One Monday night in front of the telly…

Hubby: “Let’s stop shopping at Coles, Woolworths and their subsiduaries.”

Me: “You’re on.” I said. How hard could it be?

“We barely buy anything there anyway.”

And that’s how it happened.

When the ABC ’s Four Corners aired The Price we Pay by Stephen Long, a piece on the relationship between the two major Australian supermarket groups and small local producers, we were gutted by what we saw. It added to our friend’s experiences and our own research showing that small local producers were being sent to the wall by supermarkets and their offshoots in the liquor industry.

That was only 18 days ago. So I’ve had no regrets and no trouble sticking with it. Sure, I can’t be lazy and just nip over to the nearby sexy, neon lit mega-food halls with their gleaming surfaces and pretty home brand packaging, but luckily for me there is an independent grocer another five minutes walk from our local ‘major’. Not that I’ve needed much, our fridge is always full of beautiful fresh, local tucker.

We live in a test area for the newer big supermarkets. They’re the most seductive and beautifully laid out, but they make me wander aimlessly like ‘a deer in headlights’ and compel me to spend money I don’t have, on things I don’t really need. So in a way the a pact is turning out to be much kinder on the household purse.

Some of our friends are freaked out when they find I have no packaged food in the cupboards – only condiments, seasoning, sugar and starches. I gave up packaged and processed food a little while back, but my beloved still drinks Activite and some packaged drinks. We get the majority of our food at Farmers Markets and fresh markets. The detergents, washing powder etc are bought in bulk from office cleaning suppliers.

‘Mum and Pop’ grocers are our source for seasonings, dairy, smoked meat products and the sugary drinks he loves. Our bread is sourdough and comes from local bakeries that use locally grown and milled organic whole grain flour. I buy organic flour, pulses and grains loose (unpackaged) from Rita at South Melbourne Market, home made dips from an elderly Turkish lady in Mentone and we buy our wine direct from wineries. So it really hasn’t been difficult.

It’s been a little tougher on the man about the house, as he is also turning his back on the giant ‘Man Cave’ Bunnings, petrol stations and his usual beer retailers, but by using a little lateral thinking, he’s coped well. And we’re not out of pocket either. In fact we seem to be spending less.

The Price We Pay

From the ABC Four Corners website

“…Coles and Woolworth’s sell 70 per cent of the dry groceries and half the fresh food that Australians consume – among the highest concentrations of market power in the developed world.

Last month the competition watchdog the ACCC officially ticked this arrangement, insisting the market is working.

But the growth in supermarket muscle has come at a cost to many suppliers and small retailers. “Crippling”“simply tough dealing”. is how one industry analyst terms Coles’ and Woolies’ power over food producers; the regulator calls it

“It’s just eating my farm away, we’re just finished,” says a despairing pumpkin grower whose produce retails for as much as 10 times the price he gets for it. He scoffs at the ACCC’s view that the gap between farm gate prices and the checkout isn’t growing.

Don’t like pumpkin? How about an ice-cream story to illustrate supermarkets’ throat-hold? Four Corners meets an ice-cream maker who buys a lot of milk – and bizarrely he gets it cheaper from his local supermarket than from the wholesale processor. Why? Because the wholesaler has to accept ultra low prices from the supermarket – and compensates by inflating his price to smaller buyers, says the ice-cream man.

Or try sausage. One sausage-maker explains the choice he made when the supermarket told him he had to cut his supply price or get kicked off the shelf: “The only way we would do that was by using lesser quality meat product… and adding soy proteins and what some people might call ‘fillings’ to extend the product.” He then volunteers to Four Corners that he wouldn’t even eat the product himself.

Suppliers can reel off a list of punishing “rebates” – fees – that they must pay supermarkets for product promotions, to get paid on time, or just for the privilege and opportunity of supplying goods. But few are bold enough to do so publicly.

Like suppliers to the big supermarkets, minnow retailers are fed up – but more outspoken. Small liquor merchants can get some beer and wine cheaper from supermarket-owned retail grog barns than they can from wholesalers. Some refuse to see this as competition: “In the 36 years I’ve been in our two shops I’ve had 12 armed hold-ups, 11 with a gun and one with a machete, and the biggest predator we face is this company here.”

While Coles’ and Woolies’ market clout can translate into cheap prices for consumers, there are fears it may threaten the survival of Australia’s food industry. As reporter Stephen Long reveals, these concerns are held by eminent people at the very top of the food chain.”

View the program here

Program transcript

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