Loblaw president defends price of chicken; images shared are of 'specialty product'

Loblaw chairman and president Galen Weston defended the price of chicken breast at the company's stores in response to online images showing packages of a premium brand selling for upward of $27 per kilogram.

In January, CTV News Toronto Queen's Park correspondent Siobhan Morris shared a photo of a five-pack "President's Choice Free From Chicken" package, which the company calls a premium product, selling at a Toronto Loblaws for almost $27 per kilogram.

Another image shared by CTV Toronto showed a package of chicken at a Toronto Sobeys selling for approximately $28 per kilogram.

• Tailor the news you receive straight to your inbox by signing up for our newsletters

• Download our app to get breaking news alerts delivered right to you

Weston appeared at a parliamentary committee meeting in Ottawa on Wednesday, alongside the CEOs and presidents of grocers Metro and Empire, where MPs are studying inflated food prices in Canada.

According to Statistics Canada's latest inflation report, food prices rose 11.4 per cent year-over-year in January, nearly double the rate of inflation of 5.9 per cent and up from 11 per cent the previous month.

In the video at the top of this article, Weston responds to a question on the high price of items such as chicken at Loblaws, where he told reporters on Wednesday, "I think these are examples of customers gravitating towards the highest priced items when there's a perfectly competitively priced chicken right next door.

"And we looked at our chicken prices across the entire enterprise and are very confident that we're offering terrific value. As a matter of interest, we lose money on every breast of chicken that we sell."

Asked if this was a "failure" on his part to allow a product to go on the shelves at that price, Weston replied, "Chicken was at the right price in those stores available to customers and so we are absolutely confident about that and will continue to make every effort to ensure that that's the case."

He later added that the chicken in question is "a specialty product."

• Food inflation tracker: What are grocery prices like in your province?

The heads of Loblaw, Metro and Empire — which operates the Sobeys, Safeway and FreshCo chains — denied at the parliamentary committee meeting that they are responsible for food price inflation in Canada, arguing that their margins on food-related profits have remained low.

All three companies posted higher profits in the first half of 2022 compared to their average performance in the past five years, a report last fall from the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University found.

Weston argued that Loblaw made larger profits off financial services, apparel and pharmacy sales. He added that profits amount to about $1 for every $25 spent on groceries, with food prices increasing about 25 times faster than profit margins on food products.

The Competition Bureau is also studying whether a lack of competition in the grocery industry is contributing to higher prices. The federal government expects to receive a report and recommendations in June.

With files from CTV News Toronto Multi-Platform Writer Abby O'Brien, CTV News Toronto Queen's Park correspondent Siobhan Morris, CTVNews.ca Writer Tom Yun and The Canadian Press