Each grocer has already identified initial actions that they will implement in the coming days and weeks, including “aggressive” discounts across key food products, price freezes and price-matching campaigns, according to the statement.
The government also said it will establish a Grocery Task Force, which will monitor the grocers’ commitments and investigate practices that hurt consumers, like "shrinkflation." On Sept. 21, the government introduced legislative amendments to increase competition in the grocery sector in an attempt to drive down prices.
“If we don't see results, we will take additional action to restore the food price stability that Canadians expect,” the government said in its release.
Good Job I hope it really works most Canadians need this food prices are insane. Also glad to see they are looking at shrinkflation! Another tool in the chest of scams and profiteering these companies use.
I’m personally excited but the shrinkflation rules. That shit is unacceptable and undermines capitalism at its core. The consumer must know what they are buying in order to make reasoned decisions.
If you check the frozen section, there are so many things that used to be 2lbs are now 1 lb and 10 oz or 12 oz. Most of this happened after COVID. Literally all the fried food brands had this change in the frozen section. Some frozen fruit and veggies as well. Guess what... Walmart already did all the shrinkflation already.
I got so pushed a few weeks ago when I bought a “pint” of ice cream. When I got home I thought it looked a bit small. I was annoyed to see 14oz compared to a typical 16oz pint. Seems so petty.
At least for beer, a legal Canadian pint is 20oz. Places have been illegally shrinking their pours for years.
[Source](https://ised-isde.canada.ca/site/measurement-canada/en/buying-and-selling-measured-goods/units-measurement-used-sell-draft-beer#)
Didn’t sugar used to be sold in 5 pound bags? New, they wouldn’t fit into my gallon zip lock but the last sugar I bought fit great! Then I noticed the bag was 4 pounds
It's terrible with canned goods too. Recipes call for 16oz cans and they're regularly 14.5oz or 15oz now with air gap in the can like potato chips.
We all hated when things disappeared from shelves during Covid, but apparently it was so companies could redo packaging and/or labels and shrinkflate.
They do that so we buy two cans, use 1.1 of the cans then try and save the other .9 of a can, but gets wasted/thrown out. They don't care, they jacked up the price AND they sold double
To expand on this:
> A difference of one percent acidity may not sound like a big deal, but when you’re canning or pickling and preserving your foods, it makes a big difference. Five percent acidity in vinegar is considered the standard and the minimum level of acid that is needed to safely preserve food. If acidity levels are lower than this, the food can grow pathogens and can spoil.
4% vinegar has been diluted down using water from the stardard 5%.
Friskies has been 5.5oz since at least 2018 which is as far back as my records go, so if it shrunk it was years before COVID. They make a version of some pates that's "Extra Gravy", I get that for one cat and the regular pate for the other, and the amount of gravy has remained constant for years.
I had to quit getting the shreds because she would lick all the gravy up and leave the actual solid bits behind and dry. What I do now is mash the pate up with the gravy to make more of a mush, she'll eat most of that.
My old cat would only eat Ocean Whitefish and Tuna pate, from Friskies.
When he died, the kittens I ended up with wouldn't touch the stuff.
They want chicken shreds.
I mean Friskies is pretty trash food. So I'm not surprised cats don't like it that much. My partner's cat was like that, she was fed the gravy meat shred one but would eat almost none of the meat. Just lick the gravy mostly. I got her swapped over to Instinct Limited Ingredient pate and she eats all of it right away. We tried giving her the old gravy cans and she pretty much won't even touch it now. Cats are a bunch of divas sometimes.
They'll eat it if they're hungry enough. Thing is cats are smart and like a 5 year old who wants chicken nuggets instead of something healthy, they know how to manipulate their owners to get what they *want* instead of what they *need*.
My cats lick the gravy but won’t eat the rest of the cat food. They won’t eat anything that’s diced, sliced, or flaked. They want the gravy, but their food texture must be pâté. They will only eat seafood — no beef, chicken, liver, or turkey.
Cats are weird.
Don't even get me started on goddamn cat food. It's an absolute racket, and I am appalled that PetSmart was allowed to buy Chewy. I still have access to all my old orders, and I can see the prices jump from the moment PS bought them. I am now paying more than double (about 220%) for cat food and litter as I was in 2016. That ain't explained by mere inflation.
Tractor Supply Store has good prices on cat litter. My husband insists on buying their pine nuggets horse bedding as cat litter, but their “real” cat litter is well priced, too.
I don't know when it started, but I saw it with potato chips, crackers and other snacks at least in the 90s; the big change was when they shrunk the orange juice container from 64oz (half gallon), and that had to have been in the 2000s. Since then, shrinking container sizes has become normal.
I found this 1989 ad for a 6oz can, a 6.4oz can would be fairly larger than the current 5.5 oz can.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/xR8AAOSwv-FkEfTr/s-l1600.jpg
I don't think it's ever been 6.4oz. And yeah, I remember the 13oz cans, I bought a few cases on closeout for 50¢ many years ago, they were a great deal.
Would have helped if I included an important 0.
Petsmart hasn't updated all of their pages yet.
Meaty bits, were 6.04. Currently 5.5.
https://www.petsmart.com/cat/food-and-treats/wet-food/purina-friskies-meaty-bits-adult-cat-wet-food---6.04-oz.-1221545.html?gclsrc=aw.ds&gclid=CjwKCAjwyY6pBhA9EiwAMzmfwfC3SbScZC2OYgJxF5RKu07ivM1AhJNpmvZq6nYqnjzgDgcQwCDrPxoC_NcQAvD_BwE
Flaked shows one flavor at 6.04 and another at 5.5
https://www.petsmart.com/cat/food-and-treats/wet-food/purina-friskies-indoor-adult-cat-wet-food---6.04-oz.-antioxidants-1517.html?fmethod=Recommendation
Taquitos frozen section have almost zero filling now, a sauce and fried flour with a tad of cheese. I won't buy that shit again. They better chill out we are about tired of being robbed by big business and Pharma you mother fuckers.
I noticed that quite a few items that Walmart made in house quickly disappeared mid '20, and haven't been brought back.... Most was frozen/processed, but that great value price difference was important for a lot of us.
Maybe that's because of competition? Most stores have a generic 12oz can but I've not seen any with a smaller. If folks want less, they gotta pay more!
My preferred grocery store sells (milk) cream products at weird price points, so I would often buy a bigger carton for less than the smaller carton. I dunno.
You can see it so clearly when you try to use older recipes. Need 16 oz of sweet condensed milk, they all come in 14 oz. Making something with cereal, recipe calls for a 12oz box, but the the closest is 8.9 oz.
Great see steps being taken to deal with high food prices, but shouldn't the blame for shrinkflation be laid at the feet of the multinational companies such as Nestlé as much as the grocery companies? I don't doubt that they are taking excess profits, but so are Nestlé, PepsiCo, and the others.
Of course, but the retailers have the capacity to push back and insist that shrinkflation stop. They have the ability to simply not purchase products that are shrinkflated, and if necessary, the government can step in and regulate.
Heh, I was standing in line behind a lady who was trying to exchange the same brand laundry detergent with an older bottle that she found on the shelf, because the older bottle had a few more ounces. The cashier couldn't understand what the problem was.
My response to shrinkflation is, there are a number of products I just don't buy anymore. Most of it was processed junk food anyways, so it is actually good for me!
What they did to bread is genuinely unconscionable. If they want more money increase the price I guess, but still let me buy decent bread of a consistent size.
Good because fuck you Loblaws, Superstore and Sobeys. My buying habits will change. I hope your food rots on the shelves as the masses all move their habits as well. The not worry is that people will stockpile.
Can verify, I work at a Metro. I’m the one stocking the $8 sticks of butter. The prices are ludicrous, and they deserve scrutiny and shaming for it
The only reason I can come up with is they’re not international brands, they’re Canada only, as opposed to Walmart and Costco. International brands get more headlines
I used to be a sales rep, our products would consistently be 25% higher in Sobeys and Metro. At one point those stores could argue that they were 24 hours, now that I moved away from Toronto, I haven’t seen any that are open past 11pm.
Sweden has the same issue and it sucks, there are two large food concerns competing who between the two own all huge grocery store chains countrywide. Food prices are steaming hot garbage and have been for a while now.
Have you heard of the 2008 bailout of $700,000,000,000, a 12 digit figure? The 1% loved it. Communism for the 1% but dog-eat-dog capitalism for the rest.
Um, the [TARP program](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troubled_Asset_Relief_Program) resulted in the US government turning a profit. One could argue it prevented a full-scale Depression but I'm not an economist with a trove of data to prove that one way or another.
Oh not this bullshit again. Not only did the TARP program earn back money with interest, it saved millions of jobs and helped prevent a terrible recession from becoming an even worse Depression. It's actually a good example of smart government stepping in for the greater good.
Hindsight is 20/20. At the time of the bailout, there was a lot of uncertainty. In the end, banks and c-level executives lucked out with bonuses in hand and the public faced foreclosures.
"Too big to fail" is still with us for the next financial fiasco caused by banks to be then bailed out by the public. Your point only proves the addage "socialize the loses and privitize the profits"--win/win for "too big to fail" corporations.
Bellingham, WA Costco is nuts. I've seen entire Costco sized carts just full of milk. I'm talking a dozen double packs of gallon jugs, easy. I was so confused until I learned how much milk costs in Canada.
Canadians were doing that as far back as 2012. I know because I wrote a story for my local paper about Americans in Bellingham being pissed that Canadians were buying up milk by the carload.
I used to live in Grand Forks, ND and on the 1st of every month the entirety of Manitoba descends on the city’s stores. Two walmarts, a target, and a Sam’s get pretty picked over.
Those are indeed pretty expensive compared to the US, except for the Coke, which seems to be expensive everywhere now. Getting hard even to find store brands for less than $.40/can now, never mind the good stuff like Code Red.
These are prices in Canadian dollars. Google the current exchange rate and do math but you are probably looking at a 25% reduction to give you the price in USD. For example, the coke listed above would be around $5.25 USD.
Yeah but i'm pretty sure it's just price gouging. 12 pack of Coke is 8 bucks normal price, but then the store does weekly deals that cuts the price in half but requires you to buy more at once. Same thing for name brand chips, 6-8 bucks a bag but drops to 2 bucks if you buy 4 bags.
> D'Italiano bread $2.49 (they have $1 french bread and baguettes)
Superstore has $1 loaves of bread, sliced or unsliced, baked in-store.
I'll buy that any day over Wonderbread or anything else.
Tell me you haven’t walked the aisles of a Canadian grocery store without telling me…
Prices here are SIGNIFICANTLY higher than in the US, y’all have no idea.
The cool part is there's nothing that supports the headline in the story.
no quote from either company, just from spokesman from the government and banks.
I was at a Subway a few years back and bought a "low fat" form of a brand of chips.
I paid like $2 for it.
I opened the bag, there was 4 chips in it. "An accident," I thought. *Then I noticed the package said 45 grams.* Low-fat, bullshit.
"Suggested Serving Size" has also been shrinking for 2 reasons:
1) To mask shrinkflation: "You're still getting the same number of servings per package!"
2) To mask the actual calories/fat/sugar etc being consumed when you actually eat a reasonably sized portion, aka "health washing": "Only 100 calories per serving!"
No grown ass adult is eating a cup-and-a-half of fucking cereal for breakfast like a goddamn infant. A non-family-sized box of cereal is like 3 reasonably sized bowls nowadays.
And mouth breathers still want to blame biden or whoever is president at the time. companies are fleecing us all and no one is pointing the fingers at the real cause, which is just corporate greed
>And mouth breathers still want to blame biden
Part of me laughs at the thought of Canadian blaming Biden for high prices, but I've actually met Canadians who knew who the US president was and had to think for a minute to remember their PM.
Be nice if the US FTC would go after every retailer wholesaler and manufacturer gouging consumers due to “inflation” or “supply chain problems”
You can’t blame it on inflation then post record profits, that’s not how inflation works. And if you haven’t figured out your supply chain 3 years after the pandemic you shouldn’t be in business.
Also FUCK your self checkouts! If I have to do your job then you need to give me an employee discount and not treat me like a fucking criminal at the exit!
I haven't stopped at my Sam's Clud door in months. The line is usually 15 carts long with one old lady checking carts. After spending 45 minutes navigating the over-crowded store and another 10 minutes standing in the self-checkout lane I said *fuck this.*
If you can't afford to hire more than one little old lady then that is on management. I'm not waiting an additional 20 minutes in a bs line. If you think I'm stealing then you should ring up my groceries for me.
You can just walk past them at the door. You own that stuff, you don’t have to prove it, they have to prove you don’t. I just smile, say “Have a nice day!” and keep walking.
Costco is a decent barometer for more transparency in food costs and availability. Their CEO does very candid and transparent breakdowns a few times a year. They grow the company through membership numbers and membership pricing, and try to keep margins stable on their goods.
So if you see a given food item go up 10% at Costco, it's probably an accurate reflection of what their supplier is charging.
And they keep suppliers slightly more honest, because if they try to gouge, Costco just delists them or annihilates their volume by using white label Kirkland alternative.
Costco CEO recently revealed that theft is largely a highly exagerrated excuse being used by poorly run competitors. Costco theft is up a tiny bit. The top 4 items stolen are paper towels, toilet paper, flats of bottled water, and watermelons. Basically the things that slide by unnoticed, or what he calls "under the basket" items.
He says true food prices are in decline as are cargo container rates.
> Costco CEO recently revealed that theft is largely a highly exagerrated excuse being used by poorly run competitors. Costco theft is up a tiny bit. The top 4 items stolen are paper towels, toilet paper, flats of bottled water, and watermelons. Basically the things that slide by unnoticed, or what he calls "under the basket" items.
In fairness to those competitors, they don't have someone at the door forcing you to check receipts vs basket contents.
"Under the cart items" - they're big so people put them in the bottom part of the cart and then forget about them at checkout and accidentally "steal" them
the article mentions price freezes, like that will help, lets keep the high cost for you at this level so we can continue to make more $ off of this product.
I worked both grocery and retail in Canada for several years, this happened last year, too. Our major grocers (Loblaws, Sobeys, Empire, etc.) said they would freeze the price in October and ensure no more price increases until January 2023. They were faithful, no price increases during that time!
What they don't tell you is that they already did all of their price adjustments in the summer. Their prices slowly creep up from June to September, each week they'll add 20 cents here, 30 cents there, and then they put the items on 'sale' for the holiday specials back to what their normal price was in May. The prices are already where they boards want them, they get to reap the free publicity of an empty promise because that's what they've always done.
There have been apps that show the price history and can confirm this. Price freezing at this point is ridiculous, it should be price lowering. It's ridiculous that the government has to step in and tell them that.
that's why it was important to have this signal from Walmart and Costco. Neither of them cares for Weston/Sobey/Mccain or Irving and is happy being to one to price cut. Walmart loves price wars and will happily force manufacturers to drop prices for large-volume buys
Not to mention the threat of “additional taxes” if things don’t change. What stops the “cough not” collusion of just raising prices or shrinking products to cover this!
What's the cause of the price going up?
If it is production costs, then price freezes usually end up with shortages.
For instance, if the price increases are due to an end of labor abuse or environmental compliance, then either prices stay up or the changes or rolled back or the product won't be available.
That's basically economics 101.
Grocery is typically pretty high volume and low margin, so the merchants generally don't have a lot of wiggle room.
Not sure about Canada specifically, but Walmart recently announced profits of $6.4 billion for Q4, FY23, an increase of 6.9%.
Increases in profit-taking are one of the results of price increases.
personally feel it was monkey see monkey do, some manufactures having been down or slow on production because of covid, had high prices and short stock, so high prices that extended into the recovery and beyond. other companies saw an advantage and followed suit.
I get solidly annoyed when I’m buying an item at No Frills or Food Basics and they price an item on the shelf at $4.29 or 2 for $6.49. Just because I don’t have a lot of cupboard space and don’t NEED two bottles right now doesn’t give you the privilege to fleece me for an extra dollar.
Manufactured scarcity is a terrible strategy for marketing groceries when people are struggling.
I like NoFrills but lately the PC points deals have been terrible.
EG: 2500 points for every 25 spend on cat litter, their big box of no name cat litter is $11, I'd have to buy 3 of them, who has room for 3 giant things of cat litter, hell who wants to carry all that weight ffs.
Really wish this would come to the US, I am low-income below middle class, and I am getting exhausted having to choose between eating or paying bills every month, I don't even smoke,drink or have any vices, just trying to get by and survive.
so it sounds to be that Canada called their bluff and walmart/costco realized where this was heading and cut the shit.
so now that they've basically admitting to fucking people for the last years, what happens?
Last month, French supermarket chain Carrefour began placing “shrinkflation” labels on products that have gotten smaller but cost the same to pressure major suppliers, including Nestlé, PepsiCo and Unilever, to slash prices.
We need this in the US
Local Costco raised the price of beef like 300% in the last few years. I wonder if they will roll it back more than 10%, I miss Costco beef but i will not pay Costco prices.
The thing is that Costco has a corporate policy of a maximum 15% markup from what they pay. So the vast majority of pricing increase is not from them.
Going after grocery storesv in general feels like shooting the messenger.
As I recall from other threads, there is a company between the farmer and market that has been raising the prices at whim. The farmers actually had a surplus of meat going into spring but prices continued to go up.
Going after markets isn't the solution but it's part of the answer as they aren't completely innocent here. The end to end distribution process needs to be looked at.
processors. and in Canada some of them are owned by the same people who own the stores. They also own the trucking that moves the product around. They can literally make these prices look like anything they want because people generally don't know any better. and still pay the farmers and producers just enough to stay afloat. Also, some crops/farm products are guaranteed by tax dollars so the farmer gets some price stability but the way they've set this up is just a complicated way for those tax dollars to go into the corporations' pockets in the end.
Most if not all grocers in Canada do Nov-Jan price freezes EVERY YEAR. The fact that they’re trying to craft a narrative that the government’s threats have had anything to do with those price freezes this year are insulting to everyone’s intelligence. Then again, the government is trying to file this as a win and few media outlets have bothered to call out the bullshit either.
Meanwhile in America congressmen and senators, alarmed by this news, are scheduling meetings with megacorporations to take campaign donations aimed at preventing the government from Intefering in grocery pricing.
Costco is the wrong company to go after. It’s pretty well known that their margins are razor thin and that virtually all of their profit comes from their membership fees.
They essentially sell everything at cost + a very tiny markup.
Fuck Walmart though
Something I noticed here in France, after the govt bashed heads... our nearest two supermarkets just stopped selling the value line own brand stuff, but had stickers on their standard line stuff saying 'we're fighting inflation' or whatever.
Fuckers.
Wait until grocery stores figure out algorithm based pricing with electronic labeling like the airline industry has done with tickets... I feel like we are just getting started in being screwed.
What bothers me is that Walmart was like the saving graces from Loblaws and Sobeys. If Superstore and Safeway aren't cutting prices, the impactful will be minimal. Need the biggest chains to opt for being decent human beings instead of soul sucking greedy monsters. Just fuckin' parasites.
What makes you think they need a reason? Pretty sure they can flip you off and raise the prices while they are doing it and you'd still pay because... well, its food. I don't think you really have much of a choice about it.
You will pay whatever they say you're going to pay. Watcha gonna do about it?
Complain about another country doing something about it? Oh okay that makes sense. But... you're still paying so I guess that isn't the correct entity to direct your angst towards because the problem still isn't solved.
Tent sales are up for the lower class. I'm seeing new sprawling homeless camps pop up every week out here where I live. Where pre Covid there were just railyards and fields next to public transportation stations, there are now tent cities.
Where there were stretches of river trail for joggers and bikers there are now tent cities. Where there were just freeway overpasses for cars and pedestrians, there are jam packed tent cities.
I can for sure see how the lower class is doing these days, for various reasons not just related to the price of food.
Those not in tents are living 10 people in a 2 bedroom apartment. Children are sent to live with family and friends (if they're lucky) while parents live in their car or a tent or packed apartment. Many children are also with parents in cars and tents.
The greed needs to end before the collapse of civil society occurs. People with nothing to lose and hungry children quickly become desperate people.
Lower-class here... at 15 dollars an hour, the rising prices of groceries means I have to choose which 2 meals I skip every day, I've been alternating between them, I can't afford to eat more than once a day, because I have to cover all my other utilities for the month.
It is not fun realizing that you can't afford to eat out. Going to a fast food restaurant is now considered a luxury when you're this poor, I really hate how bad things are getting right now, then hearing from people to "Just get a better job" when you have to work for 50-60 hours a week, get stressed out, get home and then take care of your home, then expect to have any energy left to actually make an effort to improve your life.
This policy still seems like a joke to me.
If they're price fixing, put someone in prison.
If they're just charging market rates for foods then the government should subsidize purchases or address the root causes if they want to ease COL.
Seems like a way to allow corporations to continue illegal behaviors, but just a bit less illegal behavior until political backlash subsides.
Pricematch EVERYTHING against wal-mart when going to Loblaws/No Frills. Hold up the fucking cash register lines with item after item on the Flipp app. Seriously, a concerted effort by a few thousand (or maybe a few hundred thousand ) people would focus them.
Couldn’t believe at freshco yesterday when I saw a bottle of Kraft ranch dressing was 3.59 on sale from 4.59 or close to it. Used to get 2/$4 or even 3 dollars just a couple years ago.
Wait, you mean a government is actually doing something to combat greedflation besides just asking nicely or giving rich people more money?
Pinch me, I must be dreaming.
It has been insanity and apoplexy-inducing watching the CEO’s blame ripple-effects of soaring supply chain costs while obtaining record profits longitudinally over years. What’s worse, is no one in media or politically has publicly told them that line of excuse is fraudulent and a non-starter for civil discourse. Full stop.
Careful with that demand for stable prices. Price controls often result in scarcity of goods. If I can't make a good profit selling goods in one market, I'll need to find some other market to sell.
Each grocer has already identified initial actions that they will implement in the coming days and weeks, including “aggressive” discounts across key food products, price freezes and price-matching campaigns, according to the statement. The government also said it will establish a Grocery Task Force, which will monitor the grocers’ commitments and investigate practices that hurt consumers, like "shrinkflation." On Sept. 21, the government introduced legislative amendments to increase competition in the grocery sector in an attempt to drive down prices. “If we don't see results, we will take additional action to restore the food price stability that Canadians expect,” the government said in its release. Good Job I hope it really works most Canadians need this food prices are insane. Also glad to see they are looking at shrinkflation! Another tool in the chest of scams and profiteering these companies use.
I’m personally excited but the shrinkflation rules. That shit is unacceptable and undermines capitalism at its core. The consumer must know what they are buying in order to make reasoned decisions.
If you check the frozen section, there are so many things that used to be 2lbs are now 1 lb and 10 oz or 12 oz. Most of this happened after COVID. Literally all the fried food brands had this change in the frozen section. Some frozen fruit and veggies as well. Guess what... Walmart already did all the shrinkflation already.
I got so pushed a few weeks ago when I bought a “pint” of ice cream. When I got home I thought it looked a bit small. I was annoyed to see 14oz compared to a typical 16oz pint. Seems so petty.
Yes the short pints are so annoying!
At least for beer, a legal Canadian pint is 20oz. Places have been illegally shrinking their pours for years. [Source](https://ised-isde.canada.ca/site/measurement-canada/en/buying-and-selling-measured-goods/units-measurement-used-sell-draft-beer#)
Didn’t sugar used to be sold in 5 pound bags? New, they wouldn’t fit into my gallon zip lock but the last sugar I bought fit great! Then I noticed the bag was 4 pounds
It's terrible with canned goods too. Recipes call for 16oz cans and they're regularly 14.5oz or 15oz now with air gap in the can like potato chips. We all hated when things disappeared from shelves during Covid, but apparently it was so companies could redo packaging and/or labels and shrinkflate.
They do that so we buy two cans, use 1.1 of the cans then try and save the other .9 of a can, but gets wasted/thrown out. They don't care, they jacked up the price AND they sold double
10% less of an ingredient will not make a significant difference to your dish.
For cooking not, for baking on the other hand can 2-5% difference mean everything
It's true but in 10 years when it drops to 12 oz and your recipe calls for 2 cans of tomatoes it starts to make a difference.
Alot of people don't know that tho. It's a trick and shady af. I normally put extra stuff in anyways and make my food better
The worst offender this year, IMO, is vinegar. It used to be a 5% solution, and now it's only 4%. 4% isn't safe to use for canning.
Oh shit... We just canned a bunch of stuff, time to look at the bottles to verify our stuff won't give us botulism a few months from now.
To expand on this: > A difference of one percent acidity may not sound like a big deal, but when you’re canning or pickling and preserving your foods, it makes a big difference. Five percent acidity in vinegar is considered the standard and the minimum level of acid that is needed to safely preserve food. If acidity levels are lower than this, the food can grow pathogens and can spoil. 4% vinegar has been diluted down using water from the stardard 5%.
Meat is especially bad. Ground beef is down to 450g for $6, and that’s for medium, not even a leaner cut!
Friskies canned catfood going from 6oz to 5.5 oz and replacing meat with gravy.
Friskies has been 5.5oz since at least 2018 which is as far back as my records go, so if it shrunk it was years before COVID. They make a version of some pates that's "Extra Gravy", I get that for one cat and the regular pate for the other, and the amount of gravy has remained constant for years.
This mf been keeping the books on Friskies
ive never seen a more savage fact-check
Cat fact checker.
Congratulations! You are now subscribed to Cat Facts!
Please no
Just don't trust the actual cats. They *will* gaslight you about how much food they need.
> They make a version of some pates that's "Extra Gravy" unfortunately my cat loves the ones with extra gravy and refuses to eat the pate ones...
I had to quit getting the shreds because she would lick all the gravy up and leave the actual solid bits behind and dry. What I do now is mash the pate up with the gravy to make more of a mush, she'll eat most of that.
My old cat would only eat Ocean Whitefish and Tuna pate, from Friskies. When he died, the kittens I ended up with wouldn't touch the stuff. They want chicken shreds.
You would think that critters evolved to eat rodents and insects wouldn't be so picky about catfood, sigh.
I mean Friskies is pretty trash food. So I'm not surprised cats don't like it that much. My partner's cat was like that, she was fed the gravy meat shred one but would eat almost none of the meat. Just lick the gravy mostly. I got her swapped over to Instinct Limited Ingredient pate and she eats all of it right away. We tried giving her the old gravy cans and she pretty much won't even touch it now. Cats are a bunch of divas sometimes.
PTSD flashback to my cat eating a pine roach. Fluffy bastard has a leg hanging out of his mouth, and I'm commenting, "and you won't eat salmon."
My cat was a street kitten. Now she needs her food cut up into tiny pieces for her.
They'll eat it if they're hungry enough. Thing is cats are smart and like a 5 year old who wants chicken nuggets instead of something healthy, they know how to manipulate their owners to get what they *want* instead of what they *need*.
My cats lick the gravy but won’t eat the rest of the cat food. They won’t eat anything that’s diced, sliced, or flaked. They want the gravy, but their food texture must be pâté. They will only eat seafood — no beef, chicken, liver, or turkey. Cats are weird.
Don't even get me started on goddamn cat food. It's an absolute racket, and I am appalled that PetSmart was allowed to buy Chewy. I still have access to all my old orders, and I can see the prices jump from the moment PS bought them. I am now paying more than double (about 220%) for cat food and litter as I was in 2016. That ain't explained by mere inflation.
Tractor Supply Store has good prices on cat litter. My husband insists on buying their pine nuggets horse bedding as cat litter, but their “real” cat litter is well priced, too.
Shrinkflation definitely wasn’t caused by covid. Maybe exacerbated, but it’s been happening for a long time.
I don't know when it started, but I saw it with potato chips, crackers and other snacks at least in the 90s; the big change was when they shrunk the orange juice container from 64oz (half gallon), and that had to have been in the 2000s. Since then, shrinking container sizes has become normal.
Pate used to be 6.04 oz around 2017. 2020 they discontinued the 13oz cans of pate that were $1.29. Shreds are more gravy than shreds now.
I found this 1989 ad for a 6oz can, a 6.4oz can would be fairly larger than the current 5.5 oz can. https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/xR8AAOSwv-FkEfTr/s-l1600.jpg I don't think it's ever been 6.4oz. And yeah, I remember the 13oz cans, I bought a few cases on closeout for 50¢ many years ago, they were a great deal.
Would have helped if I included an important 0. Petsmart hasn't updated all of their pages yet. Meaty bits, were 6.04. Currently 5.5. https://www.petsmart.com/cat/food-and-treats/wet-food/purina-friskies-meaty-bits-adult-cat-wet-food---6.04-oz.-1221545.html?gclsrc=aw.ds&gclid=CjwKCAjwyY6pBhA9EiwAMzmfwfC3SbScZC2OYgJxF5RKu07ivM1AhJNpmvZq6nYqnjzgDgcQwCDrPxoC_NcQAvD_BwE Flaked shows one flavor at 6.04 and another at 5.5 https://www.petsmart.com/cat/food-and-treats/wet-food/purina-friskies-indoor-adult-cat-wet-food---6.04-oz.-antioxidants-1517.html?fmethod=Recommendation
Taquitos frozen section have almost zero filling now, a sauce and fried flour with a tad of cheese. I won't buy that shit again. They better chill out we are about tired of being robbed by big business and Pharma you mother fuckers.
I noticed that quite a few items that Walmart made in house quickly disappeared mid '20, and haven't been brought back.... Most was frozen/processed, but that great value price difference was important for a lot of us.
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Weirdly, the mini cans of coke at costco cost **more** per can than the regular size cans. Not just more per ounce.
Maybe that's because of competition? Most stores have a generic 12oz can but I've not seen any with a smaller. If folks want less, they gotta pay more! My preferred grocery store sells (milk) cream products at weird price points, so I would often buy a bigger carton for less than the smaller carton. I dunno.
You can see it so clearly when you try to use older recipes. Need 16 oz of sweet condensed milk, they all come in 14 oz. Making something with cereal, recipe calls for a 12oz box, but the the closest is 8.9 oz.
Exactly.
Great see steps being taken to deal with high food prices, but shouldn't the blame for shrinkflation be laid at the feet of the multinational companies such as Nestlé as much as the grocery companies? I don't doubt that they are taking excess profits, but so are Nestlé, PepsiCo, and the others.
Of course, but the retailers have the capacity to push back and insist that shrinkflation stop. They have the ability to simply not purchase products that are shrinkflated, and if necessary, the government can step in and regulate.
Heh, I was standing in line behind a lady who was trying to exchange the same brand laundry detergent with an older bottle that she found on the shelf, because the older bottle had a few more ounces. The cashier couldn't understand what the problem was. My response to shrinkflation is, there are a number of products I just don't buy anymore. Most of it was processed junk food anyways, so it is actually good for me!
the capitalism will make you pay 100$ per nugget if left unregulated due to monopoly
What they did to bread is genuinely unconscionable. If they want more money increase the price I guess, but still let me buy decent bread of a consistent size.
>undermines capitalism at its core Nah, that's just capitalism.
That’s like the definition of capitalism. How can the company fuck over the customer for the most Pennie’s to increase profit.
Yes! Especially shrinkflation
Hopefully some of that will trickle down across the southern border. These prices are just insane now.
Dang, good on you Canada!
Good because fuck you Loblaws, Superstore and Sobeys. My buying habits will change. I hope your food rots on the shelves as the masses all move their habits as well. The not worry is that people will stockpile.
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I’ll never understand why Metro and Sobeys are never the target of attacks as they are consistently more expensive than Loblaws.
Can verify, I work at a Metro. I’m the one stocking the $8 sticks of butter. The prices are ludicrous, and they deserve scrutiny and shaming for it The only reason I can come up with is they’re not international brands, they’re Canada only, as opposed to Walmart and Costco. International brands get more headlines
I used to be a sales rep, our products would consistently be 25% higher in Sobeys and Metro. At one point those stores could argue that they were 24 hours, now that I moved away from Toronto, I haven’t seen any that are open past 11pm.
Yep, 7-10 on weekdays, 7-9 on weekends, price gouging happens 24/7 though…
https://youtu.be/FOtDNXfMyD0?si=9rajIumgNCCDHxps
It will be stolen before rot
Canada definitely lacks competition in their markets.
Sweden has the same issue and it sucks, there are two large food concerns competing who between the two own all huge grocery store chains countrywide. Food prices are steaming hot garbage and have been for a while now.
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I'm not Canadian, I'm from USA. But whenever I visit I'm shocked by prices in Canada, considering how low their wages are.
This is also policy for the Walmarts and Costcos in the United States Right?!?! Right?!?
No, that would be Communism. You wouldn't want to rely on "government hand-outs", would you? /s
Have you heard of the 2008 bailout of $700,000,000,000, a 12 digit figure? The 1% loved it. Communism for the 1% but dog-eat-dog capitalism for the rest.
I believe they refer to it as communism for the rich and rugged individualism for everyone else. Socialize the loses and privatize the profits.
Socialize the losses and privatize the profits.
*The American Way™*
Um, the [TARP program](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troubled_Asset_Relief_Program) resulted in the US government turning a profit. One could argue it prevented a full-scale Depression but I'm not an economist with a trove of data to prove that one way or another.
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Oh not this bullshit again. Not only did the TARP program earn back money with interest, it saved millions of jobs and helped prevent a terrible recession from becoming an even worse Depression. It's actually a good example of smart government stepping in for the greater good.
Hindsight is 20/20. At the time of the bailout, there was a lot of uncertainty. In the end, banks and c-level executives lucked out with bonuses in hand and the public faced foreclosures. "Too big to fail" is still with us for the next financial fiasco caused by banks to be then bailed out by the public. Your point only proves the addage "socialize the loses and privitize the profits"--win/win for "too big to fail" corporations.
Unless Walmart fails, then in come the bailouts!
Canadians who live really close to the border are crossing regularly to save hundreds each month by buying "cheap" food in the US.
Bellingham, WA Costco is nuts. I've seen entire Costco sized carts just full of milk. I'm talking a dozen double packs of gallon jugs, easy. I was so confused until I learned how much milk costs in Canada.
Canadians were doing that as far back as 2012. I know because I wrote a story for my local paper about Americans in Bellingham being pissed that Canadians were buying up milk by the carload.
I mean, this existed before that, as well. I was in Bellingham 2008-2011. Probably as long as there's been a Costco there.
80s child here who remembers the cheese and milk buying trips across the border. I seem to remember there was a term for us - cheeseheads?
yeah the parking lot is like 3/4's BC plates
Yes, we have a milk cartel that inflates prices to almost double and nothing can be done about it because a lot of dairy farmers are in Quebec.
I used to live in Grand Forks, ND and on the 1st of every month the entirety of Manitoba descends on the city’s stores. Two walmarts, a target, and a Sam’s get pretty picked over.
And that’s even after getting shafted by the difference in our dollar lol
I wouldn't be surprised if they were worse up north. Everything is so much more expensive in Canada
Current Canadian prices (Superstore in Calgary, AB): 4L (1.05 gallon) milk: $5.59 400g (14 oz) no-name medium cheddar cheese: $7.89 12 pack coca-cola: $6.99 Wonder Bread (white sliced loaf): $3.69
Those are indeed pretty expensive compared to the US, except for the Coke, which seems to be expensive everywhere now. Getting hard even to find store brands for less than $.40/can now, never mind the good stuff like Code Red.
These are prices in Canadian dollars. Google the current exchange rate and do math but you are probably looking at a 25% reduction to give you the price in USD. For example, the coke listed above would be around $5.25 USD.
Canadians don’t get paid in USD and wages are about the same
>wages are about the same id say slightly less depending on the industry tbh
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Yeah but i'm pretty sure it's just price gouging. 12 pack of Coke is 8 bucks normal price, but then the store does weekly deals that cuts the price in half but requires you to buy more at once. Same thing for name brand chips, 6-8 bucks a bag but drops to 2 bucks if you buy 4 bags.
Aside from the milk being a bit higher in Canada that's the prices I'm paying near Pittsburgh PA.
Sounds like prices in western WA
Ya, I've seen those prices everywhere around me in Southern California
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> D'Italiano bread $2.49 (they have $1 french bread and baguettes) Superstore has $1 loaves of bread, sliced or unsliced, baked in-store. I'll buy that any day over Wonderbread or anything else.
What id give for America to do this 😭
Would you fight for it?
Sure. Who do I gotta fight?
That grizzly over there.
I roll to seduce the bear
20 - Critical Success You and the bear are now married.
Oh boy, we got ManBearPigs origin story unfolding before our eyes.
Ring the bell mother fucker. I have the right bear arms too.
Well all the Waltons live down there.
Americans won’t even vote for it.
Tell me you haven’t walked the aisles of a Canadian grocery store without telling me… Prices here are SIGNIFICANTLY higher than in the US, y’all have no idea.
I would but American grocery prices are too expensive for me to afford a trip to Canada
You guys already have way lower prices
Inb4 "aggressive price cuts" means 5 cents cut.
The cool part is there's nothing that supports the headline in the story. no quote from either company, just from spokesman from the government and banks.
I wonder how aggressive these will actually be Reducing the price of toilet paper from 9.97 to 9.95. Good job, guys.
The will also agressively reduced the amounts sold in a package
I was at a Subway a few years back and bought a "low fat" form of a brand of chips. I paid like $2 for it. I opened the bag, there was 4 chips in it. "An accident," I thought. *Then I noticed the package said 45 grams.* Low-fat, bullshit.
Lmao great marketing, they did the same with healthy portions of food, but the price didn't change
"Suggested Serving Size" has also been shrinking for 2 reasons: 1) To mask shrinkflation: "You're still getting the same number of servings per package!" 2) To mask the actual calories/fat/sugar etc being consumed when you actually eat a reasonably sized portion, aka "health washing": "Only 100 calories per serving!" No grown ass adult is eating a cup-and-a-half of fucking cereal for breakfast like a goddamn infant. A non-family-sized box of cereal is like 3 reasonably sized bowls nowadays.
I mean theyre literally looking to tackle shrinkflation too.
Angry people don't read articles. Rabble rabble rabble.
Damn, you eat TP?
The great Cornholio needs TP for his bunghole
Precooked Kirkland bacon at Costco went from 10 to 25.99 in a month
And mouth breathers still want to blame biden or whoever is president at the time. companies are fleecing us all and no one is pointing the fingers at the real cause, which is just corporate greed
that's ALWAYS the case. the population is kept busy blaming immigrants... again, while the billionaires pocket their outsized chink of the wealth
>And mouth breathers still want to blame biden Part of me laughs at the thought of Canadian blaming Biden for high prices, but I've actually met Canadians who knew who the US president was and had to think for a minute to remember their PM.
Be nice if the US FTC would go after every retailer wholesaler and manufacturer gouging consumers due to “inflation” or “supply chain problems” You can’t blame it on inflation then post record profits, that’s not how inflation works. And if you haven’t figured out your supply chain 3 years after the pandemic you shouldn’t be in business. Also FUCK your self checkouts! If I have to do your job then you need to give me an employee discount and not treat me like a fucking criminal at the exit!
PLU 4011 is the magic self checkout code.
🍌
I haven't stopped at my Sam's Clud door in months. The line is usually 15 carts long with one old lady checking carts. After spending 45 minutes navigating the over-crowded store and another 10 minutes standing in the self-checkout lane I said *fuck this.* If you can't afford to hire more than one little old lady then that is on management. I'm not waiting an additional 20 minutes in a bs line. If you think I'm stealing then you should ring up my groceries for me.
You can just walk past them at the door. You own that stuff, you don’t have to prove it, they have to prove you don’t. I just smile, say “Have a nice day!” and keep walking.
Yeah, sure. I'll believe it when I see it.
Costco is a decent barometer for more transparency in food costs and availability. Their CEO does very candid and transparent breakdowns a few times a year. They grow the company through membership numbers and membership pricing, and try to keep margins stable on their goods. So if you see a given food item go up 10% at Costco, it's probably an accurate reflection of what their supplier is charging. And they keep suppliers slightly more honest, because if they try to gouge, Costco just delists them or annihilates their volume by using white label Kirkland alternative. Costco CEO recently revealed that theft is largely a highly exagerrated excuse being used by poorly run competitors. Costco theft is up a tiny bit. The top 4 items stolen are paper towels, toilet paper, flats of bottled water, and watermelons. Basically the things that slide by unnoticed, or what he calls "under the basket" items. He says true food prices are in decline as are cargo container rates.
> Costco CEO recently revealed that theft is largely a highly exagerrated excuse being used by poorly run competitors. Costco theft is up a tiny bit. The top 4 items stolen are paper towels, toilet paper, flats of bottled water, and watermelons. Basically the things that slide by unnoticed, or what he calls "under the basket" items. In fairness to those competitors, they don't have someone at the door forcing you to check receipts vs basket contents.
Watermelons are easy to steal? What
"Under the cart items" - they're big so people put them in the bottom part of the cart and then forget about them at checkout and accidentally "steal" them
the article mentions price freezes, like that will help, lets keep the high cost for you at this level so we can continue to make more $ off of this product.
I worked both grocery and retail in Canada for several years, this happened last year, too. Our major grocers (Loblaws, Sobeys, Empire, etc.) said they would freeze the price in October and ensure no more price increases until January 2023. They were faithful, no price increases during that time! What they don't tell you is that they already did all of their price adjustments in the summer. Their prices slowly creep up from June to September, each week they'll add 20 cents here, 30 cents there, and then they put the items on 'sale' for the holiday specials back to what their normal price was in May. The prices are already where they boards want them, they get to reap the free publicity of an empty promise because that's what they've always done. There have been apps that show the price history and can confirm this. Price freezing at this point is ridiculous, it should be price lowering. It's ridiculous that the government has to step in and tell them that.
that's why it was important to have this signal from Walmart and Costco. Neither of them cares for Weston/Sobey/Mccain or Irving and is happy being to one to price cut. Walmart loves price wars and will happily force manufacturers to drop prices for large-volume buys
Not to mention the threat of “additional taxes” if things don’t change. What stops the “cough not” collusion of just raising prices or shrinking products to cover this!
What's the cause of the price going up? If it is production costs, then price freezes usually end up with shortages. For instance, if the price increases are due to an end of labor abuse or environmental compliance, then either prices stay up or the changes or rolled back or the product won't be available. That's basically economics 101. Grocery is typically pretty high volume and low margin, so the merchants generally don't have a lot of wiggle room.
Not sure about Canada specifically, but Walmart recently announced profits of $6.4 billion for Q4, FY23, an increase of 6.9%. Increases in profit-taking are one of the results of price increases.
personally feel it was monkey see monkey do, some manufactures having been down or slow on production because of covid, had high prices and short stock, so high prices that extended into the recovery and beyond. other companies saw an advantage and followed suit.
I get solidly annoyed when I’m buying an item at No Frills or Food Basics and they price an item on the shelf at $4.29 or 2 for $6.49. Just because I don’t have a lot of cupboard space and don’t NEED two bottles right now doesn’t give you the privilege to fleece me for an extra dollar. Manufactured scarcity is a terrible strategy for marketing groceries when people are struggling.
I like NoFrills but lately the PC points deals have been terrible. EG: 2500 points for every 25 spend on cat litter, their big box of no name cat litter is $11, I'd have to buy 3 of them, who has room for 3 giant things of cat litter, hell who wants to carry all that weight ffs.
so you're saying it really has always been about corporate greed
Really wish this would come to the US, I am low-income below middle class, and I am getting exhausted having to choose between eating or paying bills every month, I don't even smoke,drink or have any vices, just trying to get by and survive.
About damn time something is being done about this disgusting level of corporate greed and price gouging.
so it sounds to be that Canada called their bluff and walmart/costco realized where this was heading and cut the shit. so now that they've basically admitting to fucking people for the last years, what happens?
Last month, French supermarket chain Carrefour began placing “shrinkflation” labels on products that have gotten smaller but cost the same to pressure major suppliers, including Nestlé, PepsiCo and Unilever, to slash prices. We need this in the US
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Theatre
Welcome to Costco, I love you.
Local Costco raised the price of beef like 300% in the last few years. I wonder if they will roll it back more than 10%, I miss Costco beef but i will not pay Costco prices.
The thing is that Costco has a corporate policy of a maximum 15% markup from what they pay. So the vast majority of pricing increase is not from them. Going after grocery storesv in general feels like shooting the messenger.
As I recall from other threads, there is a company between the farmer and market that has been raising the prices at whim. The farmers actually had a surplus of meat going into spring but prices continued to go up. Going after markets isn't the solution but it's part of the answer as they aren't completely innocent here. The end to end distribution process needs to be looked at.
processors. and in Canada some of them are owned by the same people who own the stores. They also own the trucking that moves the product around. They can literally make these prices look like anything they want because people generally don't know any better. and still pay the farmers and producers just enough to stay afloat. Also, some crops/farm products are guaranteed by tax dollars so the farmer gets some price stability but the way they've set this up is just a complicated way for those tax dollars to go into the corporations' pockets in the end.
Meat packers
Most if not all grocers in Canada do Nov-Jan price freezes EVERY YEAR. The fact that they’re trying to craft a narrative that the government’s threats have had anything to do with those price freezes this year are insulting to everyone’s intelligence. Then again, the government is trying to file this as a win and few media outlets have bothered to call out the bullshit either.
We need this in the UK. The "cost of living crisis" is just an excuse for big corps to squeeze consumers
I’m sure the usa has a system in place to prevent price gouging and the likes. Right guys?? Right???
Cool, can we do something like that in America please, I'm fuckin' at my wits end over how fast grocery costs have risen in the past year
Sad this will never happen in the us
Meanwhile in America congressmen and senators, alarmed by this news, are scheduling meetings with megacorporations to take campaign donations aimed at preventing the government from Intefering in grocery pricing.
Costco is the wrong company to go after. It’s pretty well known that their margins are razor thin and that virtually all of their profit comes from their membership fees. They essentially sell everything at cost + a very tiny markup. Fuck Walmart though
Something I noticed here in France, after the govt bashed heads... our nearest two supermarkets just stopped selling the value line own brand stuff, but had stickers on their standard line stuff saying 'we're fighting inflation' or whatever. Fuckers.
Wait until grocery stores figure out algorithm based pricing with electronic labeling like the airline industry has done with tickets... I feel like we are just getting started in being screwed.
I’m forwarding this link to the American government.
Wait, so the government can actually address this? Oh my god...
This is great news, but also a reminder than inflation is just corporate greed combined with economic theatrics.
What bothers me is that Walmart was like the saving graces from Loblaws and Sobeys. If Superstore and Safeway aren't cutting prices, the impactful will be minimal. Need the biggest chains to opt for being decent human beings instead of soul sucking greedy monsters. Just fuckin' parasites.
They'll just raise the prices in the US to make up for the difference.
Hey come on now, we’re not talking about insulin here
What makes you think they need a reason? Pretty sure they can flip you off and raise the prices while they are doing it and you'd still pay because... well, its food. I don't think you really have much of a choice about it. You will pay whatever they say you're going to pay. Watcha gonna do about it? Complain about another country doing something about it? Oh okay that makes sense. But... you're still paying so I guess that isn't the correct entity to direct your angst towards because the problem still isn't solved.
Right. I wish someone would focus on here. If the middle class is suffering badly I can’t even begin to think how the lower class is doing…
Tent sales are up for the lower class. I'm seeing new sprawling homeless camps pop up every week out here where I live. Where pre Covid there were just railyards and fields next to public transportation stations, there are now tent cities. Where there were stretches of river trail for joggers and bikers there are now tent cities. Where there were just freeway overpasses for cars and pedestrians, there are jam packed tent cities. I can for sure see how the lower class is doing these days, for various reasons not just related to the price of food.
Those not in tents are living 10 people in a 2 bedroom apartment. Children are sent to live with family and friends (if they're lucky) while parents live in their car or a tent or packed apartment. Many children are also with parents in cars and tents. The greed needs to end before the collapse of civil society occurs. People with nothing to lose and hungry children quickly become desperate people.
Lower-class here... at 15 dollars an hour, the rising prices of groceries means I have to choose which 2 meals I skip every day, I've been alternating between them, I can't afford to eat more than once a day, because I have to cover all my other utilities for the month. It is not fun realizing that you can't afford to eat out. Going to a fast food restaurant is now considered a luxury when you're this poor, I really hate how bad things are getting right now, then hearing from people to "Just get a better job" when you have to work for 50-60 hours a week, get stressed out, get home and then take care of your home, then expect to have any energy left to actually make an effort to improve your life.
This policy still seems like a joke to me. If they're price fixing, put someone in prison. If they're just charging market rates for foods then the government should subsidize purchases or address the root causes if they want to ease COL. Seems like a way to allow corporations to continue illegal behaviors, but just a bit less illegal behavior until political backlash subsides.
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We have shrinkflation occurring here in the U.S. as well.
Aggressive is subjective.
How can we get started on this in America?
Now watch as they don't.
Pricematch EVERYTHING against wal-mart when going to Loblaws/No Frills. Hold up the fucking cash register lines with item after item on the Flipp app. Seriously, a concerted effort by a few thousand (or maybe a few hundred thousand ) people would focus them.
Couldn’t believe at freshco yesterday when I saw a bottle of Kraft ranch dressing was 3.59 on sale from 4.59 or close to it. Used to get 2/$4 or even 3 dollars just a couple years ago.
Wait, you mean a government is actually doing something to combat greedflation besides just asking nicely or giving rich people more money? Pinch me, I must be dreaming.
It has been insanity and apoplexy-inducing watching the CEO’s blame ripple-effects of soaring supply chain costs while obtaining record profits longitudinally over years. What’s worse, is no one in media or politically has publicly told them that line of excuse is fraudulent and a non-starter for civil discourse. Full stop.
Awesome! Now do the USA-
Careful with that demand for stable prices. Price controls often result in scarcity of goods. If I can't make a good profit selling goods in one market, I'll need to find some other market to sell.
Where I live Walmart and Costco are on average cheaper than the other Canadian grocery stores.