War of words on a background of a cartel in the bread

File Photo, REUTERS
The CEO of Sobeys, Michael Medline, has not loved that Loblaw and Weston throw discredit on the whole industry.

Matthew Charest

Saturday, 23rd December 2017 00:00

UPDATE
Saturday, 23rd December 2017 00:00

Look at this article

Sobeys, which operates grocery stores IGA, demand an apology and immediate retraction of the part of Loblaw and Weston who are convicted with the competition Bureau of Canada (BCC) have set the price of bread for nearly 15 years.

“The team of Sobeys is outraged and shocked to have read in your about that to fix the price of bread was a practice which had been going on in “the industry”, said the president and chief executive officer of Sobeys, Michael Medline, in a letter communicated on December 21, with Galen Weston of Loblaw and Weston.

According to the president and chief executive officer of Sobeys, these accusations are unfair, illegitimate and possibly defamatory.

In a statement published on 19 December, Loblaw and Weston have spoken of the arrangement of fixing the price of bread packed which was taking place across the industry in general, what adamantly denied Sobeys and Metro and other competitors.

Metro believes the words of Weston and Loblaw as ” absolutely libelous “. “We don’t appreciate at all being drawn into this case by association,” said Marie-Claude Bacon, senior director, corporate affairs department. It is, to say the least extremely questionable. “

“We will pay particular attention on the consequences of your words on our business, our brand and our rights “, one can read in the letter of Sobeys.

“We will keep you responsible for all the damages that we may sustain. We have nothing to blame us and Canadians deserve better than that. “

Reactions of shy of the other players

Other players are the subject of an investigation by the BCC, according to which they would have been able to play a role in the scheme of fixing the price of bread packed.

The Newspaper has also contacted Giant Tiger, Canadian Bread (bread POM) and Walmart. The first two are narrow-minded to say that they were collaborating with the BCC and that they had no reason to believe that they themselves or some of their employees had been involved in this story. Walmart has issued no comment.

♦ Loblaw, which owns such supermarket Provigo and Maxi, as well as the company’s bread Weston, admitted that it had participated in the fixing of prices for certain products, bakery, from the end of 2001 to march of 2015. To apologize, she goes back to consumers who request a card of $25.