Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - November 5, 1966, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free november 1966 retailer discuss prices in the continuing dispute Over food the butt of most of housewives criticism is the supermarket they say he charges too much for what he is it True to find free press staff writer Wade Rowland arranged an interview Between Gail Leader of the cites pro test and John general manager of the Coop supermarkets in Pearse asked the ques and Maartense answered q spokesmen for some of the Chain stores claim continually that trading Stamps dont Cost anything dont add to the Cost of food in the a Stamps do Cost of it is generally agreed through out the retail Industry that Stamps add two per cent to an official from one Chain store told the Senate commons committee on rising food costs that Hie Cost of Stamps is covered if they bring about an increase in vol ume of 12 to 15 per cent but that same Chain had Only increased its sales by five per cent since the Stamps were so it costs and this has to be recovered from the theres no doubt about the con Sumer pays for for for nobody giving any tiling q Safeway profit in the United states is per but their profit in Canada is Well Over this Safeway claims this is solely because of a larger volume of sales in the i wonder if the reason is or if it is that canadians Are More Likely to be suckers in stores a assuming that Safeway does make More profit in Canada than i tin United the reason May be that there is less Competition Here fewer companies control the food in i dont say that Means Price but there is less Competition in the same it could be that Here Safeway owns its own food processing plants which would actually provide More profit than the retail one of the big chains testifying before the Senate commons committee was quoted As for that they were going to put More future investment into the processing of foods because there Are More profits to be made at the manufacturing end than in so any big chains who move into processing of or any other consumer can make profits on three Levels the processing the wholesale level and the retail q we were speaking of compete it has been said that six men control virtually the whole Canadian food and that one Chain owns or controls 28 per cent of the a i have and Bear in mind that in we considered that if you owned 15 per cent of tile retail you were big enough to have a controlling influence on prices in the with 15 per you can control q Dominion stores and Stein bergs have acknowledged at the Senate commons committee hearings that some of their privately labelled products Are turned out by the same processors who Supply National name How can there be such a difference in the Price if they Are turned out by the same people a the difference is that the Chain stores dont advertise their own Brand so this is part of their Normal but Kelloggs and Campbell to use spend a Fortune on they have to charge with private Label brands you dont have to do if a certain product is advertised on Tele people will buy the private Brand even though it was another Brand that was for one there is less advertising Cost involved in the and then of we have to consider by excluding the the wholesalers and having the pro duct go straight from the manufacturer to the Money is As q a food processing Magazine broke Down the manufacturing costs of a Box of Cereal like this manufacturing labor three packaging four and on half advertising six and profit four cents it would appear that advertising is the largest Cost of production in a that would apply to most of the products on our but this can be avoided by buying less advertised q i shop very for in for the last two years i have been buying the same Plain Brown unadvertised five Pound Box of and Over that time the Price has gone up from 55 cents to 75 its still the same Plain Brown a again you cannot blame just the the ills Start at the processing the Cost of almost every 1 thing has gone no wages for the the the store pm taxes have gone equipment and building costs have gone up in the manufacturing end As Well is in the retailing Yon have to accept a certain increase in prices Over the v q but in the last three months i Winnipeg the Price Index has gone up three Points in three a some items went Yon cant generalize about the whole store and say All prices went up that q but we cant live on just the items that went we cant live solely on fresh for in to get Back to this frugal shop you cant always be sure of get Ting the Plain Brown bbl of a product even if you want i buy the Plain Gail Pearse Pouch pack of jello when i because its but often the stores dont have Why is this a that hard to i dont know which stores you Are talking but on our grocery shelves we have sometimes the manufacturer runs Short of packaging or he May repackage it and sell it under a different name or As what can the store manager do people who have been influenced by Advertis ing on television come into the store and say Why dont you have this when its in the store across the Street q you just mentioned carrying items Twenty years ago i probably would have had a fairly easy time because at that time they had maybe two or three thousand items to now i could spend the whole Day in the store trying to figure out the multitude of really half the time i end up a were All to blame for the the As Well As the retailers and the food it is because the More items you have the More shelf space you and the shelf space posts so much per Square foot per and there Are also expenses involved with dead but what can you do we have tried year after year All the stores have to reduce the number of its foolish to have 12 brands of dog food so we try to Cut one of them and along comes our shopper and says my dog needs that 1 and you have to please your customers or you dont stay instead of items would be and the housewife would still have ample there would also be less expense for the store and that would reduce the q to get Back again to the frugal shopper idea Why is it not for instance to buy a five Pound pack age of hamburger it could mean quite a it a again we have to blame the it costs about five cents for packaging and labor on a half Pound package of ground so on a five Pound we can save quite a John Maartense bit on packaging and this can be passed on to the so two weeks ago we put the five Pound packages on the the first customer that came the meat Man Ager told me the other said shed buy the ground beef at the Price we put on but she wanted it divided into 10 half Pound now i ask you q heres a package of Rice Cris pies i brought with the Price sticker says 39 underneath the old Price is two for 39 the store paid Only one wholesale Price for Why when their wholesale costs on this particular package Haven gone up has the Price been marked up Why Are prices changed on the shelf some of these things Are due to clerical q All of them a but human error is a q but How do you account for the other changes a sometimes when you get a Price change from the wholesaler you still have some of the particular pro duct on the say that the whole Sale Price on something goes up and where we were charging 39 we now have to charge the honest thing to do would be to wait until you had sold All of the 39 cent but its not always possible to do this right at the because on a thursday or Friday night when people Are Here in such we cant run out of an item on the we have to have a certain number of an item on the shelf so that we dont run q buy Why not leave the boxed marked 39 cents on the shelf along with the new 41 cent boxes instead of changing them All to 41 that Way at least some people would get a a if Yon have two different prices for the same item on a your customers they think you Are trying to mislead you cant get away from q do you always Price your products according to a set markup for that or do you sometimes the prices in competing and set your prices at the same level a we do Check our competitors but Only to make sure oars Arent if we find their prices we Cut ours below our markup figure and take the q do you Ever raise prices that you find Are substantially below your competitors a we never do that q is it Ever done by the other Chain stores a i really its pos sible for them to do q youve been in the business for 39 surely you whether they do this sort of a All i can say is that its possible for them to do i cant say anything q to what extent Are retail Pri Ces set according to the wishes of the wholesaler in the food Industry overt Price setting of illegal but the wholesaler must exert some influence on a the wholesalers suggest retail the retailer is free Coset his own there Are a number of items which Are set by the lifesavers sell for a set for if yen want to shave it off a Yon cant sell a package of lifesavers for cents but in most the store or should take the Freedom to set their own q absolutely free a i would say 1 am not going to mention instances where manufacturers refused to sen for resale at other because then i would be getting in hot q does this sort of thing or Doest there was some one on the radio a couple of Days who claimed that the Independent food stores we rent getting their wholesale deliveries because of the Chain store a in not aware of far As i am concerned is going to Tell us what Price to sell we use our own expense ratio and set oar prices wholesalers May actually own a store or have franchise then the manager signs con tract with the and this sort of thing could but i have no inside knowledge of q but it could happen that the wholesaler would have a Strong in fluence on How a retailer sets is price1 a it eat q what about an Independent store who has to buy from a wholesaler that supplies one of the chains could he be pressured a if he is really i would say if he lots off gats and he has the Money to pay for he can teb the wholesaler to go to q then who will Supply him a if a wholesaler refuses to sell to hint he can be brought to court and forced to q it takes a lot of time and Money to do something like a that and a Tot of q just How a we go about getting food prices Maartense a keep making Tom be expected to have All the who is most to for instance just keep making noise and the people who Are in a position to know or find out will have to find the solution sooner or frenc Canadian newspapers speak out on current issues this is a selection of editorials on current translated from the French language press of be Devoir Montrealle additional sums Ottawa will pay to the provinces during the next year win amount to some this is an altogether insufficient sum when account is taken of the continually increasing obligations of the this Transfer represents barely three per cent of the yield of taxes which Ottawa and the provinces must towards the end of the con there appears to have been a fairly Strong degree of Unity among the Between the positions of the Premier of Quebec and those of Robarts of on Tario and Roblin of for there did not appear to exist any unbridgeable this rediscovered Unity could be in fact the main positive result of the Confer As Long As Quebec was going it risked having against it not Only Ottawa but also the other in place of this dangerous Isola Johnson was Able to substitute a Happy reconciliation with Manitoba and perhaps some of the other provinces As providing the provinces do not give they have the strength which in the months ahead could enable them to shake seriously Ottawa from the tactical Point of Johnsons position on return to Quebec will be the Premier had indicated last week that he would increase taxes if he did not obtain satisfaction at of Johnson can hardly in crease income tax in Quebec unless Ontario is disposed to do the same thing to establish a sizable difference in the rate of direct taxes Between the two provinces would have the effect of exposing the weaker province to serious economic to Barts must face a general election in a few months he can hardly pay himself the luxury of an increase in we would not be surprised if Johnson limited him at the next session of the to a Small in crease in contenting himself for the time being to continuing for a year or two a vigorous fight against of neither cooperative Federal ism at three per nor a vain search for a uniformity contrary to the reality of con Crete would in any Way correspond to the Gravity and urgency of the problems which face the governments of this country during be months a vigorous Campaign must be waged to bring about a More equitable division of fiscal Claude Ryan 29 one Bec 1action if Sharp succeeded in substituting himself for the Canadian he has not yet abolished Cumi Tim he must sooner or later face the electoral and i find it difficult to see How a Federal government can Hope for reelection if it deliberately indisposed each of the it May very Well be stated that provincial parties do not participate in Federal election but it can be expected that they will do something a Little special to get Sharps regardless of these election the attitude of Sharp in the face of a com Mon approach by the prov inces effectively torpedoes the Hopes of those who still be Lieve in the present Federal his attitude even pleads in favor of Quebec Independence far More eloquently than could be done by Pierre Bour Gault head of the separatist assemble rent pour 1inde Penzance in offering various Grants to the Ottawa explicitly recognizes that it has More taxation Powers than it the provinces easily prove that they have not the sources of Revenue needed to carry out their responsibilities in looking at the any of through flouts the the spirit and All plausible interpretations of the Canadian cons Titu the Federal government thus encouraging the prov inces to become More and More that is so True that Quebec can count on the collaboration of the other get a Lapress la their departure from provincial delegations to the fiscal conference obtained at least mild a re port of the fiscal published at the express re quest of the provincial pre confirmed what the premiers had been telling Ottawa throughout the during the next five years the provinces and municipalities will be in a less favourable financial position than the Central government because their expenses will increase at a faster rate than their capacity to tax and their ability to find sources of this was the reason for their pressing appeals for a better division of the fiscal which the Federal authorities listened to with a distracted provinces Are faced with a to break the the painful alternative increase their taxes or resort to double on the Federal another Choice is possible greatly reduce Pendi Tures on National defence and turn the equivalent Over to the provinces in the form of transfers of the unfortunate thing is that a minority government such As pearsons could not do this without at the same time risking its Fel teau 31 Ottawa Ita cent the Jean Baptiste society of Quebec City proclaimed its Faith in confederation and invited its members to celebrate the it rejected the idea of certain delegates who hoped for the adoption of a Resolution in which the society would have recommended that its members celebrate the Centennial Only Moder if the Jean Baptiste society of Quebec wants to celebrate the Centennial of it is because it is not it is aware of the imperfections of the present regime and in the words of one of its that 1967 will Mark a new lease on life for French Ana its views Are similar to those of a former Franco Manitoban Laurier Regmer of who said one Day that the Best Way to celebrate the Centen Nial would be to redress the injustices in its own this is what the Centennial commission is doing through its National Edu cation Campaign and by its Grants to artistic and cultural organizations As Well As by its support of As be a very Large sector of French Canada appears disposed to participate in Centennial Cerebra to those who doubt the usefulness of participating and despite Are not let us say that they should make their presence even if it is Only to assert the French fact everywhere in Canada alter 100 years of Marcel Giagu m la Tribune Sherbrooke la Premier Daniel Johnson showed remarkable ability when he agreed without Hesi tation with Premier Joey Small Wood that priority for labor and needed for the Churchill Falls project belongs to by this statement he cleared the air of any possible Misander knowing As Well As Smallwood thai what was involved was really a matter of if it is a fact that the Church Hill Falls Are in it is also a fact that Quebec has technicians who gained wonderful experience on the Man i Coragan it is also True that there is to be of Bunin in Quebec a number of Indus tries capable of filling most of the needs of the works which Are to be at Churchill it also should not be forgot ten that Hydro Quebec will buy almost All of the Power produced at Churchill Falls and that it is also Hydro que Bec will at s Cost of approximately the transmission fur Hydro Quebec holds approximately 20 per cent of the shares in Bronco which will build the in this the fact that Newfoundland May claim priority for supplying labor and materials does not in reality constitute a claim As important As one might be led to believe at first Quebec has the ;