My goodness, the things we tend to forget when it comes to grocery scandals.
It seems Canada Bread, owned by the powerful McCain Family, has pleaded guilty in a plea agreement to colluding with Weston Foods, owned by the even more powerful Weston family, in an effort to fix prices for fresh bread and bakery products found on the shelves of every grocer in Canada. The price-fixing took place back in 2007 and again in 2011, and the plea agreement was the culmination of a seven-year investigation by Canada’s Competition Bureau
Part of the agreement will have Canada Bread paying a $50 million dollar fine.
Weston foods was able to escape punishment when Loblaws admitted being part of the scheme back in 2017 and received immunity from prosecution, presumably for assisting in the investigation against rival Canada Bread. No honour among grocery thieves, I guess. For its part, Loblaws offered $25 gift cards to customers as a form of compensation. With that as compensation, Loblaws customers can now afford to buy bread, maybe even a couple of loaves.
Search warrants were also executed for other grocers not part of the Loblaws family, like Metro, Empire Foods, Sobey’s, and Walmart, but no evidence of wrong-doing was found. Which to me means that these guys either didn’t think of it on their own or they just managed to not get caught. A cynical viewpoint, perhaps, but all of these entities price-gouge on a daily basis anyway. Maybe they’re just not as greedy as the McCains or Westons.
It’s a little bit of justice for applied to grocery companies and does a bit of a good job of placing grocers on the national stage with egg on their face. It’s a good look, although with the price of eggs, it’s an expensive look.
So, chalk one up for the good guys. No more price fixing on hot dog and hamburger buns and a loaf of bread. We’re still being price-gouged, but the difference is they do that in plain sight with nothing underhanded. I suppose it makes a difference.
NEWSMAGRENFREW 