Mar. 11, 2025 "Expert says language on labels leaves a lot of room for guesswork about how Canadian a product is": Today I found this article by Frances Willick on CBC:
Amid the patriotic chest-thumping and sincere efforts of Canadians to do right by their country in the face of the on-again, off-again U.S. tariffs, the humble little Maple Leaf has been working overtime.
Perhaps nowhere more so than at the grocery store, where shelves are emblazoned with red maple leaves to indicate that certain products are, to some extent, Canadian.
But does it mean what shoppers think it means?
Why do some Canadian products have a maple leaf sticker or shelf talker, while others do not?
A visit to a Halifax Sobeys and Superstore found a somewhat haphazard and bewildering use of the indicators.
For example,
Kicking Horse Coffee had a maple leaf sticker on the shelf at one Sobeys,
while Newfoundland-based Jumping Bean Coffee did not.
Kicking Horse Coffee was started in British Columbia and was sold to Italy's Lavazza in 2017,
but still employs people in Canada.
Coffee beans from Tim Hortons,
which is partly owned by a Brazilian investment firm,
did not have the sticker at Sobeys,
but did have a shelf talker at the Superstore saying it was "prepared in Canada."
The packages themselves had a prominent maple leaf on the front, with text underneath that said "roasting in Canada since 1964."
Some products that are likely known by locals to be produced in Nova Scotia, such as Farmers milk,
Oxford blueberries
and Cosman and Whidden honey did not have the sticker at one Sobeys,
though some did have the branding for Nova Scotia Loyal.
Nova Scotia Loyal is a provincial program that labels products as being locally made.
Nova Scotia-based Just Us Coffee had coffee beans with both the Nova Scotia Loyal branding and the maple leaf sticker on the shelf.
The maple syrup aisle was equally confusing.
Only one maple syrup product at Sobeys — the store's in-house brand, Compliments — received the maple leaf shelf treatment,
while several other Canadian brands did not.
Anna and Chris Hutchinson have been producing maple syrup at their farm south of Berwick, N.S., for more than a decade, selling locally as well as exporting to the Middle East, the Netherlands and Costa Rica.
Anna Hutchinson drives her products to every Sobeys store in the province and stocks the shelves herself.
She has noticed that some stores have the maple leaf sticker on the shelves bearing her syrup, while others do not.
She says using the stickers is at the discretion of the store manager,
but if some are missing next to her product, it's likely just human error.
"I think it's just staffing," she said. "They just don't have enough staff to look after things."
And, granted, grocery stores carry thousands of products.
It would be difficult to successfully label everything correctly.
But Hutchinson said she does want her products to have the shelf sticker because she sees that it makes a difference in what customers buy.
She adds that while her products do have the Nova Scotia Loyal branding, it's "not noticeable enough."
As a consumer, Hutchinson questions how the store decides when to use the maple leaf shelf sticker.
"They're everywhere. Ninety per cent of the product seems like it has one of those on it. So it makes me wonder, OK, have you done the research? Do you know that or did someone just put it there?"
The CBC requested an interview with Sobeys, but the company did not respond.
A spokesperson for Loblaw declined an interview and provided a statement that did not answer the CBC's question about how the company decides which products get the "prepared in Canada" shelf sticker.
The statement said Loblaw is showcasing products that are prepared in Canada in its
stores,
online
and in flyers
in the hopes it will make purchasing decisions easier.
The company is also securing as much food as possible that is grown or made in Canada, and seeking more such products, the statement said.
The fine print
At Sobeys — a Canadian company
— almost all of the in-house brand Compliments products had the maple leaf sticker,
even if the product itself was just "imported for" Sobeys, such as shredded coconut,
or "prepared for" Sobeys, like orange juice.
Mike von Massow, a professor at the University of Guelph who studies food and labelling, says food producers and retailers should explain what their labelling actually means.
"I think grocers need to be a little bit careful. They need to be straightforward in saying what it means and why they're putting those labels on there. Have some companies gone too far? Perhaps," von Massow said.
"As long as we're clear on what they're telling us, I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, but it might in some cases be an oversimplification," he said.
"There is a risk of, you know, to coin a new phrase, maple-washing to try and get more credit for being Canadian than perhaps a customer might expect."
The language on labels leaves a lot of room for guesswork about how Canadian an item truly is, with terms such as
"made in Canada from imported and domestic ingredients,"
"manufactured by/for,"
and "imported by."
Canada has plenty of rules about food labelling,
but most consumers haven't taken the time to visit the Canadian Food Inspection Agency website to decipher it all.
Von Massow says if buying Canadian is important to consumers,
they should
read labels
and ask questions.
"There's obviously room for deception here.
But if you ask,
if you pay attention,
you can make your decision based on that nuanced middle ground."
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/grocery-store-labels-maple-leaf-canadian-1.7477488
Mar. 12, 2025 "Buying Canadian is a matter of pride for shoppers. For major grocery chains, it's an opportunity": Today I found this article by Jenna Benchetrit on CBC:
The Buy Canadian movement has arrived in the country's major grocery stores. You've probably noticed
labels with bright red maple leafs,
prominent displays stacked with Canadian products
or promotional flyers that tout homegrown items.
"All the best things have always been made here. All we had to do was look," proclaimed a recent Buy Canadian-themed commercial from supermarket giant Sobeys, one of several supermarket giants trying to prove its Canadian bona fides to consumers amid a tariff war with the U.S.
Shoppers just want it to be easy to find Canadian products right now,
and some are willing to scour labels or seek out the items themselves — but that could get old, quick, said Tandy Thomas, an associate professor of marketing at Queen's University.
Grocery stores to the rescue: "That is going to be imperative to the longevity of this," she said.
"Because if it is hard,
if every decision requires three minutes in the grocery aisle to really try and decipher the labels,
consumers won't be able to do that.
It's too big of an ask."
The country's major food retailers have all rolled out new marketing strategies in recent weeks to meet a newfound demand for Canadian products — and with price hikes in play, they're betting on a reputational reset after years of contention between shoppers and consumers came to a boiling point last year.
Loblaws priming shoppers for tariff price hikes
Loblaws is priming its shoppers for pricier groceries as the trade war plays out, announcing this week it will add a triangular "T" label to store items that it says will be costlier due to tariffs.
As soon as the tariff goes, so will the price hike, according to the company's website.
CEO Per Bank explained in a LinkedIn post last week the company would be doing more to highlight Canadian products in-store, in promotions and on flyers,
and that shoppers would have the option of swapping an item for a Canadian-made version in PC Express, the company's online delivery platform.
The company is also "offering points for Canadian products,"
but it's unclear if those products now qualify for a higher PC Optimum points reward than they did previously.
CBC News reached out to Loblaws for an interview and a statement and did not hear back.
Spokespeople for Sobeys (which shares parent company Empire with FreshCo, Safeway and IGA) and Metro did not grant CBC News an interview, but said they were putting more effort into highlighting local and Canadian products and making them more visible to customers in-store, online and in marketing material.
But they're not always getting it right. A recent CBC News investigation found a Sobeys in Nova Scotia had labelled its house brand maple syrup with a red maple leaf, but hadn't done the same for other Canadian maple syrup brands.
The same investigation found other discrepancies,
like a maple leaf on products by brands owned by foreign companies,
but not on brands wholly owned in Canada.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency told CBC News in an email it had seen "an increase in complaints related to country of origin claims on food labels or in advertisements" over the past month, indicating some savvy shoppers have become more conscious of labelling mishaps.
After a total of five complaints made between November and January, 23 complaints were made in February alone.
A spokesperson for the agency, which regulates food safety and labelling, said it's reviewing the complaints but that it's too early to tell if any of them violate Canada's food laws.
A reputational reset after summer boycotts
Some retailers are probably relieved they'll get a break from being the subject of consumer anger after inflation-induced boycotts were directed at Loblaws, Sobeys and Metro last summer, said Tim Dewhirst, a professor and senior research fellow in marketing public policy at the Gordon S. Lang School of Business and Economics at the University of Guelph.
The Buy Canadian movement represents an opportunity for major grocers "to be seen as good corporate citizens," he said, especially as focus shifts — for some, but not all — from one boycott to another.
"In a lot of ways, people's anger has been diffused or redirected towards American brands, but more in particular,
the decisions and threats coming from President [Donald] Trump and his administration," he said.
But Dewhirst also pointed out consumers have a long memory.
When inflation was soaring two years ago, shoppers accused major grocers of price-gouging during an affordability crisis.
Their executives denied it, but experts told CBC News at the time inflation would give them cover to hike retail prices.
Several readers have written to CBC News recently saying they're concerned that grocery retailers will capitalize on tariff-related costs, and increase prices more than necessary.
"With geopolitical tensions and the threat of tariffs and so on, it's expected that would lead to an increase in prices," said Dewhirst.
"And we have observed in the past, especially [due to] the lack of competition that there is among the grocers in Canada,
that there are opportunities potentially for price gouging or allegations of profiteering."
Calgary grocer takes a different approach
Mike Soufan, owner of Calgary grocery wholesaler Freestone, said a small portion of his clientele have asked to be directed to Canadian products while shopping in his store.
But he has no plans to launch a marketing blitz to highlight those products — he'll leave that to the grocery giants, he told CBC News.
"A lot of people ask if it's a Canadian product, 'I'm not buying U.S.,' but I think they're in the minority.
Other people don't care. They only care about the price," he said.
Soufan said he plans to share the cost of the tariff with his supplier and his trucking company to keep prices low for consumers.
The store imports produce from the U.S. and other countries like Mexico and Peru,
in addition to sourcing products domestically,
and he's more worried about importing food with a weak Canadian dollar
than he is about a tax on goods.
He acknowledged he would have to
bargain with suppliers
and cut expenses in the store
to make up for a 25 per cent tariff.
But he said he wouldn't join the major grocers in their Buy Canadian marketing push.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/canadian-grocers-buy-canadian-1.7475346
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