retail environment
Carrefour introduces signage to notify customers of 'shrink-flation'
Shrinkage is the common term used in the LP and profit protection lexicon to refer to unexplained loss due to factors such as external theft, internal dishonesty, damage or product write-offs.
But the term, or at least a variation of it, crept into the retail lexicon in Europe during September, although its definition was all to do with the cost-of-living crisis and managing customer expectations around the size of household confectionary.
French supermarket Carrefour has put signs next to certain products to warn customers of ‘shrinkflation’, a form of reverse price rise where the products have reduced in size while what customers pay remains the same.
According to a report by the BBC, items including Lindt chocolate and Viennetta ice cream are among the products which have got smaller but without an equivalent drop in price.
Carrefour told the BBC that around 26 products have shrunk, without a price reduction to match. These are manufactured by companies including Nestle and Unilever.
The move has also triggered a war of words between the supermarkets and the product manufacturers.
"Obviously, the aim in stigmatising these products is to be able to tell manufacturers to rethink their pricing policy," Stefen Bompais, director of client communications at Carrefour told the BBC.
Responding to the allegations, a spokesperson for Lindt & Sprüngli, said its prices had gone up on average by about 9.3 per cent in line with rising raw material costs.
"We always comply with the labelling laws and regulations requiring objective information about how much product is in the package, including a net weight statement, a serving size, and a servings-per-container statement”, they said.
"Consumers can use this information to make accurate and informed purchasing decisions about the amount of product they are buying."
