Frito-Lay Chips Return to Loblaw Stores After Two-Month Pricing Dispute
By Simon Hung
April 11, 2022April 11 update: Frito-Lay and Loblaw Companies have settled their pricing dispute after an eight-week impasse, which means Frito-Lay chips will be trickling back into Loblaw-owned grocery stores as early as the Easter long weekend. Both companies have declined to comment on how the dispute was resolved, only confirming a mutual resolution between the two was reached on Monday.
This is a welcome sign for both chip fans and Loblaw stores, as the chip aisle was often barren over the past two months and the grocer was forced to fill the empty space with inferior store-brand chips from No Name and PC.
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Published February 18: Loblaws Stops Carrying Frito-Lay Chips Due to Pricing Dispute
The chips are down if you visit any Loblaw-banner store this week, as the grocery chain has stopped carrying Frito-Lay chips due to a pricing dispute between the two companies.
News of the retail squabble first surfaced last week, after Loblaw Companies refused to accept price increases on products supplied by Frito-Lay, which include an enormous catalogue of popular snack brands like Cheetos, Doritos, Lay's, Miss Vickie's, Ruffles and Tostitos. As a result, Frito-Lay has halted all orders to over 2400 Loblaw-owned grocery stores across Canada, including subsidiaries like Atlantic Superstore, Maxi, No Frills, Real Canadian Superstore, Shoppers Drug Mart, Zehrs and others.
According to Frito-Lay Canada, the company was forced to adjust product pricing due to rising manufacturing costs and ongoing supply chain issues stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic. After Loblaw Companies refused to accept the higher prices, Frito-Lay made the decision to stop supplying Loblaw stores.
In a statement to the Toronto Star, Loblaw spokesperson Catherine Thomas says the company is focused on minimizing prices for customers and noted "When suppliers request higher costs, we do a detailed review to ensure they are appropriate. This can lead to difficult conversations and, in extreme cases, suppliers don't ship us products."
Frito-Lay Canada has not commented directly on the dispute, but a spokesperson has confirmed that there is a "temporary disruption with one customer."
Loblaw-banner stores will not be re-stocking any Frito-Lay products until the dispute is settled, but Frito-Lay products are still available at competitors including Metro, Sobeys and Walmart for any Canadians who have a potato chip craving.
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Source: Toronto Star, with reports from The Canadian Press
Showing 40 Most Recent Comments
View allCanada, Australia and NZ are all members of CPTPP, how many diary products Canada exports to them??
I doubt many Australians and New Zealanders think Canada is a market big enough that worths the effort to explore, they have bigger fishes like Japan, China, Korea to go for. You export to markets that have high demand and can afford to pay.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bnnblo ... 5.amp.html
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bnnblo ... 7.amp.html
Is there ever free trade between Canada and the U.S.??
What happened during the softwood lumber dispute?? Canada win WTO case but still the U.S. was able to push a small guy like Canada around.
I remember that during covid, the U.S. banned vaccine export and government of Canada had to scramble for new deals to source from Europeans.
When the Americans want to access your market, they talk about free trade and its benefits but when being threatened losing share of their market, they wouldn't hesitate to bring out the big guns.
A very timely and current example of the dairy issue: the Americans are trying to get Canada to honour its trade obligations under the USMCA trade agreement in terms of dairy, and are planning retaliatory tariffs on other products if Canada refuses.
https://nationalpost.com/news/dairy-tar ... etaliation
dairy suppliers =/= dairy farmers!!!
You have to get this right.
Canadian dairy suppliers have for decades had their market position (and therefore shelf space in retailers) guarded tooth and nail by federal and provincial governments, insulating them from facing genuine (foreign) competition. And now they want to complain about lack of competition among supermarket retailers???
https://web.archive.org/web/20160427041 ... e3874a6e64
The PC Original ones are my go to.
Walmart had a thick cut original, but it's been out of stock for months.
Prior to this whole ordeal this location would routinely offer two bags for $7, and now it's two bags for $8 so perhaps Loblaws lost this one?
I can't believe Sobey's (& some other store brand) knock offs are made with (heavy) tomato powder. Crazy.
Criminally they do not have Hickory Sticks or Fritos BBQ anymore.
Most brands use some blend of canola &/or corn &/or sunflower oils, except Frito-Lay who will not disclose their oils on the bag (it just says "vegetable oil," which could be anything, really. Well not undisclosed soy or peanut on account of allergens, I guess. Probably roughly the same as everyone else). Kettle uses a pricier safflower &/or sunflower &/or canola blend.
I was looking at Metro's house brand chips the other day and they were $1.88, picked up the bag and couldn't believe how light it was... they shrunk them.
https://www.foodandwine.com/news/food-s ... s-gatorade
3 for $9 at Walmart vs. 2 for $8 at Loblaws.
And Walmart didn't lock Lays out of stores.
What a joke.
Ruffles Original = 290 mg sodium in 50 g, Lay's Wavy Original = 250 mg. Both No Name & PC have 210 mg sodium/50 g. The only regular chip that is lower in salt than those 2 is Kettle.
I just saw this weekend lays chips were restocked at my local Loblaws.
2 for $8 or 4.49 each.
Seriously?! WTF