Tag Archive for 'coles'

Food price hike

Published
by
Brian
4 months, 1 week ago
in Food
. 17 Comments

Competition lawyer Professor Frank Zumbo studied food prices in the OECD from 2000 and found price increases in Australia at 41.3% were the third highest behind only New Zealand and South Korea. He had no doubt the evil duopoly of Coles and Woolworths was to blame.

Graeme Samuel, the chairman of the ACCC, was more inclined to blame the drought and “other factors” pointing out also that in fresh food the market share of Woolworths and Coles was probably less than 50%.

I heard Choice supporting Zumbo and the Retail Association supporting Samuels. Stephen King doubts the duopoly argument and points out that prices have risen faster in Britain in the last five years.

Continue reading ‘Food price hike’

Unit pricing games

Published
by
Robert Merkel
8 months, 1 week ago
in Economics and Policy
. 25 Comments

At my local Coles last Sunday evening, I was struck by the number of “3 for 2″ or “4 for 3″ offers being made. That is, if you buy four of a particular item, you pay the same as for three. This kind of thing certainly isn’t new, but it seems that almost all the specials in the store were of this type.

In other supermarket news, unit pricing has been rolled out in the local Coles and Safeway. That is, just about every product line in the shop now has a second label telling you the price per 100 grams, or 100 millilitres. These tags are supposed to make it easier to compare the price between different-size bottles from different (or the same) brands, and thus let people choose the cheapest if they so desire. It’s fairly standard Economics 101 – make the market more transparent and it’s supposed to work more efficiently.

But, of course, a “4 for 3 special” means that the unit price on the sticker on the shelf no longer applies and means the shopper is back to a bit of mental arithmetic. Am I being paranoid, or is this not entirely coincidental? And if so, what’s in it for the supermarkets?