduflation” in French) should flourish on the shelves of Carrefour stores. Last week, Alexandre Bompard, the group’s managing director, announced that he wanted to tackle this practice by labeling all products whose quantity has fallen, despite a rising price.
From the contraction of the English verb to shrink (“shrink”) and the word “inflation”, the shrinkflation is not a new practice. “Manufacturers have always been tempted to adjust the quantity of product sold, in particular so as not to exceed certain price thresholds for consumers. This can even be done for good reasons, to improve the formula of products for example without increasing the price”, explains Philippe Goetzmann, consultant in the agri-food sector. In 2018, the bottle of Coca-Cola was increased from 1.5 to 1.25 liters to avoid having to pass on the introduction of the soda tax to consumers.
A legal but misleading practice
In general, this reduction in quantity is done without any information to the consumer. But for the past year, the consumer defense association Foodwatch has been sounding the alarm about the acceleration of this practice, which is certainly legal but misleading. At the end of 2022, it had pinpointed several brands, such as Kiri, St Hubert, Saint Louis, Salvetat, Lindt, Teisseire, or even Uncle Ben’s, which used the different methods of shrinkflation: reduction in weight and increase in the price per kilo with or without price increase in stores, announcement of price reduction compensated by a reduction in quantity…
In recent months, it is the distributors who have finally stepped up to the plate. Before Carrefour, Intermarché also led its anti-shrinkflation guerrilla campaign during the summer by denouncing on the shelves the double increase (per unit and per kilo) of a bag of Findus potatoes. For its part, Carrefour refuses to communicate on the number of products concerned, but is not stingy with examples. As with this packet of Lay’s chips reduced from 150 to 135 grams, despite a price increase requested from the distributor of 27%. Or this bottle of Lipton Ice Tea increased from 1.5 to 1.25 liters despite a 40% price increase.
Having carried out the survey on the shelvesBFM Business estimates that at least 125 products would be affected by this price increase despite the drop in weight, with increases per kilo that could reach more than 100%. A figure that should nevertheless be put into perspective in the face of the several tens of thousands of references from a supermarket.
A practice in the sights of Bercy
In any case, for months, Bercy has been announcing that it will tackle the problem. After Olivia Grégoire, the Minister Delegate for Trade, who had announced before the summer that she would seize the National Consumer Council to conduct an in-depth investigation, the Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, promised at the end of August a law to oblige industrialists “to make the reduction in content very visible when they keep the same packaging”.
A regulation that specialists in the sector already consider inapplicable since it will suffice for manufacturers to change their formula, by lowering the quality of the products used. A practice which already has its name: « cheap inflation » !
“The Ball of the Hypocrites”
Beyond these practices condemned by all, no one is fooled: Carrefour’s White Knight operation is part of a price war with manufacturers, in which all shots are allowed when new annual industry negotiations. ” It’s very hypocritical to say that there are scams. The distributors who have these products, they have accepted them », Reacted on RTL the president of Ania, representing the industrialists.
“In reality, we are at a ball of hypocrites with shrinkflation, because when they refuse to pass the price increases of manufacturers, distributors also become accomplices”estimates mass distribution specialist Olivier Dauvers. “And then we must remember that some distributors themselves use this practice on their own brand (private labels, or “private labels”) »observes Audrey Morice, campaign manager at Foodwatch.
In April 2021, the association had pinpointed a private label which had reduced from 650 to 500 grams of bags of frozen red fruits whose price per kilo had thus increased by 30%. The distributor in question, who offered these sachets in its anti-inflation products, was none other than a certain Carrefour…
#Carrefour #tackles #paying