Colruyt and JDE Peet’s end boycott

Belgian supermarket chain Colruyt has found an agreement with coffee producer JDE Peet’s to end the boycott and resume deliveries. The Douwe Egberts and L’Or owner is still in conflict with a number of other European retailers.

“Busy restocking”

In December, the retailer had stopped orders in protest against what it thought were “excessive” price increases by JDE Peet’s. As a result, many products from its many brands (also including the likes of Jacqmotte and Senseo) were no longer available in Colruyt stores. That will now change quickly: “The products will soon be available again in our stores. We are busy restocking”, Colruyt confirmed to news agency Belga.

Coffee prices have already risen by around 80 % this year, partly due to extreme weather conditions such as drought and storms. Brazil and Vietnam, the largest coffee producers in the world, expect lower harvests. Coffee producers are therefore forced to implement price increases, but many supermarket chains are not willing to just go along with those.

Among others, Ahold Delhaize and Jumbo in the Benelux, Auchan, Casino and Intermarché in France and Edeka and Aldi in Germany have stopped orders to put pressure on the manufacturer. They find the requested price increases unacceptable because, claiming they are much higher than the price increases at private label coffee producers.