Supermarket Dirk van den Broek lowers the price of hundreds of everyday groceries
For a full cart of groceries, you pay much more than you did a few months ago. Worse still: it doesn’t just cost more; sometimes you also get much less (shrinkflation; we’ve already written about it). According to economists at ING and ABN AMRO, food price increases will continue for a while yet. They think prices will keep rising at least until the middle of this year—except at this supermarket! Dirk van den Broek has decided to lower the prices of hundreds of everyday groceries instead.
Dirk (does anyone still call it Dirk van den Broek?) was named the cheapest supermarket in the past year (by the Consumers’ Association and the TV programme Kassa), and now that the government’s compensation for restoring consumers’ purchasing power on groceries has failed to materialize—and the abolition of VAT on vegetables and fruit may even disappear from the coalition plans—the supermarket is taking action itself.
A price cap—that’s Dirk too
The products whose prices are being reduced are mainly everyday groceries, including both private-label and leading brands. Think dairy, baby and personal-care products. Bread and coffee will also become cheaper. It doesn’t stop at just these price reductions. Dirk is also introducing a price cap. Until the end of the year, the products that are now becoming cheaper will remain in stores at this price—or their prices may even fall further.
Can it pay off?
Constantly being the cheapest sounds like a challenge—how can that be sustainable? Dirk is doing it by making tough choices in its spending patterns. Earlier this year, for example, it decided to stop advertising on television.
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