Atlantic Superstore quietly down-sizing their bread.
I live in a small community on the south shore of Nova Scotia. Being small there are a limited number of places available to shop for basic food items, the main two being Atlantic Superstore and Sobeys. Neither is perfect, but they both do a fairly good job marketing their products. I make it a habit to compliment where due and to pass on concerns when they arise. I do so in a spirit of openness and honesty, expecting similar in return.
With the retail food market in general, I am concerned about a number of issues. One of those is the declining sizes of products. The smaller sizes become, the higher is the price per weight ratio. That is bad enough, but smaller product packaging means far greater packaging and handling ratio, bad for the environment and bad for my pocketbook. You would expect that if retailers were really trying to maximize value for their customers, for the reasons just stated they would maintain, not reduce, product size, and yet the opposite is occurring. The latest example at Atlantic Superstore (Loblaws) is their presentation of fresh baked sourdough loaves.
My wife and I have been buying these sourdough loaves for many years because they are fresh, the bread itself is heavier, less fluffy, and it is very tasty. Over time I have raised the concern of decreasing freshness of Superstore bread with them, both by speaking with the store manager and staff and also corresponding with Customer Service where appropriate. Of course, I am always assured that their bread is the freshest it can be, yet time and again we have been disappointed to find that it clearly wasn't as fresh as it should be, exhibiting the qualities of older bread when actually eaten.
On April 3, 2013, my wife and I selected a sourdough loaf from the freshly baked bread display at the Liverpool Superstore. It immediately struck us as being far smaller than we have been used to. Not focusing on the weight shown on the label but on the size itself, we asked the bakery clerk if the loaves had been downsized. She told us she did not think so but that the loaf we were discussing did indeed look small. The store manager was not in that day so we left our details asking that she call. When we got home I took photos of the loaf, the packaging and weighed it. It was then that we noticed that the bread was deemed good to be sold until a full five days after that day's date. We also noted that the weight of the loaf was labelled as 450gm. Bread size for the longest time has been 675gm for full size and 450gm for the smaller size. We usually avoid the smaller size loaves as less satisfying due to their fluffy texture. It was then that we realized that although the sourdough loaf had been reduced from it's earlier size assumed to be 675 gm, its actual volume was not reduced by a similar amount. The bread had evidently been allowed to rise more than it had been in the past, going some way to disguising the drastic reduction in weight. In my book that is tantamount to dishonesty, pure and simple. The sourdough bread is lighter and fluffier than in the past. To me, the only reason for a store to reduce weight and allow bread to rise more than in the past is to conceal the weight reduction.
With that in mind, I did not wait for the store manager to call me; I sent a note to Customer Service along with pictures, very clearly detailing my concerns. Shortly after that I heard from the store manager. She agreed that my concerns regarding freshness (five day sale time) were valid, but she assured me that there had been no reduction in the size of bread loaves. I ask myself, is such a size reduction of basic food items such as bread something that a store manager would have been unaware of? Hardly, if the manager knows anything about her job, and she is a good manager in other respects. After that, my correspondence went back and forth with Customer Service a couple of times. I located and sent them a couple of examples of their sourdough bread being advertised in flyers as 675 gm loaves. I restated my specific question, has the size of their sourdough loaves been reduced? All replies from them to me have totally ignored that question. Their avoidance made it clear that there is an element of shame on their part, a guilty knowledge, knowing that such a reduction has deliberately occurred yet being unable to bring themselves to openly acknowledge it. After yet further correspondence with them, they finally stated "All current flyers from 2013 for Atlantic Superstores do not advertise Sourdough loaves at 675g, and has always been 450g in size for the past 3 years." As a regular purchaser of their sourdough bread, I know that not to be the case. I also note that sourdough loaves in Ontario are currently produced and advertised at 675gm as usual. Loblaws perhaps see us here in Nova Scotia as poor cousins worthy of less largesse.
Different points of view will inevitably arise. I certainly do not begrudge any enterprise the right to market their products however they wish at whatever size they wish. I draw the line at quietly reducing the size of the most basic of food items without announcement or clarity, even changing the production process to hide the change, then avoiding a simple question from a customer about it. A relationship with my local food retailer where I end up feeling that I am being duped is not a relationship that I am looking for. I suspect other shoppers would be equally disappointed in their food retailer if they knew that this type of practise was occurring.
By the way, I regularly see "Fresh baked bread" displayed in perforated bags with best before dates five days later. Loblaws Customer Service wrote "All breads packaged in perforated bags vary in shelf life from 1-5 days. Bread is sold packaged in a perforated bag on day one and these breads are not sold in a perforated bag on day 2-5. The 5 day shelf life is for customers to take home to enjoy. To further enhance the freshness of the bread, you may want to consider a non-perforated bag.. A poly bag will assist to maintain its freshness until day 5. You may certainly request to speak to a Bakery colleague and request a poly bag to package the bread at home, to ensure it remains fresh." I suspect I am not alone in expecting "fresh baked" bread to have a much shorter shelf life.
