The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is taking supermarket giant Coles to court over alleged claims the marketing of its bread products is false, misleading and deceptive. Slogans such as "Baked Today, Sold Today" are attached to products only partially baked in-store, it said.
AdNews highlighted the practice in the 22 March issue, after editor-in-chief Paul McIntyre noticed something amiss while checking the price of of his Danish pastry. It said baked in store. But made in Belgium.
Coles Bakery and independent baked goods brand Cuisine Royale, sold exclusively at Coles, are those the ACCC will be investigating. It believes products under those brands actually arrive at Coles already partially baked and frozen, at which point the supermarket completes the cooking process.
Such products - which are sold at Coles with in-store bakeries - carry slogans such as ‘Baked Today, Sold Today’ and ‘Freshly Baked In-Store’. They are also situated near signs which say ‘Freshly Baked’ or ‘Baked Fresh'.
The ACCC claims the supermarket is thus guilty of "false, misleading and deceptive conduct" in the supply of products that have been par-baked. "[They] were likely to mislead consumers into thinking that the bread was prepared from scratch in Coles’ in-house bakeries on the day it was offered for sale and that it was entirely baked on the day it was offered for sale," it said.
Coles also uses these same slogans to promote bread that has actually been made from scratch in Coles’ in-store bakeries, the ACCC said, which shows a "lack of disctinction" in the promotion of its products. "[The lack of disctinction between freshly prepared and par-baked products] is misleading to consumers and places competing bakeries that do freshly bake from scratch at a competitive disadvantage," it said.
The ACCC is seeking orders that Coles reviews its compliance program, publish corrective notices on its website and in Coles supermarkets that have in-store bakeries, and costs.
The matter has been filed in the Melbourne Federal Court's Fast Track List. The first Scheduling Conference is listed for 13 August 2013 at 9.30am.
The ACCC’s Compliance and Enforcement Policy, which was released in February 2013, states that credence claims, particularly in the food industry, with the potential to have a significant impact on consumers or the competitive process, continues to be one of its enforcement priorities.
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