mumsnetters supermarket comments

[Fifichef]

I would like to start a campaign that would force supermarkets to be truthful about the fresh food they sell. Do you think it would be a good idea for Mumsnet to have somewhere where we could post our comments on the 'naughties' that we discover? Mumsnet seems to get successfully involved in getting noticed in many political issues so perhaps we could get together to improve food standards.

What do you mean 'truthful', exactly?

what truth are you seeking?i buy on price not on whats on the naughty list. and what is naughty misdemeanour to one customer is no biggie to another customer! by all means have a comments list but my purse speaks louder than any naughty list.and i wouldnt stop purchasing on that basis

Can you give an example of a supermarket not being truthful re fresh food? Do you mean sell-by dates or contents or what?

last night dinner inc
cherry tomato,coriander all flown in from overseas.was labelled as such,not concealed.i made that choice.read the label, still bought it

what truth are you after?
what food standards do you seek to improve?

I'm really aiming mainly at the labelling.
I know that some people are restricted by price but for me cheapness doesn't come into it if I know that a certain meat item comes from an unrecoginisably named country I wouldn't buy it!! Another beef is the 'special offer' department. I've been thoroughly hacked off with seeing strawberries at half price all summer - £2 per punnet. Why did they not get any cheaper? It's an extortionate price.

How do you mean FIfichef?
I DO think there should be controls over the bollocks places like M&S use where they sell a salmon from a loc (is it loch muir? i forget) which actually, geographically doesn't even exist!!

quote:
Of Lochmuir, Andrew Mallinson, M&S fish expert, said: "It's a name chosen by a panel of consumers because it had the most Scottish resonance. It emphasises that the fish is Scottish."

The Scotsman understands Lochmuir salmon is in fact being farmed at five sites north of the Border by supplier Scottish Sea Farms after three years of research.

well if your purse/conscience extend to boycotts good for you.i buy on price and avilability.not bothered if food came from far-far-away-made-up.my purse dictates the price

Yes coraltoes that's one of my gripes. That channel 4 programme 'Food' is partly what brought my 'grumps' on. I feel that they are making fools of us and unless somebody looks into these thing we might never know.

Not sure what you mean.

Supermarkets do what we (the consumer) demand. We want lots of special offers. We get half-price strawberries all summer. We are our own worse enemies.

no one is being made a fool of.dont presume everyone shares your ire.

main thing i do make active choice on is eggs- i buy organic & free range

What do you mean by "unrecoginisably named country"?

Sorry I can't be arsed.

I never buy the fruit or veg in a supermarket. It is usually flown thousands of miles, frozen. When you buy it, its solid, by the time it softens it is rotten in the middle and devoid of flavour.

Much better to buy from a market or greengrocer.

Same with meat, it's usually from miles away, but if packaged in the Uk, they call it made in Britain. Aarggh. How can they get away with it?

Customers are sophisticated nowdays, so I know they have to try hard to make things appealing. My father is a butcher, and he always makes his display nice, with fresh hearbs and salads. But he doesn't need to make fancy claims for the product, becuase it is what he sells it as, proper, fresh, local meat. No one is easily fooled now, but the supermarkets are getting even better are hoodwinking us.

I think it is awful that it is cheaper to import food than use the british supply chain. THAT is what needs addressing, more so than the cost of strawberries...if you push the prices down too hard, british farmers can't actually survive to produce for supermarkets...you can't really complain about food miles and then also want local food super cheap.

I think that its a good idea.
For example, if I had bought the salmon from M+S I would have assumed that Loch Muir did actually exist.
I am not a fool, and I do know that they try to con us in all sorts of ways, but to actually dream up the name of a Loch!!!

I do recall bloody waitrose promoting british rhubarb on its Delia ads then only having the german stuff in store. blurgh
But that isnt "hiding a naughty" in the labelling...that was bad demand planning

There are rules that manufacturers/packers/supermarkets have to abide by when making factual statements on food products. With special offers, for example, the product has to have been offered for the higher price for a particular length of time. (And if you think £2 for 400g strawberries is extortionate you don't have to buy them, incidentally.)

Marketing is more fluid and a lot of time is spent designing packaging and thinking up product names to be appealing. Where would perfume be if it weren't for the fancy bottles and alluring names? BTW.. Should we boycott Shreddies because they actually aren't 'knitted by nanas'?

Oh damn, I would have picked up the rhubarb without checking in that case.
Maybe I am a fool!

Check out the article on the "Oakham Chicken" in The Daily Telegraph online - they are all at it creating "names" for their products, not just M&S and their Lochmuir salmon.

"It is usually flown thousands of miles, frozen. When you buy it, its solid, by the time it softens it is rotten in the middle and devoid of flavour."

Fresh produce is usually not flown anywhere simply because it is far too expensive. With the exception of very short-life products such as berries or sugar-snap peas, most of it is transported in refrigerated vessels or trucks. British produce is clearly marked.

"Check out the article on the "Oakham Chicken" in The Daily Telegraph online - they are all at it creating "names" for their products, not just M&S and their Lochmuir salmon."

Why is this such a surprise to anyone? Do people really think 'Aunt Bessie' made the frozen Yorkshire Puddings? Do we think 'Mars Bars' are from outer space? Or that Mr Kipling's 'French Fancies' are from France?

I do think we need clear labelling on everything - this is a thing that the WI is campaigning on this year - we want fresh produce to be labelled accordign to each step of its production.

At the moment, fresh produce can be labelled as being from a country at any stage of itsproduction.

So a lamb grown in NZ, can be shipped to Egypt for slaughtering, to Romania to be chopped into chops, and to england to be wrapped in people-sized portions.
It can then be sold as NZ lamb or as British, if they want.

The WI's campaign is that the food be labelled at every part of the process.
so in this case, it would have to say
reared in NZ, processed in Egypt, Romania and England. (it wouldn't have to say "slaughtered")

That way, consumers can be aware of where there food comes from, and where it's been.

Taht doesn't mean that shoppers can't make their choice based on cost, but it does mean that they can see what's happened to their food.
I personally make my choice based on where it's come from/how it's been reared and then on cost.

These guidelines would not override the growing regulations on Battery, Barn, Organic etc.

ShirleyKnot - I would be sued if I mentioned any names of countries so I'm not going there. Chil 1234 you sound as though you are employed by a supermarket. I realise that there are rules with labelling but food 'marketing' people are employed to get round the rules and they surely do.

Also it is not transported frozen, but chilled - if it were frozen, it would go mushy when defrosted to be displayed.

I don't have a problem with it at all. The only thing I care about is buying free range eggs and chicken and that's it. Who cares if 'Oakham chicken' is made up? Big deal? If it is free range I buy it, not because it has 'Oakham' in the name.
I am also not bothered by Veg getting flown in from far off countries either because the people in the country producing the veg depend on it. If we didn't buy it they would have no money or living.