“We also allege that in many cases both Woolworths and Coles had already planned to later place the products on a “prices dropped” or “down down” promotion before the price spike, and implemented the temporary price spike for the purpose of establishing a higher “was” price.
It’s a pity the small chains do exactly the same shit.
My local supermarket (formerly an IGA, now Drake’s) recently did that with an item I buy regularly. Bumped the price up from $26 to $45, only to have it ‘on sale’ a week later for $28. Wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the only instance.
The funny thing is that I could have probably lived with the direct price increase, but that doesn’t sell as well to the people who aren’t paying attention. All they see is the ‘price drop’ sticker.