MADRID – The largest Spanish supermarket Mercadona has decided to lower the prices of 500 daily products from this month until the end of the year. According to the chain, this will result in substantial savings for customers.
According to the calculations of the Valencian company, it is about €150 on an annual basis that customers will spend less on their shopping baskets. With this decision, the supermarket wants to anticipate a decrease in costs observed “slowly” in the market.
Related post: Bank of Spain foresees further increase of food prices
The price reduction of 500 products in 1,637 supermarkets across Spain will be carried out “without affecting the quality of the products and the sustainability of the entire food chain (suppliers, productive sector of the company and workers).
Which products are getting cheaper?
The chain selected 500 products that are used regularly, if not daily, by many households. Think of fresh products such as zucchini. turkey, burgers, ground beef, fresh pizza dough and fish. Canned products such as tuna, tomato, meatballs in sauce, and manzanilla olives stuffed with anchovies. Dairy products such as cheese, yoghurt, chocolate mousse and strawberry flavoured yoghurt.
For fresh products, such as zucchini, fish or turkey fillet, the company will use market movements to lower the price. Price reductions will be clearly communicated. A yellow label contains the old and current prices with the discount applied.
Total savings for customers of 200 million euros
In total, according to the company’s calculations, the price reductions will save Mercadona’s customers €200 million between now and the end of the year. This saving has an impact on the company’s margin. Consequently, it will drop by 0.6 point.
Prices “bizarre” increased
Last March, Mercadona’s CEO acknowledged that sales prices at its branches had risen “bizarrely” in a way he had never seen. Juan Roig assured that the company has made every effort to pass on lower costs to consumers. Still, they had to go up, because otherwise, according to the businessman, “the disaster in the production chain would have been impressive”.
This was evident from the presentation of the annual figures for 2022, the year in which the Valencian company struggled with a 12% price increase from its suppliers and a 10% increase passed on to the public. “We managed to take two points off that, which is a lot for us, €600 million,” said Roig. He also acknowledged that his company is “deeply concerned about inflation” because it mainly affects people on the lowest incomes.
Examples of price reductions
White bread, tuna in sunflower oil from Hacendado, grated cheese, Marseille liquid detergent from Bosque Verde, vanilla custard and ‘tomate frito’ are some of the 500 basic products in the shopping cart that Mercadona has reduced the price of since April.
For example, the 560-gram jar of traditional tomato sauce will go from €2.15 to €2.05. The packaging of six cans of light tuna in sunflower oil from Hacendado will be reduced from €4.6 to €4.5. Furthermore, the 250-gram baguette will go from €0.58 to €0.55, or the Nidina jars for baby food now cost €16.65, three less than before the price reduction.
Related post: Call for boycott of the Mercadona because of labour abuse s
