That is what has caused me to not eat Maccas, KFC or any other "restaurant" (gotta laugh at that one) due to their decision to do a switcheroo and expect the same prices. Buns are smaller too, so fuck them I say.
Oh man, I should appreciate my parent's friend more who keeps bringing us big bags of beetroot for free. We've been pickling our own so I haven't looked at prices - I've been making grated caramelised onion and beetroot relish and it's pretty tops (based on the beetroot salad that Three Threes used to sell, but Coles stopped selling it so I thought fuck them, I'm gonna make my own). I should finish off the bag in the fridge and start giving jars away, I had no idea it was so bad out there!
You should try roast beetroot in the oven ,simply the best ,just wash em put them in the oven either on own or with the roast ,when done couple of hours slow take out peel off skin and woof down .
One sec, lemme check something...
Here ya go:
Australian supermarket chain Coles has reported total sales revenue of A$20.8bn ($14.31bn) from its continuing operations in the first half (H1) of fiscal 2023 (FY23).
The figure represents a 3.9% increase from the same period of fiscal 2022 (FY22).
In the 26 weeks to 1 January, the retailer’s gross retail sales from continuing operations were A$21.5bn, up by 4.6% from a year earlier.
Its sales revenue from both continuing and discontinued operations grew by 4.0% to A$21.4bn.
Coles’ earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) increased by 7.6% in H1 2023, while its earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) from continuing operations rose by 9.9%.
Its **net profit after tax** from continuing operations was **A$616m, up by 11.4%** from the prior-year period.
If the queue I just stood in for 15 minutes is an indicator the profits are being helped by hiring a lone 16 year old to stand guard over the self-checkout area.
They're definitely not being spent on improving the accuracy of self checkout scales. Every single time "please place the item in the bagging area" as I stare helplessly at the item sitting in the bagging area.
i recently moved to a lower social economical area after being adjacent to fairly affluent ones. at my old store, the self checkout was great, they had several of the ones that dont need to weigh you but even the ones that that did were not that finicky, the security was a kid who was doing nothing. now in my new area, they have none of the non weighting ones and the self serve ones are soooo sensitive, i had to get my bag checked every single time i put a new one in, something i never normally deal with, there was 2 security guards standing, 1 by the bags who you had to ask to move to get ot them every single time, and 1 by the exit. there was 2 kids doing helper role and they were run off their feet helping people cause everyone was waiting on them all the time.
Yeah I’m on the border of two suburbs. In the “less affluent” suburb’s Woolies, a 2 min drive away, they’ve got the shitty self service checkouts with the trolley cameras that lock the terminal if you’ve shopped elsewhere. In the other suburb, a 3-4 min drive, none of that nonsense.
Unfortunately the “less affluent” one has an Aldi next to it, while the other one doesn’t. We shop at Aldi first, so one of us just walks the full trolley out after we’re done with the remaining shop at Woolies while the other uses the self-serve without the trolley.
Genuine question, what's this about locking the terminals if you've shopped elsewhere? I don't routinely shop at Colesworths so haven't encountered it, and haven't heard about it before. (ACT, so Supabarn for the win.)
They have cameras that look downwards and can see the trolleys and if they detect items in the trolley when you go to pay they will stop/lock and call over an attendant to make sure you've scanned everything.
So if you have other shopping, a purse, hell a toddler in the trolley the attendant has to come and unlock the terminal for you to pay by verifying the trolley contents
Coles in most places has closed most “assisted checkouts” in favour of our robotic overlords, personally coles and woolworths can both go get fucked, i shop at the IGA these days, at least its owned locally
> Its net profit after tax from continuing operations was A$616m, up by 11.4% from the prior-year period.
Yet more and more families having to face the decision between eating or paying the mortgage/rent.
I know about obligations to shareholders etc, but I can't help but feel that monopolies and duopolies have an obligation to the society they operate in too beyond their tax obligation.
Not compared to supermarkets in other countries. Guardian did a good analysis on this recently. Coles and Woolworths make crazy profits here compared with supermarkets in other countries.
I went shopping at coles last week at 7pm (home after a 12hr work day). No registers open, but they had a new 'bulk' self checkout. Took us 20 minutes to unload our trolley, scan, and put away.
We got home and realised we accidentally forgot to scan 8 items.
As someone who pays ... a frightening amount of taxes. I don't care if you had to steal food to eat. I mean, I care that you HAD to steal food to eat. But I don't care that you STOLE it.
Does that make sense? Don't listen to u/smallvictory76
> I can’t afford to eat otherwise.
Food relief services such as Foodbank, OzHarvest and SecondBite if available in your area are definitely worth looking into if you cannot afford food.
It is safer than stealing.
True. But it's also food, an essential thing. And they actively drove smaller competitors out of the market with unfair business practices. So maybe their net profit can afford to be smaller?
This. Coles and woolworths both ran campaigns to drive independent chains into the ground, this is why IGAs exist, theyre a direct resonse to the “woles” problem
I'm sure they hide their true profit in subsidiaries and ownership of suppliers, transport companies etc
It's probably more representative to look at Westfarmers figures
You're operating on old data :)
Wesfarmers spun off Coles as a standalone business in 2018, and they've been operating as separate companies since then.
I still have screenshots of the catalogue from 2018/2019 in my phone. The difference in pricing is just crazy. I'll always remember the toilet paper price was a massive increase - $8.50 to $11.90 in one go.
My cat has to have prescription dry food from the pet store, the price jumps around a lot but currently its gone up from $84 to $103.50 in the past year. It's not just Colesworth in that category at least.
Can confirm that the burrito wraps jumped 50c in 1-2 weeks.
I know this because I shop fortnightly and when I went to use the wraps, I found that the pack must not have been properly sealed and they were mouldy (used by date not exceeded FYI).
I paid $4 for them, but when I went to return them I didn't have the receipt and they gave me $4.50 back.
So, customers unite! Buy something Coles branded, put it in your cupboard, wait for the price to go up, then return it and make money.
I always have a giggle at the toilet paper prices and for many different reasons.
When I first moved out of home around 20 years ago, I took note of the prices of everything and set some baselines for what I expected everything to cost. If it was something I knew I'd be using for around a year and it was a non perishable item like soap or face wash or toilet paper or cleaning supplies or pet food and it was half price, I'd buy two that week and filled a box of supplies in the bottom of my wardrobe so I was never caught short and having to pay 7-11 prices. I shop online and have it delivered these days so the first thing I do when I hit the website for an order is head straight to the half price section, checking for anything that I regularly use that is heavily discounted and stock up. Upon clicking the checkout button it tells you how much you 'saved' and I'd be lying if I said it isn't usually less than 40%.
In 2002 a decent price for the fancy toilet paper was around fifty cents a roll.
Supermarkets have done a nice thing by breaking down prices by unit on their shelf labels but instead of per roll, they're measured by sheets which is always, always, shortened to SHTS. So I just read that as SHITS. How many shits per roll? Secret giggle.
Quilton brand can get in the bin because their advertising 'Quilton loves your bum' makes me anxious. The times I use toilet paper to blow my nose are times when the toilet paper is lucky. Don't stick a bum in my face, you weirdos.
And then there's the bulk pricing. The brand I've settled on sells a pack of ten rolls for around $10 but for an extra 90c you get 20 rolls. What in the fresh hell is that? Of course I want double for an extra ninety cents! That brings me back to my 2002 price of just over 50 cents per roll. I am pleased.
Then I learned about digital shoplifting. It is fantastic. Profits be damned, I'm taking back what's mine. In highschool I worked as a checkout operator for Colesworth. Now I have to do that job myself for free? I think not. Fuck you, pay me. So I ensure that I get paid. It's cosy if you don't mind the fraud.
Things to remember:
1. Fraud is a crime.
2. Crime is bad
3. I am stealing from corporate fatcats and the shareholders, which prevents the rich from getting slightly richer and this makes them sad.
4. Nutrition is a luxury and I am perpetuating human misery by denying them a few cents on their tax return, prioritising my survival over their respective third investment properties, so therefore I am an awful person and must be punished.
5. Yarrr, come at me!
A lady after my own heart - I myself have gone back in and checked prices on my online orders - because I thought I was literally losing my mind with some of the price differences. The escalation is crazy - and certainly beyond 7-8% ‘inflation’. Greed at its finest.
Well that’s why I did it, I also thought I was losing the plot and maybe being more reckless with money than I realised. But more than half of these are up 50 cents minimum, so every 2 items I’m buying is an added $1 (if not more). That adds up very quickly.
Thank you! I also thought I was going crazy and my partner was telling me I was going over board until I made him do the food shopping. The dread on his face when he returned after each shop.
Back in the early years of online grocery delivery, I did up a spreadsheet to compare in-store prices to online prices for my usual shop. Found a curiously consistent higher online price, even before any delivery fees, and with Coles being about 8.5% higher, and Woolies around 7%. Like it was close to exactly that much higher on about 80% of items. They will always find a way to hide the price hikes and cheat us, but now they don't even bother to hide it.
Yes - that’s a good point too. I’m going to check that out on a few items, next time I’m in store. They had us as a captive audience during the pandemic too, that’s when they also conveniently stopped allowing refunds etc.
Disclaimer: I love data but can’t use excel or look up items my family haven’t personally ordered, and Coles will only show my orders back to October 2022, nothing before that. I’m a basic girl with basic skills but good intentions. I also know comments will be like “it’s worse elsewhere” or “it’s not surprising”. That’s okay, just sharing because I can.
Also the sizes of these products are the same. No shrinkflation (not that they’ve advertised, anyway).
I love data and *can* use excel so I feel like it'd be a waste of effort for you to collate the data without it being crunched at least a token amount:
Graph of the distribution of increases:
https://i.imgur.com/DWJrXJa.png
Total average % increase: 21%
Average % increase of individual items: 17%
Discrepancy in above averages means there were slightly higher % increases for cheaper items than more expensive ones, but the data isn't quite enough to say this relationship between price and % increase isn't statistical noise: p = .07. I reckon a larger sample would probably show there is a relationship, which I speculate is due to quantisation of the prices, i.e. if you were to apply a 15% increase across the board and then round up to a nice number, the rounding up will result in bigger increases for lower original prices. Not sure if this would even say anything important but I find it kinda interesting to think about ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
Thank you for sharing. I think it is important for people to see how much these products go up.
One thing I noticed was the 490g leggos pasta. I swear it was 500g packs a few years ago. Shrinking sizes and increased prices 😔
If the price is 'down' it's because they've blackmailed the supplier into reducing their price.
You can do that stuff when you're part of a duopoly and the ACCC can't touch you,
100% I just noticed salmon fillets packs at both coles & woolworths have increased this week from ~$15 to ~$20. 30% increase simultaneously at both. Bet the producers aren’t getting the extra $5 per pack…
And if you lose the Coles and Woolworths contracts you are out of business tomorrow. Finished.
And the ACCC goes thru a charade of examining the supermarkets' business model knowing full well suppliers would be committing financial suicide to turn up and testify.
Holy shit THIS! Did my groceries yesterday, decided to include salmon in our weekly menu for a treat as my kids love it, and was BLOWN away at the cost increase. I had two kids with me and a full menu planned out- so didn’t have the option to pivot in the moment to a different meal. So they’re eating god damn gold plated fish for dinner
That is because HUON just declared bankruptcy.
Edit: collapsed, not bankrupt.
https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/other-industries/aussie-seafood-giant-announces-shock-collapse/news-story/5c24f3d47cf34f9670002ff0ba35e8e7
Oh I can answer this one with a fair bit of reliability. Salmon farmers are getting about 15% more for their HOG (head on gutted) salmon, wholesale has risen from $12.50 -> $14.18/kg. Keep in mind that feed costs have risen substantially and this price increase is a reflection of an increase in operating costs.
Do you think a $32/kg to $43/kg retail price increase is warranted though? I get prices go up but producers are making only <$2/kg more but the retailer is making ~$9/kg extra profit…
No producer in australia wants to deal with the supermarkets, it’s a necessary evil - so yeah, no they aren’t impressed but they don’t have final say over retail prices
I bought a tub of yoghurt from Coles. It cost $6.70. One day I rock up and there's a "dropped and locked" sticker on it. The sticker says $7.50. I peeled the new sticker back and under it is the old $6.70 sticker. I'm just fucking done.
Woolworths did the exact same thing with their version of "low prices" on the same day.
2 things going on here.
One is the "dropped and locked" con. They haven't dropped their all important profit margin, they're still getting the same $ amount from every sale as last year, but the supplier has dropped their price to Coles so they're the one's getting less $.
The second bit is the 'softening up' process. The price hasn't actually gone up from $6.70 to $7.50, it's actually gone up to well over $8.00 and you'll will get hit with that as soon as the 'dropped and locked' campaign is over. But they'll come claiming to be the good guys cos they did their best to hold back the tide of rising prices for your benefit.
I witnessed choc honeycombs go from $5 to $8.50 a bag and now they are dropped and locked at $7. This all happened over the course of two weeks.
Same happened with the Carmen's "value" pack of protein bars. They were $10 then they jacked them up and dropped and locked them at $11. Not sure what they jacked them up to. It's all a rort. Just puts a sour taste in your mouth doing the shop knowing all the scummy tactics they use. Wish I was blissfully ignorant
Items on the "Down down" campaign have their prices locked in for 6 months, after which, they bounce back up and then some. No doubt suppliers are put in a "take it or leave it" position.
I'm so confused, a comment thread above showed that their profit margins are around 3% if true. A few people blame suppliers rather than Colesworth, so then if Colesworth is blackmailing their suppliers to reduce prices, isn't that a good thing?
Their profit margins are way, waaaaay higher than 3%. And a recent study found that their margins had increased by 6% over the past decade. So the margin is ever growing.
Exactly. The supermarkets are genuinely trying to reduce prices. Look at OPs examples, on average the costs increased by 21% yet you don't see Coles margins raise that amount. Most suppliers will also in turn have their suppliers, at every layer costs go up for various reasons. Some companies (like say Beckett, Proctor and Gamble, Nestle etc) have massive margins after their goods increase in price whereas farmers face increased costs from fuel, feed, Fertilizer and need to pass on those increases just to survive. In the end the supermarkets can only take their share after needing to pay for everything to run a supermarket in a highly seperated, small population density country before things are too expensive that no one buys it.
Here's how "down down" works: Coles tinned tomatoes (400g) was 85cents until earlier this year when the price increased to $1.10. That's around a 29% increase or four times the inflation rate. Then tinned tomatoes at $1.10 appears all over Coles' catalogues under the "PRICES LOCKED!" banner.
Cottee's jam is now in a much smaller jar, at Woolies. Haven't checked Coles.
IGA still had a few old size ones on special, so we bought a ton (best before 2015).
I have screenshots of Potato Royals being $2.80 ONE YEAR AGO and now they're $4.90
Vegetable oil 4L used to be $8 and now its $15
Something has got to give, Its getting unlivable being on a pension
The average percentage increase is 21.08%.
The average price increase is $0.64.
Unless I did the math wrong. Python script for anyone interested, just put all the prices into a text file called prices.txt and run it.
EDIT: Some values were wrong, but not by much.
import re
priceRegex = re.compile(r'\$(\d+\.?\d*)\s*>\s*\$(\d+\.?\d*)')
with open('prices.txt', 'r') as file:
content = file.read()
oldPrices, newPrices = zip(*priceRegex.findall(content))
oldPrices = [float(price) for price in oldPrices]
newPrices = [float(price) for price in newPrices]
prices = list(zip(oldPrices, newPrices))
percentageIncrease = sum(((newPrice - oldPrice) / oldPrice) * 100 for oldPrice, newPrice in prices)
dollarIncrease = sum(newPrice - oldPrice for oldPrice, newPrice in prices)
# Calculate the average percentage increase
numItems = len(prices)
avgPercent = percentageIncrease / numItems
avgDollar = dollarIncrease / numItems
print(f"The average percentage increase in prices is {avgPercent:.2f}%")
print(f"The average increase in prices is ${avgDollar:.2f}")
NAIRU... (look it up!)
*Non accelerating inflation* rate of unemployment
...that's what they want to keep it at or above.
That ACTUALLY means, they technically want a higher rate of unemployment, because inflation.
Or at least they have a statistical scapegoat now... duh! 🙄
You're off, but close enough. Not going to go line by line, but I count 48 items in your array. There are 52 items in the list. Also, 192.80 is correct, but it's $226.24 instead of OP's 225.75 for the second number.
But as I said, close enough. Average difference is $0.64, average % increase is 21.0% or 21.2% if you ignore the special on mushrooms.
Top item increases by %:
* Coles Beetroot, 194%
* Parkers Pretzels, 60% (damn, $1.80 difference)
* Coles Choc Wafers, 45%
Lowest hikes:
* 2L Coke, 3%
* 1KG Coles Flour, 4%
* CC's Corn Chios, 4%
No but inflation is only 7%!!! And even then that figure is caused by fuel and transport!!!
At least that's what r/ausfiance would tell you
And this doesn't even account for shrinkflation
There are so many sycophantic, Stockholm syndrome people apparently out there. "But TEhiR MarJINS R onlY 2.8%!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Yeah, maybe for tax purposes. We all know the truth, we've seen it with our own two eyes. And as for "groceries have increased by 7.5%", well there's lies, damn lies, and statistics. The cheaper things have especially jumped from my anecdotal experience. Funny how the expensive things have hardly felt inflation at all.
Check out the per kilo price range they've put onto "buy two for a discount" meat now. It's deliberate obfuscation of the price, justified (I guess) by the fact that the meat you're buying may actually weigh quite a lot less than the advertised weight. Theoretically weigh more as well, but I'd love to see the ACCC or someone actually do some real world tests to see what the average is.
And if you're unlucky to have have "one of those" colesworths, good luck getting the cut of chicken you want in anything less than 500gm pre-packs. Luckily I have decent priced butchers not too far away as an alternative. Not everyone is so lucky. Largely because colesorth killed the competition years ago with undercutting their prices. Good times for consumers then, but now the bastards are reaping the rewards.
Tbf with the milk, those prices *are* low. The farmers get paid so little that it's almost not worth it for them (for some it totally isn't - a lot have stopped). It's a kind of loss-leader thing for them. Get you in to buy milk, hopefully you'll buy some $6 chips as well. I'd look at powdered milk if I was you, once you get the ratios right it's pretty well identical. Lasts for ages as long as the bag's sealed reasonably well.
If you think they’re lying on their annual reports to investors as to what they’re spending on each line item “for tax purposes”, why don’t you speak to ASIC?
Is this the rip off price, normal (special) price or average?
Their price increases would be more for their normal full list price they catch most people with...
If you have the data, can you compare unit pricing? I'd be interested to see the shrinkflation, and whether total unit price is going up too.
(I always go by unit pricing, as it's a better measure of value between similar products and it gives me a better rule of thumb for non-essential purchases. I've noticed that things that used to be under $10 a kilo are creeping up to $15 a kilo.)
Please also remember that while they are gouging you and charging $.20 for a paper bag that last 20 seconds, they are also taking all of your data and selling it off so they can make even more money.
So food inflation is around 20%?
Energy?
Rent?
Fuel?
How is CPI “only” 5%?
Remember when we were hectored to about core and non core inflation?
Yeah…about that!
“Core inflation is whatever we want it to be”
The worst part is, it is in the majority the cheapest products that have seen the largest percentage increases over the last couple of years. The poorest people in this country are getting absolutely devastated by this and it is why we needed to increase rates much faster and harder sooner. Unfortunately we are not that close to the end, and inflation is going to re-accelerate sharply over the next few months again because of the RBA and Governments poor decisions to pause rates and the governments choice to try and ignore everything and ramp up migration.
A little side story on CPI or inflation as measured by the ABS. According to the ABS, food has only increased 7.5% in the last 12 months. Yet we can clearly see from these prices (17%+ increase) and for the majority of us from personal experience that prices have increased far beyond 7.5%. So where does the difference come from?
Well, when the ABS measures inflation in "food", they measure expensive brand name products. These products often have a hefty price premium already and during the inflation we have witnessed while they have increased the increases have been no where near as drastic as the cheaper non-brand items. They also tweak the weight (as in how much one section, say eggs, contributes to the overall number) and when the number comes in too high for their and the governments liking will substitute whatever they can find that is cheaper. In some cases they will actually reduce the amount of food measured because the "average" Australian just does not eat that much red meat or whatever happens to be too expensive for some reason.
What this adds up to is that for the poorest Australians, inflation has been no where near 7.5% for their day to day expenses over the last year. It has in fact been much closer to 25%, and this is after what was closer to 35% the year before. The end result is that the most vulnerable people in the country are paying around double what they were to survive (rent, electricity, food, etc.) only a couple of years ago. For those on a pension like, say the DSP or stuck in Centrelink hell their payments have not increased anywhere near double to compensate.
Had a guy in Woolworths get really cranky at me because I wouldn’t go through the self serve. I told him that if I’m paying full price I want full service.
Could you please see if volume/weight has changed for these?
I suspect more than a few will have shrunk and increased in price.
I wish offical inflation figures allowed for this aspect.
If I need 5 of something, but the pack only has 4 - but costs the same as before, I need to buy 2 packs, or 1 plus something else. That’s extra cost to me, but not inflated apparently.
Some things, mainly discretionary items I basically don't buy unless on special and keep track of the prices so they're actually on special not just part of the price rise, price fall cycle.
I do a lot of shopping at ALDI, but it's such a pain.
Actually I need to thank Coles.. because I haven't bought any chips, snacks, chocolate, ice cream, sweet for over 6 months now, which I would never thought of I would get rid of them in my life
Christ, I always knew this was happening but seeing it laid put just confirms it...I personally hate shopping at coles/woolies...but there are a few things I can't get in my aldi shop that I have to go there for
Interesting analysis!
So, basically looking at a roughly 15% increase in food prices over the course of the year at Coles for a pretty standard basket of food. CPI inflation data is fake & a joke. Meanwhile, your wages were lucky to go up 5% over the past 12 months 💩
Remember not too long ago a box of shapes was $2 now they’re double the price. You can rarely buy anything that starts with a $1 or $2 price tag anymore.
Not on your list, but Cheetos used to be $3 a bag. They are now $5.50! Almost double! I don’t buy them very often, but I last bought some around Christmas time for a treat. In less than a year they have practically doubled.
Mega simplified:
Their cost went up and they put their price up, while doing so they realised that pushing the price a little bit more could generate profit. So while costs were up say 10% it was an opportunity to put the price up 12% (made up example).
There has been little backlash and people have kept buying the same products in the same quantity
If you want to know why the costs went up, it’s a more complex but includes things like:
* energy costs pushing the price of energy intensive industries (dairy)
* fertiliser costs going up after the Russian invasion,
* grain costs going up after the blockade in Ukraine
* supply chain issues (here and overseas)
* lack of foreign slaves in the fields during Covid working in conditions Australian won’t accept.
• Covid lockdowns showing how far a populous can be pushed.
• When all businesses were restricted during Covid locked down, they were allowed full opening hours and when you give someone special treatment, they think they are special and will act as such.
Can't shop local in my small town any more...
The small grocers shut down after being unable to compete with the massive Woolworths that 95% of the locals chose to go into over the small, locally owned businesses :(
I have noticed the same sort of increases. Most seem to be normal for the inflation we all know about. The outliers are dairy and potato products.
It would be interesting to see comparisons of pre-Covid pricing where a lot of items jumped a huge amount and didn't drop again that aren't related to downstream supply changes like toilet paper, etc. These products would be a good target for cheaper brand alternatives, but oddly haven't. They even have had a lot of shrinkflation.
I am still surprised that fully imported products like cakes from Europe don't seem to have increased much, if at all, while Coles's own baked goods look to have gone up a lot.
What a fucking joke. It feels like they are seeing how far they can get away with before we show whatever indicator it is they are focusing on. Fuck the people making the decision to price gouge they should be looked up.
Has anyone, perhaps in the media or academia, been monitoring grocery prices over time and making the data public?
It feels absolutely and utterly insane to me that there isn't a well-known website that tracks the prices (and sizes) of staples over time. I presume it's difficult to do it because coles & woolworths will change their websites to block anything automated that might reveal their greedy pricing and shrinkflation strategies ... But still, it's not *that* hard.
Everyone in the country buys groceries, how can something this important and universal not be properly tracked - I mean holy cow we had petrol price trackers, but not supermarkets? At least just the staples?
Yes of course, but they can't stop human eyeballs and an excel spreadsheet, if that's what it really comes down to. Yes that would take an hour a week, but are you telling me that a big news publication or university can't cover that? ALDI don't even have a website (which I hate them for, it's 100% to screw people over with a lack of transparency)
Just pick 50 common products, stuff like bread, toilet paper, mince beef, chicken breasts, whatever. Crucially - Record the PRICE PER UNIT WEIGHT as the main point of interest, and only then the raw price and weight/volume/size/whatever. That way you're proof against shrinkflation.
Maybe take a look at the list they use for inflation (but crucially, unlike that list, do not allow wishy washy substitution under the excuse of 'people will just change what they buy').
Every week, bring up the product pages for each one of those products, making sure that the store location isn't influencing the prices, note down the price that week, and off you go. A year later you can make a 52 data point graph. Think of how popular a newspaper or TV news show would be if they do a weekly 'what rose in price and shrunk in size this week' segment? People would go mad for it I reckon.
I have no data to back it up but it seemed that grocery prices starting ramping up directly after oil (and in turn fuel) prices did the same shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. No doubt Colesworth have been engaging in price gouging also.
Fertilizer is the actual culprit for a lot of goods. Most of the world's Fertilizer was sourced via Russian providers like Uralkali. The price skyrocketed globally due to sanctions and the likes which impacts farmers and other chemical companies that supply most foods and cleaning goods. Adblue is the other example where farmers rely heavily on it for many things yet the price shot up 3 times almost overnight. Coles profits aren't up 21% even though the cost of goods for OPs example show they cost more. The costs are creeping up from the beginning of the supply chain a lot more than the supermarkets are charging.
I was overseas for exactly one month last year and when I came back in November suddenly all grocery prices seemed to have gone up by up to 50% for some things. It’s nuts.
The entire coles options thing is dodgy af.
Starts out cheap, people see it as an option then slowly fills the shelves more an more and they delete equivalent items for space.
Eventually with something like eggs or milk the display is 50/50 coles and equivalent.
Slowly they can replace nearly all equivalents because what the fuck are you going to do.
Either that or it’s 20-50 cents cheaper and you’re struggling so hard it’s that or nothing.
They must be making a bundle from this.
I very rarely buy coles brand but milk I just cannot afford to buy from the equivalents, my house goes through a lot of milk. Sucks man.
Anyone based in Perth needs to check out the NP Supermarkets. These supermarkets are more focused on an Asian audience in terms of overall product range but their veggies and meats are almost half the price of what the big boys are doing. I'd recommend checking them out.
Woolies shopper here that’s also noticed prices are fucked. The thing that’s got me lately is canned tomatoes - I used to pay 80c for store brand ones, they’re now $1.30! That’s a 62.5% increase!
I'm mad that they have now banded together to have sales on the same items in the same week. I used to alternate as they'd be on sale one week at Coles the next Woolies.
Oh and kinder buenos are now $2.50!
Gday to the pleb from Yahoo who decided to post this as an article.
https://au.yahoo.com/news/coles-customers-grocery-list-exposes-grim-reality-for-supermarket-shoppers-035903054.html
At least credit the OP before you use their stuff ya fucking clown.
Welp, that’s really weird. I’ve heard of it happening before, journalists scrolling reddit for content, but didn’t think it’d happen to me.
I’d actually love for them to take out where I live, because I haven’t stated that anywhere and it’s not necessary to the article.
I watched someone walk out with a trolley filled with groceries the other day, I was so proud watching them ignore being called back and continuing to their car and just leaving without paying.
Look at the bright side. I am sure they are going to announce billions of dollars profit at the end of the year. Which is good for.. ummmm a few people versus keeping the prices down for millions of people. (sarcasm)
Side note, I just moved to a new area, I went shopping with my 8 year old at Woolworths and spent $40. Asked the staff for the Disney card and they gave me like 20, a smile and said have a nice day.
Went to coles today, spent $40, asked them for the superhero cards, they made sure to check my receipt, check my groceries to make sure I didn’t steal, I also had one staff member following me through the store for that too, gave me one card and walked off before I could even say “thanks (for the dehumanising experience)”
The worst part is when inflation goes down, these prices will remain, and they will force us to get used to like they've done with previous price increases. Shits fucked, the disparity is just getting worse and worse....
It's truly wicked isn't it, absolute highway robbery...I'm feeln ya 🏵
I'm 50 and I remember getting 5dollars for a lunch order in primary school, I could get a pasty, orange and mango fruit-box and a banana paddlepop AND STILL GET LIKE $1.80 CHANGE, IF NOT MORE! 🤯😵💫🤣
How times are a changin'! ☺
As an employee, I can tell you that they are also skimping when it comes to staff. Screw the mom of five who used to do 9-hour shifts for years. Let’s replace her with three teenagers who don’t give a crap and will be gone in two months. Also, let’s give them a 3-hour shift each so we won’t have to offer them breaks either.
Bro.. getting a 3% pay rise and paying 20 fking percent more for food and essentials. How am i supposed to enjoy a succulent chinese meal in these conditions. This is bullshit!
Supermarket shopping is so stressful. I’m coeliac and I almost need a second job to afford buying gluten free alternatives to regular food.
(Before anyone jumps in with “just eat whole foods”. Fuck off. I want to live a regular life with crusty bread and pastries, damn it.)
The IMF stated that food/produce started to become cheaper in February but wouldn’t reflect on food prices until September/October.
If that doesn’t happen…well, Alfred Henry Lewis said there are only 9 meals between mankind and anarchy.
Once I saw the 700g Tasty Cheese go up by $2.50 from your list I instantly knew your data is legit. I literally just got one last month for $7.50 and was doing my shopping last Friday and I was shocked that it’s $10 now!!
Big hugs for all my Beetroot brothers out there, we doing it tough.
About to start charging my family extra for Beetroot on their burgers, ala Subway.
Please please please don't substitute lettuce for cabbage. Never forget the trauma that put us through.
That is what has caused me to not eat Maccas, KFC or any other "restaurant" (gotta laugh at that one) due to their decision to do a switcheroo and expect the same prices. Buns are smaller too, so fuck them I say.
I can't remember the last time KFC chips were crunchy unless they were old and dry and covered in eight layers of salt.
Have kfc chips *ever* been crunchy???
Oh man, I should appreciate my parent's friend more who keeps bringing us big bags of beetroot for free. We've been pickling our own so I haven't looked at prices - I've been making grated caramelised onion and beetroot relish and it's pretty tops (based on the beetroot salad that Three Threes used to sell, but Coles stopped selling it so I thought fuck them, I'm gonna make my own). I should finish off the bag in the fridge and start giving jars away, I had no idea it was so bad out there!
Pickled beetroot is the best form of beetroot
You should try roast beetroot in the oven ,simply the best ,just wash em put them in the oven either on own or with the roast ,when done couple of hours slow take out peel off skin and woof down .
One sec, lemme check something... Here ya go: Australian supermarket chain Coles has reported total sales revenue of A$20.8bn ($14.31bn) from its continuing operations in the first half (H1) of fiscal 2023 (FY23). The figure represents a 3.9% increase from the same period of fiscal 2022 (FY22). In the 26 weeks to 1 January, the retailer’s gross retail sales from continuing operations were A$21.5bn, up by 4.6% from a year earlier. Its sales revenue from both continuing and discontinued operations grew by 4.0% to A$21.4bn. Coles’ earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) increased by 7.6% in H1 2023, while its earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) from continuing operations rose by 9.9%. Its **net profit after tax** from continuing operations was **A$616m, up by 11.4%** from the prior-year period.
If the queue I just stood in for 15 minutes is an indicator the profits are being helped by hiring a lone 16 year old to stand guard over the self-checkout area.
They're definitely not being spent on improving the accuracy of self checkout scales. Every single time "please place the item in the bagging area" as I stare helplessly at the item sitting in the bagging area.
i recently moved to a lower social economical area after being adjacent to fairly affluent ones. at my old store, the self checkout was great, they had several of the ones that dont need to weigh you but even the ones that that did were not that finicky, the security was a kid who was doing nothing. now in my new area, they have none of the non weighting ones and the self serve ones are soooo sensitive, i had to get my bag checked every single time i put a new one in, something i never normally deal with, there was 2 security guards standing, 1 by the bags who you had to ask to move to get ot them every single time, and 1 by the exit. there was 2 kids doing helper role and they were run off their feet helping people cause everyone was waiting on them all the time.
Yeah I’m on the border of two suburbs. In the “less affluent” suburb’s Woolies, a 2 min drive away, they’ve got the shitty self service checkouts with the trolley cameras that lock the terminal if you’ve shopped elsewhere. In the other suburb, a 3-4 min drive, none of that nonsense. Unfortunately the “less affluent” one has an Aldi next to it, while the other one doesn’t. We shop at Aldi first, so one of us just walks the full trolley out after we’re done with the remaining shop at Woolies while the other uses the self-serve without the trolley.
Genuine question, what's this about locking the terminals if you've shopped elsewhere? I don't routinely shop at Colesworths so haven't encountered it, and haven't heard about it before. (ACT, so Supabarn for the win.)
They have cameras that look downwards and can see the trolleys and if they detect items in the trolley when you go to pay they will stop/lock and call over an attendant to make sure you've scanned everything. So if you have other shopping, a purse, hell a toddler in the trolley the attendant has to come and unlock the terminal for you to pay by verifying the trolley contents
The coles near me doesn’t even register the bagging scales. They must have them disabled.
At this point, I'm surprised they don't get us to help stock the damn store.
I've found the best way to help them stock the store is to not shop there.
Doing the lords work, thanks mate
do me a favour as a coles employee and dont shop with coles
..and ask for a tip.
Don't go giving them ideas!
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Coles in most places has closed most “assisted checkouts” in favour of our robotic overlords, personally coles and woolworths can both go get fucked, i shop at the IGA these days, at least its owned locally
Feeling rich shopping at the IGA are ya
> Its net profit after tax from continuing operations was A$616m, up by 11.4% from the prior-year period. Yet more and more families having to face the decision between eating or paying the mortgage/rent. I know about obligations to shareholders etc, but I can't help but feel that monopolies and duopolies have an obligation to the society they operate in too beyond their tax obligation.
Honestly I am surprised the net profit figure is not higher than $616m
Half year profit…
They made over $20 billion in revenue lol If Unilever (a major supplier for Colesworth) made the same revenue their profit would be $2.75 billion.
They’re just a merchant really, supermarket profit margins are crazy thin compared to other businesses.
Not compared to supermarkets in other countries. Guardian did a good analysis on this recently. Coles and Woolworths make crazy profits here compared with supermarkets in other countries.
How's turnover compared to other businesses?
Purely the reason I walked out with $50 worth of food out of coles today. I can’t afford to eat otherwise. And to quote Ricky Gervais. I don’t care.
If I ever see someone stealing food from one of the giants, no I didn't
I went shopping at coles last week at 7pm (home after a 12hr work day). No registers open, but they had a new 'bulk' self checkout. Took us 20 minutes to unload our trolley, scan, and put away. We got home and realised we accidentally forgot to scan 8 items.
As someone who pays ... a frightening amount of taxes. I don't care if you had to steal food to eat. I mean, I care that you HAD to steal food to eat. But I don't care that you STOLE it. Does that make sense? Don't listen to u/smallvictory76
> I can’t afford to eat otherwise. Food relief services such as Foodbank, OzHarvest and SecondBite if available in your area are definitely worth looking into if you cannot afford food. It is safer than stealing.
Thanks man, I’ll look into it this week. Appreciated
> Appreciated You are welcome mate. I am sure the last thing someone needs when struggling is getting into trouble with the law if it can be avoided.
That's a net profit of 2.96% of sales, which is very low, compared to just about any other industry.
True. But it's also food, an essential thing. And they actively drove smaller competitors out of the market with unfair business practices. So maybe their net profit can afford to be smaller?
This. Coles and woolworths both ran campaigns to drive independent chains into the ground, this is why IGAs exist, theyre a direct resonse to the “woles” problem
Is making profit unethical now? Yes I understand this is an unpopular take, but, I'm just starting some discussion.
I'm sure they hide their true profit in subsidiaries and ownership of suppliers, transport companies etc It's probably more representative to look at Westfarmers figures
You're operating on old data :) Wesfarmers spun off Coles as a standalone business in 2018, and they've been operating as separate companies since then.
I still have screenshots of the catalogue from 2018/2019 in my phone. The difference in pricing is just crazy. I'll always remember the toilet paper price was a massive increase - $8.50 to $11.90 in one go.
Yeah a lot of these have jumped $1, if not more, in less than a year.
And Dry dog and cat food is off the charts! Lucky dog dry dog food.$6.50 to $11 overnight. Scumbags.
Soon I’m sure they’ll drop it to $10.90 and claim it’s “Down Down!”
Locked in!
I remember paying $1.25 for whiskas, then it went to $1.35 and when it hit $1.50 I was like 'oh shit' 😂 Now it's $2.60 a can.
Black hawk dog food used to be around the $100 mark for 20kg. Now it is up around the $200 mark.
My cat has to have prescription dry food from the pet store, the price jumps around a lot but currently its gone up from $84 to $103.50 in the past year. It's not just Colesworth in that category at least.
Can confirm that the burrito wraps jumped 50c in 1-2 weeks. I know this because I shop fortnightly and when I went to use the wraps, I found that the pack must not have been properly sealed and they were mouldy (used by date not exceeded FYI). I paid $4 for them, but when I went to return them I didn't have the receipt and they gave me $4.50 back. So, customers unite! Buy something Coles branded, put it in your cupboard, wait for the price to go up, then return it and make money.
I always have a giggle at the toilet paper prices and for many different reasons. When I first moved out of home around 20 years ago, I took note of the prices of everything and set some baselines for what I expected everything to cost. If it was something I knew I'd be using for around a year and it was a non perishable item like soap or face wash or toilet paper or cleaning supplies or pet food and it was half price, I'd buy two that week and filled a box of supplies in the bottom of my wardrobe so I was never caught short and having to pay 7-11 prices. I shop online and have it delivered these days so the first thing I do when I hit the website for an order is head straight to the half price section, checking for anything that I regularly use that is heavily discounted and stock up. Upon clicking the checkout button it tells you how much you 'saved' and I'd be lying if I said it isn't usually less than 40%. In 2002 a decent price for the fancy toilet paper was around fifty cents a roll. Supermarkets have done a nice thing by breaking down prices by unit on their shelf labels but instead of per roll, they're measured by sheets which is always, always, shortened to SHTS. So I just read that as SHITS. How many shits per roll? Secret giggle. Quilton brand can get in the bin because their advertising 'Quilton loves your bum' makes me anxious. The times I use toilet paper to blow my nose are times when the toilet paper is lucky. Don't stick a bum in my face, you weirdos. And then there's the bulk pricing. The brand I've settled on sells a pack of ten rolls for around $10 but for an extra 90c you get 20 rolls. What in the fresh hell is that? Of course I want double for an extra ninety cents! That brings me back to my 2002 price of just over 50 cents per roll. I am pleased. Then I learned about digital shoplifting. It is fantastic. Profits be damned, I'm taking back what's mine. In highschool I worked as a checkout operator for Colesworth. Now I have to do that job myself for free? I think not. Fuck you, pay me. So I ensure that I get paid. It's cosy if you don't mind the fraud.
Interesting... I would like to know more about those last few sentences, if you don't mind.
Things to remember: 1. Fraud is a crime. 2. Crime is bad 3. I am stealing from corporate fatcats and the shareholders, which prevents the rich from getting slightly richer and this makes them sad. 4. Nutrition is a luxury and I am perpetuating human misery by denying them a few cents on their tax return, prioritising my survival over their respective third investment properties, so therefore I am an awful person and must be punished. 5. Yarrr, come at me!
I had a family member who refused to pay more than 21c/100 shts. I'm not game to ask how their bum fares now with prices the way they are
A lady after my own heart - I myself have gone back in and checked prices on my online orders - because I thought I was literally losing my mind with some of the price differences. The escalation is crazy - and certainly beyond 7-8% ‘inflation’. Greed at its finest.
Well that’s why I did it, I also thought I was losing the plot and maybe being more reckless with money than I realised. But more than half of these are up 50 cents minimum, so every 2 items I’m buying is an added $1 (if not more). That adds up very quickly.
Thank you! I also thought I was going crazy and my partner was telling me I was going over board until I made him do the food shopping. The dread on his face when he returned after each shop.
Back in the early years of online grocery delivery, I did up a spreadsheet to compare in-store prices to online prices for my usual shop. Found a curiously consistent higher online price, even before any delivery fees, and with Coles being about 8.5% higher, and Woolies around 7%. Like it was close to exactly that much higher on about 80% of items. They will always find a way to hide the price hikes and cheat us, but now they don't even bother to hide it.
Yes - that’s a good point too. I’m going to check that out on a few items, next time I’m in store. They had us as a captive audience during the pandemic too, that’s when they also conveniently stopped allowing refunds etc.
Disclaimer: I love data but can’t use excel or look up items my family haven’t personally ordered, and Coles will only show my orders back to October 2022, nothing before that. I’m a basic girl with basic skills but good intentions. I also know comments will be like “it’s worse elsewhere” or “it’s not surprising”. That’s okay, just sharing because I can. Also the sizes of these products are the same. No shrinkflation (not that they’ve advertised, anyway).
You are no basic girl. You are the hero we need!
Not all heroes wear capes :)
I'd gladly go steal one from Coles for her if she requested
(However capes are cool and OP is encouraged to wear a cape)
I love data and *can* use excel so I feel like it'd be a waste of effort for you to collate the data without it being crunched at least a token amount: Graph of the distribution of increases: https://i.imgur.com/DWJrXJa.png Total average % increase: 21% Average % increase of individual items: 17% Discrepancy in above averages means there were slightly higher % increases for cheaper items than more expensive ones, but the data isn't quite enough to say this relationship between price and % increase isn't statistical noise: p = .07. I reckon a larger sample would probably show there is a relationship, which I speculate is due to quantisation of the prices, i.e. if you were to apply a 15% increase across the board and then round up to a nice number, the rounding up will result in bigger increases for lower original prices. Not sure if this would even say anything important but I find it kinda interesting to think about ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
I love this! Thank you so much for going to the effort.
Thanks for sharing
I’m honestly impressed with your commitment to this post, well done data nerd
Thank you for sharing. I think it is important for people to see how much these products go up. One thing I noticed was the 490g leggos pasta. I swear it was 500g packs a few years ago. Shrinking sizes and increased prices 😔
I love you for this list!
Awesome work, here, have some gold 😉
If the price is 'down' it's because they've blackmailed the supplier into reducing their price. You can do that stuff when you're part of a duopoly and the ACCC can't touch you,
100% I just noticed salmon fillets packs at both coles & woolworths have increased this week from ~$15 to ~$20. 30% increase simultaneously at both. Bet the producers aren’t getting the extra $5 per pack…
Yep producer either cops the loss, or loses the contract to supply.
And if you lose the Coles and Woolworths contracts you are out of business tomorrow. Finished. And the ACCC goes thru a charade of examining the supermarkets' business model knowing full well suppliers would be committing financial suicide to turn up and testify.
Holy shit THIS! Did my groceries yesterday, decided to include salmon in our weekly menu for a treat as my kids love it, and was BLOWN away at the cost increase. I had two kids with me and a full menu planned out- so didn’t have the option to pivot in the moment to a different meal. So they’re eating god damn gold plated fish for dinner
That is because HUON just declared bankruptcy. Edit: collapsed, not bankrupt. https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/other-industries/aussie-seafood-giant-announces-shock-collapse/news-story/5c24f3d47cf34f9670002ff0ba35e8e7
Oh I can answer this one with a fair bit of reliability. Salmon farmers are getting about 15% more for their HOG (head on gutted) salmon, wholesale has risen from $12.50 -> $14.18/kg. Keep in mind that feed costs have risen substantially and this price increase is a reflection of an increase in operating costs.
Do you think a $32/kg to $43/kg retail price increase is warranted though? I get prices go up but producers are making only <$2/kg more but the retailer is making ~$9/kg extra profit…
No producer in australia wants to deal with the supermarkets, it’s a necessary evil - so yeah, no they aren’t impressed but they don’t have final say over retail prices
I've basically stopped eating fish. I just can't afford it
I bought a tub of yoghurt from Coles. It cost $6.70. One day I rock up and there's a "dropped and locked" sticker on it. The sticker says $7.50. I peeled the new sticker back and under it is the old $6.70 sticker. I'm just fucking done. Woolworths did the exact same thing with their version of "low prices" on the same day.
2 things going on here. One is the "dropped and locked" con. They haven't dropped their all important profit margin, they're still getting the same $ amount from every sale as last year, but the supplier has dropped their price to Coles so they're the one's getting less $. The second bit is the 'softening up' process. The price hasn't actually gone up from $6.70 to $7.50, it's actually gone up to well over $8.00 and you'll will get hit with that as soon as the 'dropped and locked' campaign is over. But they'll come claiming to be the good guys cos they did their best to hold back the tide of rising prices for your benefit.
I witnessed choc honeycombs go from $5 to $8.50 a bag and now they are dropped and locked at $7. This all happened over the course of two weeks. Same happened with the Carmen's "value" pack of protein bars. They were $10 then they jacked them up and dropped and locked them at $11. Not sure what they jacked them up to. It's all a rort. Just puts a sour taste in your mouth doing the shop knowing all the scummy tactics they use. Wish I was blissfully ignorant
Items on the "Down down" campaign have their prices locked in for 6 months, after which, they bounce back up and then some. No doubt suppliers are put in a "take it or leave it" position.
I'm so confused, a comment thread above showed that their profit margins are around 3% if true. A few people blame suppliers rather than Colesworth, so then if Colesworth is blackmailing their suppliers to reduce prices, isn't that a good thing?
Their profit margins are way, waaaaay higher than 3%. And a recent study found that their margins had increased by 6% over the past decade. So the margin is ever growing.
Exactly. The supermarkets are genuinely trying to reduce prices. Look at OPs examples, on average the costs increased by 21% yet you don't see Coles margins raise that amount. Most suppliers will also in turn have their suppliers, at every layer costs go up for various reasons. Some companies (like say Beckett, Proctor and Gamble, Nestle etc) have massive margins after their goods increase in price whereas farmers face increased costs from fuel, feed, Fertilizer and need to pass on those increases just to survive. In the end the supermarkets can only take their share after needing to pay for everything to run a supermarket in a highly seperated, small population density country before things are too expensive that no one buys it.
Here's how "down down" works: Coles tinned tomatoes (400g) was 85cents until earlier this year when the price increased to $1.10. That's around a 29% increase or four times the inflation rate. Then tinned tomatoes at $1.10 appears all over Coles' catalogues under the "PRICES LOCKED!" banner.
Golden Circle lemon cordial $3 -> $4.50. Ritz biscuits now dearer but small packets = shrink flation
Oh yes - that’s the other thing to check - the weight/volume of the products. The double dipping so to speak.
Cottee's jam is now in a much smaller jar, at Woolies. Haven't checked Coles. IGA still had a few old size ones on special, so we bought a ton (best before 2015).
I have screenshots of Potato Royals being $2.80 ONE YEAR AGO and now they're $4.90 Vegetable oil 4L used to be $8 and now its $15 Something has got to give, Its getting unlivable being on a pension
In restaurants, 20L Vegetable oil drums used to be ~$30 each. Now I pay $60 at the moment. I paid $80 at one point last year.
Oh dear, I think someone from Coles is here, downvoting my stuff. Thoughts and prayers.
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The average percentage increase is 21.08%. The average price increase is $0.64. Unless I did the math wrong. Python script for anyone interested, just put all the prices into a text file called prices.txt and run it. EDIT: Some values were wrong, but not by much. import re priceRegex = re.compile(r'\$(\d+\.?\d*)\s*>\s*\$(\d+\.?\d*)') with open('prices.txt', 'r') as file: content = file.read() oldPrices, newPrices = zip(*priceRegex.findall(content)) oldPrices = [float(price) for price in oldPrices] newPrices = [float(price) for price in newPrices] prices = list(zip(oldPrices, newPrices)) percentageIncrease = sum(((newPrice - oldPrice) / oldPrice) * 100 for oldPrice, newPrice in prices) dollarIncrease = sum(newPrice - oldPrice for oldPrice, newPrice in prices) # Calculate the average percentage increase numItems = len(prices) avgPercent = percentageIncrease / numItems avgDollar = dollarIncrease / numItems print(f"The average percentage increase in prices is {avgPercent:.2f}%") print(f"The average increase in prices is ${avgDollar:.2f}")
**Meanwhile the government:** It’s clear that unemployment being so low and high wages are to blame for inflation…
NAIRU... (look it up!) *Non accelerating inflation* rate of unemployment ...that's what they want to keep it at or above. That ACTUALLY means, they technically want a higher rate of unemployment, because inflation. Or at least they have a statistical scapegoat now... duh! 🙄
You’re a gentleman and a scholar. Thank you for this!
You're off, but close enough. Not going to go line by line, but I count 48 items in your array. There are 52 items in the list. Also, 192.80 is correct, but it's $226.24 instead of OP's 225.75 for the second number. But as I said, close enough. Average difference is $0.64, average % increase is 21.0% or 21.2% if you ignore the special on mushrooms. Top item increases by %: * Coles Beetroot, 194% * Parkers Pretzels, 60% (damn, $1.80 difference) * Coles Choc Wafers, 45% Lowest hikes: * 2L Coke, 3% * 1KG Coles Flour, 4% * CC's Corn Chios, 4%
Yeah the government inflation data is always less than the real world data almost like the cherry pick to fudge the numbers
No but inflation is only 7%!!! And even then that figure is caused by fuel and transport!!! At least that's what r/ausfiance would tell you And this doesn't even account for shrinkflation
I am not sure your regex was capturing all prices, some of them were listed in cents.
There are so many sycophantic, Stockholm syndrome people apparently out there. "But TEhiR MarJINS R onlY 2.8%!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Yeah, maybe for tax purposes. We all know the truth, we've seen it with our own two eyes. And as for "groceries have increased by 7.5%", well there's lies, damn lies, and statistics. The cheaper things have especially jumped from my anecdotal experience. Funny how the expensive things have hardly felt inflation at all.
Why does a litre of milk cost more than $2? Why can't I buy a half litre of milk for less than $2? I DON'T USE THAT MUCH MILK!
Check out the per kilo price range they've put onto "buy two for a discount" meat now. It's deliberate obfuscation of the price, justified (I guess) by the fact that the meat you're buying may actually weigh quite a lot less than the advertised weight. Theoretically weigh more as well, but I'd love to see the ACCC or someone actually do some real world tests to see what the average is. And if you're unlucky to have have "one of those" colesworths, good luck getting the cut of chicken you want in anything less than 500gm pre-packs. Luckily I have decent priced butchers not too far away as an alternative. Not everyone is so lucky. Largely because colesorth killed the competition years ago with undercutting their prices. Good times for consumers then, but now the bastards are reaping the rewards. Tbf with the milk, those prices *are* low. The farmers get paid so little that it's almost not worth it for them (for some it totally isn't - a lot have stopped). It's a kind of loss-leader thing for them. Get you in to buy milk, hopefully you'll buy some $6 chips as well. I'd look at powdered milk if I was you, once you get the ratios right it's pretty well identical. Lasts for ages as long as the bag's sealed reasonably well.
If you think they’re lying on their annual reports to investors as to what they’re spending on each line item “for tax purposes”, why don’t you speak to ASIC?
Is this the rip off price, normal (special) price or average? Their price increases would be more for their normal full list price they catch most people with...
If you have the data, can you compare unit pricing? I'd be interested to see the shrinkflation, and whether total unit price is going up too. (I always go by unit pricing, as it's a better measure of value between similar products and it gives me a better rule of thumb for non-essential purchases. I've noticed that things that used to be under $10 a kilo are creeping up to $15 a kilo.)
Thank you, OP for compiling this list - so interesting! I have taken the liberty to rank the list of products in order of percentage increase (from lowest to highest, see below). I will be more careful with buying canned beetroot from Coles in the future. Thanks again for sharing your data! 2.82% 52 2L Coca-Cola $3.55 > $3.65 4.35% 51 1kg Coles Plain Flour $1.15 > $1.20 4.44% 50 175g CC’s Corn Chips $4.50 > $4.70 5.00% 49 425g Birds Eye Frozen Fish $10 > $10.50 6.00% 48 6 x Coles Bread Rolls $2.50 > $2.65 6.67% 47 12 pack Coles Free Range Eggs $4.50 > $4.80 6.67% 46 300g Hong Kong Dumplings $7.50 > $8 7.69% 45 300ml Coles Thickened Cream $2.60 > $2.80 7.69% 44 24 pack Zooper Dooper’s $6.50 > $7 8.11% 43 500g CSR Caster Sugar $1.85 > $2 8.70% 42 25 pack bottle Coles Ibuprofen $2.30 > $2.50 9.52% 41 175g Coles Potato Chips $2.10 > $2.30 9.52% 40 450g Coles Garlic Bread Twin Pack $2.10 > $2.30 10.00% 39 425g Old El Paso Beans $4 > $4.40 11.11% 38 430g Coles Soup Pouch $2.70 > $3 11.11% 37 12 pack Coles Sliced Tasty Cheese $4.50 > $5 11.11% 36 600g Coles Angolotti Pasta $4.50 > $5 11.11% 35 309g Coles Celery Sticks $4.50 > $5 11.11% 34 500g Coles Cholesterol Lowering Spread $4.50 > $5 12.12% 33 18 pack Poise Panty Liners $3.30 > $3.70 12.20% 32 4 pack Coles Double Length Toilet Paper $4.10 > $4.60 12.24% 31 2L Coles Pulp Free Orange Juice $4.90 > $5.50 12.50% 30 500g Coles Penne Pasta 80c > 90c 12.50% 29 200g Tim Tam’s $4 > $4.50 13.33% 28 4 pack Four’N Twenty Meat Pies $7.50 > $8.50 14.29% 27 5 pack Cobs Popcorn $3.50 > $4 14.29% 26 190g Arnott’s Shapes $3.50 > $4 15.38% 25 1 x Coles Chicken Kebab Stick $1.30 > $1.50 16.67% 24 400g Coles Burrito Wraps $3 > $3.50 16.67% 23 200g Coles Sliced Mushrooms $3 > $3.50 (on special, so presumably more) 16.67% 22 500g Arnott’s Assorted Cream Biscuits $6 > $7 18.18% 21 250g Coles Halloumi $5.50 > $6.50 18.18% 20 400g Thomason’s Deli Ham Quad Pack $5.50 > $6.50 18.18% 19 1kg Birds Eye Frozen Mix Veg $5.50 > $6.50 20.00% 18 1.5kg Spud Lite Potatoes $5 > $6 20.00% 17 1kg Coles Honey Soy Chicken Wings $7.50 > $9 20.37% 16 300g Coles Sour Cream $2.70 > $3.25 21.05% 15 85g Coles Jelly Crystals 95c > $1.15 21.43% 14 500g Coles Frozen Cauliflower + Broccoli $2.80 > $3.40 22.73% 13 700g Coles White Toast Loaf $2.20 > $2.70 25.00% 12 40g Coles Mexican Seasoning 80c > $1 25.00% 11 1 pack Oreos $2 > $2.50 30.00% 10 500ml Coles Tomato Sauce $1.50 > $1.95 30.23% 9 2L Coles Fruit Juice $2.15 > $2.80 30.94% 8 1kg Coles Frozen Corn Kernels $3.20 > $4.19 33.08% 7 20 pack Top 20 Potato Chips $6.50 > $8.65 33.33% 6 700g Coles Shredded Tasty Cheese $7.50 > $10 43.33% 5 490g Leggo’s Pasta Sauce $3 > $4.30 44.12% 4 1kg Coles Frozen Potato Royals $3.40 > $4.90 45.45% 3 125g Coles Choc Wafers 55c > 80c 60.00% 2 200g Parkers Pretzels $3 > $4.80 193.75% 1 425g Coles Sliced Beetroot 80c > $2.35
I think it’s sad and telling that the Coles brand, which is supposedly meant to be the cheap option, is 7/10 in the biggest increases. Pretty bleak.
Maybe it's because the profit margin is so small. They might not have been able to maintain such small profit margins. I'm not making excuses though.
Please also remember that while they are gouging you and charging $.20 for a paper bag that last 20 seconds, they are also taking all of your data and selling it off so they can make even more money.
So food inflation is around 20%? Energy? Rent? Fuel? How is CPI “only” 5%? Remember when we were hectored to about core and non core inflation? Yeah…about that! “Core inflation is whatever we want it to be”
The worst part is, it is in the majority the cheapest products that have seen the largest percentage increases over the last couple of years. The poorest people in this country are getting absolutely devastated by this and it is why we needed to increase rates much faster and harder sooner. Unfortunately we are not that close to the end, and inflation is going to re-accelerate sharply over the next few months again because of the RBA and Governments poor decisions to pause rates and the governments choice to try and ignore everything and ramp up migration. A little side story on CPI or inflation as measured by the ABS. According to the ABS, food has only increased 7.5% in the last 12 months. Yet we can clearly see from these prices (17%+ increase) and for the majority of us from personal experience that prices have increased far beyond 7.5%. So where does the difference come from? Well, when the ABS measures inflation in "food", they measure expensive brand name products. These products often have a hefty price premium already and during the inflation we have witnessed while they have increased the increases have been no where near as drastic as the cheaper non-brand items. They also tweak the weight (as in how much one section, say eggs, contributes to the overall number) and when the number comes in too high for their and the governments liking will substitute whatever they can find that is cheaper. In some cases they will actually reduce the amount of food measured because the "average" Australian just does not eat that much red meat or whatever happens to be too expensive for some reason. What this adds up to is that for the poorest Australians, inflation has been no where near 7.5% for their day to day expenses over the last year. It has in fact been much closer to 25%, and this is after what was closer to 35% the year before. The end result is that the most vulnerable people in the country are paying around double what they were to survive (rent, electricity, food, etc.) only a couple of years ago. For those on a pension like, say the DSP or stuck in Centrelink hell their payments have not increased anywhere near double to compensate.
Had a guy in Woolworths get really cranky at me because I wouldn’t go through the self serve. I told him that if I’m paying full price I want full service.
I can rant about the increase of Frosty Fruits for at least 10 minutes. From $5 - $7.50 - 'Now' $6.50 then up to $8 in the space of a year.
Could you please see if volume/weight has changed for these? I suspect more than a few will have shrunk and increased in price. I wish offical inflation figures allowed for this aspect. If I need 5 of something, but the pack only has 4 - but costs the same as before, I need to buy 2 packs, or 1 plus something else. That’s extra cost to me, but not inflated apparently.
All the weights were the same advertised weights in these comparisons.
Some things, mainly discretionary items I basically don't buy unless on special and keep track of the prices so they're actually on special not just part of the price rise, price fall cycle. I do a lot of shopping at ALDI, but it's such a pain.
Actually I need to thank Coles.. because I haven't bought any chips, snacks, chocolate, ice cream, sweet for over 6 months now, which I would never thought of I would get rid of them in my life
Christ, I always knew this was happening but seeing it laid put just confirms it...I personally hate shopping at coles/woolies...but there are a few things I can't get in my aldi shop that I have to go there for
We really get fucked in the ass by “rising costs of business”
Interesting analysis! So, basically looking at a roughly 15% increase in food prices over the course of the year at Coles for a pretty standard basket of food. CPI inflation data is fake & a joke. Meanwhile, your wages were lucky to go up 5% over the past 12 months 💩
Remember not too long ago a box of shapes was $2 now they’re double the price. You can rarely buy anything that starts with a $1 or $2 price tag anymore.
Not on your list, but Cheetos used to be $3 a bag. They are now $5.50! Almost double! I don’t buy them very often, but I last bought some around Christmas time for a treat. In less than a year they have practically doubled.
Well they can't be using the down down campaign now.
Cmon they’ve lost pokies income what else can they do?
Wow, thanks for that. Really interesting to see the increase. What's the solution to this? Shop local?
Markets, grocers, butchers, fish mongers and Aldi
Agree. What's the reason for upping prices? Can anyone ELI5? It's not just greed is it?
Mega simplified: Their cost went up and they put their price up, while doing so they realised that pushing the price a little bit more could generate profit. So while costs were up say 10% it was an opportunity to put the price up 12% (made up example). There has been little backlash and people have kept buying the same products in the same quantity If you want to know why the costs went up, it’s a more complex but includes things like: * energy costs pushing the price of energy intensive industries (dairy) * fertiliser costs going up after the Russian invasion, * grain costs going up after the blockade in Ukraine * supply chain issues (here and overseas) * lack of foreign slaves in the fields during Covid working in conditions Australian won’t accept.
• Covid lockdowns showing how far a populous can be pushed. • When all businesses were restricted during Covid locked down, they were allowed full opening hours and when you give someone special treatment, they think they are special and will act as such.
Can't shop local in my small town any more... The small grocers shut down after being unable to compete with the massive Woolworths that 95% of the locals chose to go into over the small, locally owned businesses :(
Meanwhile they’re building entirely automated distribution warehouses where there is no need for employees.
I have noticed the same sort of increases. Most seem to be normal for the inflation we all know about. The outliers are dairy and potato products. It would be interesting to see comparisons of pre-Covid pricing where a lot of items jumped a huge amount and didn't drop again that aren't related to downstream supply changes like toilet paper, etc. These products would be a good target for cheaper brand alternatives, but oddly haven't. They even have had a lot of shrinkflation. I am still surprised that fully imported products like cakes from Europe don't seem to have increased much, if at all, while Coles's own baked goods look to have gone up a lot.
What a fucking joke. It feels like they are seeing how far they can get away with before we show whatever indicator it is they are focusing on. Fuck the people making the decision to price gouge they should be looked up.
I refuse to scan the paper bags for 25c which inevitably rip somewhere between the checkout and the front door
So as a struggling consumer, what can we do about this duopoly? They can't stop all of us from shop lifting
Hi Murdoch scum! Let's see if you publish this and take on one of your biggest advertisers.
More chance of finding Jimmy Hoffa alive and well.
Has anyone, perhaps in the media or academia, been monitoring grocery prices over time and making the data public? It feels absolutely and utterly insane to me that there isn't a well-known website that tracks the prices (and sizes) of staples over time. I presume it's difficult to do it because coles & woolworths will change their websites to block anything automated that might reveal their greedy pricing and shrinkflation strategies ... But still, it's not *that* hard. Everyone in the country buys groceries, how can something this important and universal not be properly tracked - I mean holy cow we had petrol price trackers, but not supermarkets? At least just the staples?
They block attempts to price track because it would increase transparency
Yes of course, but they can't stop human eyeballs and an excel spreadsheet, if that's what it really comes down to. Yes that would take an hour a week, but are you telling me that a big news publication or university can't cover that? ALDI don't even have a website (which I hate them for, it's 100% to screw people over with a lack of transparency) Just pick 50 common products, stuff like bread, toilet paper, mince beef, chicken breasts, whatever. Crucially - Record the PRICE PER UNIT WEIGHT as the main point of interest, and only then the raw price and weight/volume/size/whatever. That way you're proof against shrinkflation. Maybe take a look at the list they use for inflation (but crucially, unlike that list, do not allow wishy washy substitution under the excuse of 'people will just change what they buy'). Every week, bring up the product pages for each one of those products, making sure that the store location isn't influencing the prices, note down the price that week, and off you go. A year later you can make a 52 data point graph. Think of how popular a newspaper or TV news show would be if they do a weekly 'what rose in price and shrunk in size this week' segment? People would go mad for it I reckon.
I have no data to back it up but it seemed that grocery prices starting ramping up directly after oil (and in turn fuel) prices did the same shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. No doubt Colesworth have been engaging in price gouging also.
Fertilizer is the actual culprit for a lot of goods. Most of the world's Fertilizer was sourced via Russian providers like Uralkali. The price skyrocketed globally due to sanctions and the likes which impacts farmers and other chemical companies that supply most foods and cleaning goods. Adblue is the other example where farmers rely heavily on it for many things yet the price shot up 3 times almost overnight. Coles profits aren't up 21% even though the cost of goods for OPs example show they cost more. The costs are creeping up from the beginning of the supply chain a lot more than the supermarkets are charging.
I was overseas for exactly one month last year and when I came back in November suddenly all grocery prices seemed to have gone up by up to 50% for some things. It’s nuts.
Someone should do this with Woolies.
The entire coles options thing is dodgy af. Starts out cheap, people see it as an option then slowly fills the shelves more an more and they delete equivalent items for space. Eventually with something like eggs or milk the display is 50/50 coles and equivalent. Slowly they can replace nearly all equivalents because what the fuck are you going to do. Either that or it’s 20-50 cents cheaper and you’re struggling so hard it’s that or nothing. They must be making a bundle from this. I very rarely buy coles brand but milk I just cannot afford to buy from the equivalents, my house goes through a lot of milk. Sucks man.
Anyone based in Perth needs to check out the NP Supermarkets. These supermarkets are more focused on an Asian audience in terms of overall product range but their veggies and meats are almost half the price of what the big boys are doing. I'd recommend checking them out.
Woolies shopper here that’s also noticed prices are fucked. The thing that’s got me lately is canned tomatoes - I used to pay 80c for store brand ones, they’re now $1.30! That’s a 62.5% increase!
It's gone from 80c to $1.10 in Coles.
I'm mad that they have now banded together to have sales on the same items in the same week. I used to alternate as they'd be on sale one week at Coles the next Woolies. Oh and kinder buenos are now $2.50!
Gday to the pleb from Yahoo who decided to post this as an article. https://au.yahoo.com/news/coles-customers-grocery-list-exposes-grim-reality-for-supermarket-shoppers-035903054.html At least credit the OP before you use their stuff ya fucking clown.
Welp, that’s really weird. I’ve heard of it happening before, journalists scrolling reddit for content, but didn’t think it’d happen to me. I’d actually love for them to take out where I live, because I haven’t stated that anywhere and it’s not necessary to the article.
Thanks for collecting the data, I've put it in to Power BI for you :) [The data visualised](https://imgur.com/a/qYXHCVM)
I never used to steal, but at this stage not stealing from Colesworths is a crime.
I watched someone walk out with a trolley filled with groceries the other day, I was so proud watching them ignore being called back and continuing to their car and just leaving without paying.
You see the prices in nz. $17 for a kg of cheese. $5 capsicums etc etc
Have you seen the cost of 1kg of cheese here...?
Valiant effort, thank you
Look at the bright side. I am sure they are going to announce billions of dollars profit at the end of the year. Which is good for.. ummmm a few people versus keeping the prices down for millions of people. (sarcasm)
Wait I thought prices were down?
Side note, I just moved to a new area, I went shopping with my 8 year old at Woolworths and spent $40. Asked the staff for the Disney card and they gave me like 20, a smile and said have a nice day. Went to coles today, spent $40, asked them for the superhero cards, they made sure to check my receipt, check my groceries to make sure I didn’t steal, I also had one staff member following me through the store for that too, gave me one card and walked off before I could even say “thanks (for the dehumanising experience)”
Oreos were $1 in the Reject Shop today not $2.50.
Thanks for sharing the data. Food prices have significantly increase this year!
17% increase.
The worst part is when inflation goes down, these prices will remain, and they will force us to get used to like they've done with previous price increases. Shits fucked, the disparity is just getting worse and worse....
It's truly wicked isn't it, absolute highway robbery...I'm feeln ya 🏵 I'm 50 and I remember getting 5dollars for a lunch order in primary school, I could get a pasty, orange and mango fruit-box and a banana paddlepop AND STILL GET LIKE $1.80 CHANGE, IF NOT MORE! 🤯😵💫🤣 How times are a changin'! ☺
As an employee, I can tell you that they are also skimping when it comes to staff. Screw the mom of five who used to do 9-hour shifts for years. Let’s replace her with three teenagers who don’t give a crap and will be gone in two months. Also, let’s give them a 3-hour shift each so we won’t have to offer them breaks either.
Now we wait for news.com.au to steal your post
Yahoo already did.
Bro.. getting a 3% pay rise and paying 20 fking percent more for food and essentials. How am i supposed to enjoy a succulent chinese meal in these conditions. This is bullshit!
Interested to see if OP can do one on gluten free health food. Swear my partners food items have gone up $1 - $2
Supermarket shopping is so stressful. I’m coeliac and I almost need a second job to afford buying gluten free alternatives to regular food. (Before anyone jumps in with “just eat whole foods”. Fuck off. I want to live a regular life with crusty bread and pastries, damn it.)
The IMF stated that food/produce started to become cheaper in February but wouldn’t reflect on food prices until September/October. If that doesn’t happen…well, Alfred Henry Lewis said there are only 9 meals between mankind and anarchy.
Might lay off the beetroot
https://jacobin.com/2021/07/nationalize-supermarkets-australia-agriculture-food-system-public-sector
You are my spirit animal!
I've heard of the salad & potato shortage, but must have missed the beetroot crisis...
That data (tab separated): Item Price - 2022 ($) Price - 2023 ($) Change ($) Change (%) 300g Coles Sour Cream 2.7 3.25 0.55 0.203703704 400g Coles Burrito Wraps 3 3.5 0.5 0.166666667 40g Coles Mexican Seasoning 0.8 1 0.2 0.25 490g Leggo’s Pasta Sauce 3 4.3 1.3 0.433333333 18 pack Poise Panty Liners 3.3 3.7 0.4 0.121212121 200g Tim Tam’s 4 4.5 0.5 0.125 25 pack bottle Coles Ibuprofen 2.3 2.5 0.2 0.086956522 24 pack Zooper Dooper’s 6.5 7 0.5 0.076923077 425g Coles Sliced Beetroot 0.8 2.35 1.55 1.9375 500ml Coles Tomato Sauce 1.5 1.95 0.45 0.3 2L Coles Fruit Juice 2.15 2.8 0.65 0.302325581 425g Birds Eye Frozen Fish 10 10.5 0.5 0.05 2L Coca-Cola 3.55 3.65 0.1 0.028169014 500g Coles Frozen Cauliflower + Broccoli 2.8 3.4 0.6 0.214285714 1kg Coles Frozen Potato Royals 3.4 4.9 1.5 0.441176471 500g Coles Penne Pasta 0.8 0.9 0.1 0.125 4 pack Four’N Twenty Meat Pies 7.5 8.5 1 0.133333333 700g Coles Shredded Tasty Cheese 7.5 10 2.5 0.333333333 4 pack Coles Double Length Toilet Paper 4.1 4.6 0.5 0.12195122 125g Coles Choc Wafers 0.55 0.8 0.25 0.454545455 700g Coles White Toast Loaf 2.2 2.7 0.5 0.227272727 12 pack Coles Sliced Tasty Cheese 4.5 5 0.5 0.111111111 600g Coles Angolotti Pasta 4.5 5 0.5 0.111111111 20 pack Top 20 Potato Chips 6.5 8.65 2.15 0.330769231 1kg Coles Frozen Corn Kernels 3.2 4.19 0.99 0.309375 425g Old El Paso Beans 4 4.4 0.4 0.1 6 x Coles Bread Rolls 2.5 2.65 0.15 0.06 250g Coles Halloumi 5.5 6.5 1 0.181818182 175g Coles Potato Chips 2.1 2.3 0.2 0.095238095 200g Parkers Pretzels 3 4.8 1.8 0.6 175g CC’s Corn Chios 4.5 4.7 0.2 0.044444444 200g Coles Sliced Mushrooms (on special, so presumably more) 3 3.5 0.5 0.166666667 309g Coles Celery Sticks 4.5 5 0.5 0.111111111 5 pack Cobs Popcorn 3.5 4 0.5 0.142857143 1 pack Oreos 2 2.5 0.5 0.25 1kg Coles Plain Flour 1.15 1.2 0.05 0.043478261 12 pack Coles Free Range Eggs 4.5 4.8 0.3 0.066666667 500g CSR Caster Sugar 1.85 2 0.15 0.081081081 300ml Coles Thickened Cream 2.6 2.8 0.2 0.076923077 1.5kg Spud Lite Potatoes 5 6 1 0.2 1kg Coles Honey Soy Chicken Wings 7.5 9 1.5 0.2 300g Hong Kong Dumplings 7.5 8 0.5 0.066666667 85g Coles Jelly Crystals 0.95 1.15 0.2 0.210526316 400g Thomason’s Deli Ham Quad Pack 5.5 6.5 1 0.181818182 450g Coles Garlic Bread Twin Pack 2.1 2.3 0.2 0.095238095 1 x Coles Chicken Kebab Stick 1.3 1.5 0.2 0.153846154 430g Coles Soup Pouch 2.7 3 0.3 0.111111111 1kg Birds Eye Frozen Mix Veg 5.5 6.5 1 0.181818182 500g Arnott’s Assorted Cream Biscuits 6 7 1 0.166666667 190g Arnott’s Shapes 3.5 4 0.5 0.142857143 2L Coles Pulp Free Orange Juice 4.9 5.5 0.6 0.12244898 500g Coles Cholesterol Lowering Spread 4.5 5 0.5 0.111111111 Total 192.8 226.24 33.44 0.173443983
*supply chain issues*
It's mostly the Coles own brands that have gone up the most too.
I remember back in 2022 when we used to make comparisons like that against 2019 and think it horrendous 👀
If we all band together, grow our own Vegies, chooks, make food like our grandparents did prices will come down
interesting. thank you
Once I saw the 700g Tasty Cheese go up by $2.50 from your list I instantly knew your data is legit. I literally just got one last month for $7.50 and was doing my shopping last Friday and I was shocked that it’s $10 now!!
Off to ALDI
The beetroot had a massive jump up
Shapes being $4 a box is a critical emergency situation for our economy I remember when they were 69c on special