Good afternoon - hasn’t caught up for a day or two so much going on but felt I must respond to the comment about veggie prices - the supermarkets buy off the veggie markets like Turners and growers - they set the price with the grower and the markup on fresh veggies in my sons PaknSave is 11% which isn’t excessive when you take into account the wastage ,wages ,electricity etc etc has to come out of that .Paknsave owners unlike Countdown or New World are allowed to have agreements with local buyers - my son has had the same local market gardeners and orchards supplying him for 15 years - he doesn’t rip them off if he did they would send their produce to market .My son started stacking yoghurt as a schoolboy - he was always going to be a policeman - but something clicked and the management saw something in him - he worked really hard - admittedly my husband was able to help him prepare stuff for the bank to borrow the nearly 20 million to buy his store - the bank loans are truly frightening - at the end of the year his return on his investment sits around 4% - both of them work extremely hard in the beginning 7 days a week - yes he drives a nice car and has flash sun glasses and his children go to boarding school mainly so they can do all the sports they love and yes he can afford to give his Mum free groceries and he can afford to sponsor the rugby team at the local low decile schools and every school day he sends the necessary food for the breakfast club and a truckload goes out everyday to food bank ,once a week to SPCA and the Sallies and recently food rescue charities .He funds a program at a low decile school for school leavers to learn how to present themselves for an interview - I could go on and on - his trolley boys are the lowest paid on site at $25.74 so he pays well -he has trolley boys that have advanced up to Department Managers so he obviously cares for his workers .It really saddens me that people aren’t looking at the whole picture - recently the government legislated to stop the power companies giving our food processors and supermarkets prompt payment discounts which resulted in costs going up right across the board 25% and the power companies are making more money - the legislation recently passed to take my low user rebate and give it back to the power companies because it’s unfair pensioners get it is simply unbelievable but the facts are there on MBIE website why she decided to put pensioners power charges up and increase power company profits - Countdown stores pay 59% more for transportation than their Ozzie stores do because our fuel is double the price - we have the most expensive transportation costs in the OECD because our fuel tax is double what Ozzie pay so of course are prices are higher -a container of groceries used to cost $600 to Cross our border since covid that same container is $18000 - and the contents of many are spoiling - again legitimate reasons why prices are increasing .I am not saying owning a supermarket isn’t a good lifestyle it’s a lot of hard work and like any job when you work hard you are rewarded .The Commerce commission admitted that they were wrong saying the supermarkets are making 24% and in fact it is only 4% which if you take into account the billions of dollars invested by the owners is what we used to get at the savings bank .It really saddens me to hear people wanting to destroy a 100 year old kiwi company by tax payers assisting a German company Aldi to open here - if there was profit in the kiwi market for Aldi they would have jumped the ditch when they opened in Oz and to think tax payers money would subsidise this move is simply incredible .
I hope this doesn’t offend but I think the Commerce Commission realised there really isn’t racketeering going on - otherwise there would have been action taken but like the enquiry into the fuel companies there was no racketeering - but of course the rhetoric has been set that supermarkets are responsible for the increasing prices but the increases have been caused by our government and the worldwide supply chain grinding to a halt
Just one other point his cauliflower are $3.99 - never bern above $5 -
I hope this doesn’t offend but I think the Commerce Commission realised there really isn’t racketeering going on - otherwise there would have been action taken but like the enquiry into the fuel companies there was no racketeering - but of course the rhetoric has been set that supermarkets are responsible for the increasing prices but the increases have been caused by our government and the worldwide supply chain grinding to a halt
Just one other point his cauliflower are $3.99 - never bern above $5 -