Northern Light
Superstar
The statutory limit is October 20th, 2025.
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PM Justin Trudeau's Canada
- Thread starter King of Kensington
- Start date
The statutory limit is October 20th, 2025.
afransen
Senior Member
Are you suggesting prohibiting a franchise model? Sobeys and Loblaws have franchise stores such as SDM, Freshco, No Frills. Are you suggesting that these retailers should be required to operate these franchise locations as wholly owned corporate stores? And to not supply independent retailers?
kEiThZ
Superstar
Jagmeet Singh qualifies for his pension in Feb 2025. I expect to see a vote against the budget triggering a Spring election.
kEiThZ
Superstar
It's pure economic ignorance and political cynicism. Grocer profits are up because there is less dining out. This is a trend that started during COVID. Now they want to penalize grocery stores for being successful?
Unless they are willing to impose price controls (and that would become its own entertainment really quickly), any penalties or windfall taxes they impose on grocers will simply be passed on to consumers eventually. One chat with an economists would have explained this to them.
They have a whole public service full of smart economists and business analysts. I have doubts these politicians ever actually talk to them.
I'm all for battling oligopolies. But funny how they start with groceries and not the really oligopolistic telecom sector that the feds actually have substantial control over. This is what tells me these politicians aren't serious and this is all signalling.
Admiral Beez
Superstar
The same goes for households. We stopped eating out a restaurants and instead bought more groceries and eat at home. So, while I’m contributing more revenue to the grocers I have more money in my pocket from not eating out.
I began slowing down my eating out when tips began creeping over 15%. Now it’s not uncommon for servers to expect you to pay another quarter of the meal’s value in gratitude.
lenaitch
Senior Member
I'm not sure I draw a straight line between eating out and higher grocery industry profits, but we've noticed prices our certainly way up. We hardly every eat out and our lifestyle/eating habits have not changed. Some aspect from analysts that I have read, such as breaking up large holding/encouraging smaller chains and some kind of controls on large retailers being wholesalers for their smaller competitors, I tend to agree with. I think a large part part of the problem lies between the producers and the grocery store.
But this is little more than wagging a finger. As mentioned, they've huffed and puffed with the telcos and we still have high costs and poor coverage in many areas.
But this is little more than wagging a finger. As mentioned, they've huffed and puffed with the telcos and we still have high costs and poor coverage in many areas.
Northern Light
Superstar
I value and guard my privacy; so I'm loathe to let too much slip; I will say, I have access to the internal numbers of (some) of the major grocers in this country; this is not a fulsome explanation.
The above did drive some basket-size growth for sure, I could even tell you which categories. (baking is no secret)
But, there are other things at work.
1) Many suppliers have in fact raised their prices, some for just reasons, others due to gouging and monopoly positioning (see Canadian Dairy Council)
The retail price, all other things being equal, is a percentage mark up over wholesale cost; so if the supplier adds .40c, the retailer may up the end price by .80c.
2) There absolutely has been some margin bloat, you can see that right in the public financials. Its less than people think, but it is there.
3) Shink is up big time (loss due to theft in this case, as opposed to spoilage), that cost is being passed through, and its a bit of a negative feedback loop.
I certainly concur that sector needs tackling as well. Though, curiously, its worth saying, the Telco sector actually provided better value when it operated as a regulated monopoly with strict margin limits, and no costs related to customer churn.
Northern Light
Superstar
I'm not thinking of that, no.
What I'm thinking of is that when Walmart entered Canada they did have a supply chain for fresh/frozen, and they contracted with Sobeys wholesale for the first 3 years.
They now do have their own supply chain.
But when Target entered Canada, they literally did the exact same thing. (Sobeys again).
Where Target is supposed to be a competitor but is buying its grocery from Sobeys, that strikes me as anti-competitive.
Admiral Beez
Superstar
Self checkout may not have been a smart move.
Admiral Beez
Superstar
Federal Court judge reserves decision on deportation of truck driver in Broncos crash
CALGARY — A lawyer for the truck driver who caused the deadly Humboldt Broncos bus crash told a federal judge Wednesday that the Canada Border Services Agency should not have recommended his client be deported. Jaskirat Singh Sidhu was sentenced in 2019 to eight years after he pleaded guilty to...
I'd be okay with the driver remaining in Canada, with a condition that he work as an worst-case avoidance instructor for our Indian-heavy trucking industry.
Northern Light
Superstar
It was rolled out pretty aggressively, because the initial indications did not show a significant jump in shrink, and cost savings were material.
Even today the numbers vary widely by location.
That said, Walmart has made the first high profile move to pull self checkout entirely from one problematic store in the Ottawa area.
Meanwhile, Loblaws has littered its own-store brand locations with those new entry/exit gates.
I will tell you, front-line staff are even less impressed with those than customers. They've created problems.
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afransen
Senior Member
I think what you're asking for would create greater barriers to entry. Sort of akin to saying Rogers can't sell access to their network for other telcos trying to start cellular service in the country.
Nominally, franchises and and the franchisor are competitors if the franchisor also directly owns corporate stores.
Northern Light
Superstar
I can only say, having some understanding of the impact of the arrangement above on the prices/margins of the new entrants, I will respectfully disagree.
Towered
Senior Member
I use it often, and wonder to myself, "what's stopping people from just pretending to scan items and toss them in a bag and walk out without actually paying for certain things?" - even though there is usually a worker in the area (though often not at all I've noticed), they always look bored and are barely paying attention because they're not paid enough to care if someone is stealing, and even if they catch someone, they're certainly not going to do anything about it. Just last week at the LCBO I saw a guy take a shopping cart that was fully loaded with expensive liquor bottles and casually stroll out the door with it while the staff helplessly looked on in utter humiliation. I've seen this quite a few times. Once I left the store, he was outside putting the bottles into shopping bags he had with him. He nervously looked at me several times because I was watching him, and then he walked down the street, struggling with the weight of his ill-begotten haul.
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afransen
Senior Member
Realistically, I think the Liberals were getting and heeding that advice until polls made them feel like they needed to grandstand. I think at most, squeezing the grocery retailers might lower prices by a couple of percentage points. Their net income margin is pretty low compared to other industries. Perhaps squeezing the entire food supply chain could yield more results (food processors, regulated producers such as dairy etc.) but it seems like a massive lift. Could Canada force Pepsi to divest Frito, etc.?
Telecom is definitely an industry with enormous, outsized profits, and one where prices could come down materially. My parents, until recently, were paying Bell almost $300/month. That's probably not far off their grocery bill.