Two of Norway’s largest grocery store companies, NorgesGruppen and REMA1000, have stopped sending prisjegere (literally, price-hunters) into each other’s stores to check and record shelf prices on a wide range of items. One researcher called the move “an implicit admission” that such price-checking has hindered competition.
There was no immediate response from Coop, the third-most dominant grocery retailer in Norway. All three firms face huge fines from competition authorities in Norway, who charge them with illegal cooperation on grocery pricing. It’s not unusual that everyday items like sliced cheese cost exactly the same at a REMA and Kiwi store, the latter of which is the allegedly low-price chain in NorgesGruppen.
The grocery firms that dominate the Norwegian market have denied guilt and vowed to appeal their fines. At the same time, though, they acknowledge that they must suspend price-checking until their appeals are settled.
Ivar Gaasland, a researcher at business school BI, told state broadcaster NRK that the decision to end price checking “signals some humility and can perhaps be viewed as an implicit admission that the practice has been unfortunate for competition.” Norway’s food prices remain among the highest in the world, a complex result of protectionist agricultural policy, highly regulated dairy, meat and poultry markets, and the concentration of dominant wholesalers and retailers.
NewsinEnglish.no staff
