If you bought bread at a Loblaw store up until 2015, you could get a part of a massive class-action settlement.
Loblaw Companies Limited and its parent company, George Weston Limited, announced on Thursday that it has agreed to settle nationwide class-action lawsuits against them relating to their involvement in what they called “an industry-wide price-fixing arrangement… involving certain packaged bread products.”
George Weston has agreed to pay $247.5 million in cash, and Loblaw will pay $252.5 million — $156.5 million in cash and credit for $96 million previously paid to customers by the grocery giant under the Loblaw Card program. This amounts to a total settlement of $500 million.
Loblaw Companies Ltd./Facebook
“On behalf of the Weston group of companies, we are sorry for the price-fixing behaviour we discovered and self-reported in 2015. This behaviour should never have happened. We have the privilege of serving Canadians from coast to coast. That privilege needs to be earned each and every day,” said Galen Weston Jr., chairman of Loblaw and chief executive officer of George Weston.
“Reaching a settlement on this matter was the right thing to do in response to previous behaviour that did not meet our values and ethical standards,” he added.
As a recap, in 2015, Loblaw says it discovered the industry-wide bread price-fixing arrangement and immediately reported it to the Competition Bureau.
This essentially means that Canadians probably spent more on bread than they should have between 2001 and 2015.
Other major grocery stores, such as Metro, Sobey’s, and Walmart, were implicated in the scandal. The Competition Bureau said the companies “committed indictable offences under the Competition Act.”
Loblaw and George Weston say it immediately responded by overhauling its pricing management and “significantly enhancing” its compliance programs.
The staggering settlement figure was negotiated with the plaintiffs’ lawyers in a mediation presided over by the Chief Justice of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice.
The settlement still has to be finalized in a binding agreement between the companies and the plaintiffs’ lawyers and court approval.
After approval, Loblaw says the settlement will resolve all the plaintiffs’ claims against the companies relating to bread price-fixing.
The settlement funds will be distributed to eligible class members according to a distribution plan that the courts will approve. The details will follow the court’s approval process.
This news follows the grocer’s second-quarter earnings results. The company reported a $51 million decrease in net earnings, which it says was “primarily driven by charges related to the settlement of class action lawsuits.”
In addition, the report found that food sales at Loblaw-owned stores increased by 0.2% compared to 6.1% last year and drug sales at Shoppers Drug Mart increased by 1.5% compared to 5.7% last year.
The grocery giant also rolled out a new program called “Fresh Promise.” It allows customers who aren’t satisfied with produce purchased in-store to get it replaced and refunded within seven days, no questions asked.