With inflation that has persisted for several months, the purchasing power of the French is being undermined. In the new show France Large Format broadcast Tuesday February 6, 2024 on France 2, Marie Drucker looks at the following theme: “Food: who benefits rising prices ?” A long investigation into a France where the rate of poor people continues to increase. The opportunity to highlight a new practice: after shrinkflation, manufacturers adopted “cheapflation”. The concept ? Selling the same quantity, but reducing its quality – sometimes even increasing the price – by replacing one ingredient with another less expensive and/or lower quality ingredient. Invited to C to you on France 5, Marie Drucker returned to this “cheating” by manufacturers. “We would call it ‘reduflation’, in French. These are practices which are not illegal, even if they are questionable, she believes. The price remains the same, the quantity remains the same but the product is degraded.”
Eight brands highlighted by FoodWatch
A problem of which the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire would have been alerted. “That, normally very very quickly, there should be sanctions. The consumer sees it as a real scam”concluded Marie Drucker It’s up to you. In her report, the journalist questioned FoodWatch France, who looks at a dish from the Findus brand: its Bordeaux-style fish. “Bordeaux-style Alaskan hake, a frozen product, saw the share of its hake which is the main ingredient go from 75% to 71%, explains the NGO’s campaign manager, Audrey Morice in the France 2 documentary. Its share of breadcrumbs goes from 7.2% to 8.3%. It is a product that has more fat, more saturated fatty acids, more sugars and less protein. It’s the consumer who toasts.” In total, FoodWatch identified eight brands: After Eight (Nestlé), Bordeau Chesnel, Findus, Fleury Michon, Maille (Unilever) and Milka (Mondelez).