The French authorities are to investigate whether a Nutella promotion that sparked brawls in supermarkets broke the country’s strict trading laws.
France’s finance ministry said its fraud squad was launching an inquiry after the Intermarché chain offered a 70% discount on jars of the hazelnut and chocolate spread.
The promotion, in which the price of a 950g jar dropped from €4.50 to €1.41 (£1.24), caused punches to be thrown and claims that customers behaved “like animals”, pushing and shoving to grab the cheap Nutella.
Ministry consumer watchdogs will want to establish whether the promotion fell under the official January sales period, which allows for substantial discounts on products, or was a one-off offer on a single product, which could fall foul of “unfair competition” regulations.
Stores in France are not permitted to sell food products at a loss or engage in what is deemed “product dumping”. Investigators will want to know how much Intermarché paid for the Nutella.
Under the country’s strict consumer code, most shops can discount food during the official biannual sales periods only if they have bought the product more than a month before the sales begin and only if the discounted price is considered “fair”.
The dates of the six-week-long winter and summer sales are fixed by regulation and also cover online stores, though certain shops in specific tourist or border areas are allowed to offer discounts outside these periods.
Before the Nutella promotion, Stéphane Travert, the minister of agriculture and food, announced plans to limit discounts to a maximum 34% of the amount the store paid for a product. Travert also wants to put an end to the relatively recent introduction of buy-one-get-one-free offers, saying he wants to “give value back to products”. His proposals will be presented to the Assemblée Nationale on Wednesday.
Last week’s three-day Nutella discount and the hysterical scenes it prompted caused astonishment around the world, and a wave of national soul-searching in France.
Nutella’s manufacturer, the Italian group Ferrero, said it “deplored” the discount operation “and its consequences”. The Intermarché chain kept a low profile.
The sociologist Gérard Mermet claimed brawling parents were justifying their behaviour because it was “for their children”; another sociologist Catherine Lejealle blamed the internet. Intermarché customers told Le Parisian unemployment, low wages and poverty were to blame.