“An aberration”: Michel-Edouard Leclerc criticizes the sales authorization due to fuel loss

Like its competitors Carrefour, Intermarché or Système U, Leclerc has no intention of activating the lever of selling at a loss, although the Government has exceptionally released it due to the increase in fuel prices.

Michel-Edouard Leclerc himself confirmed it this Sunday in an interview with JDD. “Distributors not only oppose loss-making sales, but they do not have the capacity to do so,” says the president of the strategic committee of the Leclerc centers, adding that “fuel represents between 20 and 25% of the figure business”. ” from certain distributors. “Therefore, it is inconceivable that the balance of our accounts will be sold at a loss.”

“It’s inconsistent”

Michel-Edouard Leclerc declares himself “shocked” by the Government’s announcement to authorize the sale of fuel at a loss. “Once we were informed, we obviously called our competitors – and also our colleagues – to, each one on their own, convince our interlocutors at the Ministry of Industry, in Bercy and in Matignon, that this decision was an aberration and that we had to pick up the money that was circulating,” continues the head of the leading group in the large-scale distribution sector.

For him, this measure “is not only a setback but is incoherent.” “Say, on the one hand, ‘we authorize you to sell at a loss and then we will see the problem of the small pump attendants’ and, on the other hand, we force ourselves to sell food products 10% more expensive to protect small farmers . , does not make a very readable policy,” he laments. Without taking into account that “the ability of distributors to sell at a loss is marginal; it is limited to a few cents (…)”.

Michel-Edouard Leclerc believes that “beyond a costly psychological threshold, that is to say beyond two euros, only the State can act”, either by deciding to “lower taxes” or by blocking the “refinery outlet prices”. “This price is decisive in the resale price. It would be enough to impose it on the refinery operators,” suggests the manager, for whom “the effort should be made by the oil companies.”