A LEADING retailer has accused rivals of ripping off islanders. The charge has been denied by the Co-op and the Chamber of Commerce.
And it was dismissed by Alliance managing director Andrew Bagot’s apparent principal target, Sandpiper, as the ‘spurious comments’ of ‘a disgruntled ex-employee’.
But Mr Bagot 42, said the reasons others gave to justify their prices – such as food inflation and fuel or freight costs – were often exaggerated or avoidable.
‘People in Guernsey are being wildly overcharged,’ he said yesterday. ‘I’ve heard talk of food inflation pushing costs up 20%. Our experience says food inflation is about 6%, but their prices continue to go up out of proportion. Many companies say freight costs are a major factor and push up prices but that is a bit of a myth.
‘We are actually well served by good freight services at fair prices here and often the costs are subsidised by the suppliers, too.’ He said that freight might add 2% but not much more, rejecting some stores’ argument that freight costs were roughly the same as VAT.
Article posted on 2nd October, 2008 - 2.30pm
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17 Article Comments
Well said Andrew.
Perhaps some of the so called competitiors will steer away from the usulal excuses and myths of Guernsey prices.
same here in jersey ripping us off the 2 main players ever since morrisons left.use every trick in the book to prevent any new players makes you wonder if they have vested interest in these companies
Surely Sandpiper are quite out of order and naive in referring in the public domain to Mr Bagot’s motivation as that of a ‘disgruntled employee’. It begs the question does it not that he may have had every reason to be disgruntled so the remark can backfire badly on them as an employer let alone a retailer.
Sandpiper would do better to attempt to justify to the public in a way that they can verify exactly why their prices are so high rather than hide behind an attack on this person’s character. That is what interests the consumer so Sandpiper thus far leave a very fishy taste?
I totally agree with Alliance,our weekly bill has gone through the roof,lets hope other shops take note.
Totally agree with Mr Bagot
Food is pricey over here along with lots of other consumables. However, retailers comments of freight costs negating any savings from no VAT are tired and convenient for them. There is simply no way that freight accounts for nearly 20% of every item imported via the UK.
Funny how John Lewis can deliver items to the Channel Islands and not charge VAT or Carriage.
I understand economies of scale apply but we do have very regular air and sea transport.
Collusion and smokescreens are in existance everywhere but you can buy sensibly if you understand how things work.
If you don’t or can’t be bothered to shop around then retailers and tradespeople are basically free to rip you off.
I would like to meet the spokes person from the CO-OP, a friend of mine convinced me that the CO-OP was cheaper then checkers, so we (the family) did a weeks shop there. Well we had 60 items or so, we compared about 15 of them (got bored!) and on 11 items the CO-OP was around 10p an item more expensive. So take into account checkers is overcharging the CO-OP, are, well you make up the words…..
As for my friend, he is now shopping around!
I agree with the article, costs are increasing every week. What has happened to the new Iceland Store that was supposed to be opening in St Martins in September?
I think the Womens Institute did an excellent food price survey a couple of years ago comparing local prices against the same basket in the UK
Time for a repeat survey ????
I buy quite a lot of items from the UK and often find that carriage is free for orders over around £100. So why do our island retailers allegedly incur so much freight costs when placing much bigger orders?
Many electrical items can be bought by islanders online from the UK without VAT and without shipping costs for cheaper than some Town retailers can but the same item from their mandatory wholesale supplier. Our retailers don’t stand a chance but charging high prices just encourages even more people to shop online and it just snowballs from there.
Perhaps Mr Creasy and others such as Sandiper, will comment on the points made by David.
They deserve a response
iceland has been shelved julie.info came from a checkers employee.went to alliance yesterday.prices were def a lot cheaper.even the sunday roast beef was about £4 a kilo cheaper than checkers.
sounds like there is a definate case of “sour grapes” on the side of Mr Bagot , after all before he was fired he was recieving the benefits of the so called “rip-off” shops in the form of a salary , actually on a number of my normal shop i.e household goods, groceries etc Alliance is dearer, I am fortunate in that I have some spare time during the day ( I Work night shifts ) so I go round to all of the usual suspects and use the BOGOF offers or reduced price items, parents can do this on the way to do the school run etc. instead of sitting in car parks, saves time and money ( 5 minutes a day is all thats needed ) I know some will cry they are too busy but you need to do your shop sometime after all , one item i purchase in bulk from the UK is £3.99 each post free and yet alliance have at £5.72 , now whos ripping off ???
All the shops here rip us off, VAT is left on, mystery freight, this is n’t new although it is outrageous. Having said that we pay low tax on our wages and savings, the wages here are high and there’s no unemployment so perhaps we shouldn’t moan too much. as for this iceland shop people seem to want, i’m glad it has been shelved, the reason the food is so cheap is because it is rubbish, i’d rather spend more and put decent grub in me. go down the hedge veg, eat less and better.
One thing shoppers should be aware of is the marking of prices… I have had 6 instances recently in various Checkers outlets where I have seen the price on the shelf & thought it was good value - only to get to the checkout to see it scan through at anything up to £1.20 more expensive… Not sure why but I have always watched the till as items get scanned through & after having to complain 6 times in 4 weeks I will continue to do so & urge all shoppers to do the same!
Why are some shops such as Acessorize, Monsoon and Claire’s allowed to even open thier doors whilst still charging VAT, when we are a Vat free island? shouldn’t they be made to sign a contract before trading to say they will remove the tax? what goin on? and when will it get sorted?
WH Bonney has a point…Checkers can overcharge for items and unless you are watching the stuff get scanned you can very easily miss incorrect prices. Only this week a tin of Kidney beans scanned in 31p more than the sticker price and then it took 2 assistants to correct the error and gruffly reimburse the difference.
It’s got to the stage now where you actually need to check the till reciept before leaving the store.
NO food shops here are “cheap” - not even Alliance - but good on them anyway!
The COOP isn’t too bad if you rummage about, select own brands etc.
A little recent example: 500ml bottle of diet Pepesi. Checkers £1.15, Aquarium(!) £0.85 and the COOP 2 for £0.89!
Make of that what you will.
Of for Sainsburys/Tesco/ASDA/Morrisons