getting a little tired of the crack/meth heads

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I mean, they are being investigated for this, so it's not like Nik's point is baseless.

https://financialpost.com/news/retai...etition-bureau

Let's see how that turns out...in June.

Of robbing the store?

[nik-]

Loss prevention raises prices is a canard. They charge the maximum they think customers will pay without losing them, loss prevention or not. The BOC has given them a great excuse to gouge the #### out of people, that's why the profits are up so much.

[81MC]

Originally Posted by Locke

…The only people getting screwed by Grocery theft is Grocery consumers. So...the rest of us...who pay for our groceries.

I’m picking up what you’re putting down…

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by 81MC

I’m picking up what you’re putting down…

Now try walking out of the store with it. Feels good, doesn’t it?

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by opendoor

But that's not really what's happening. Here's Loblaws' Net Income and revenue by year for the last 5 years:

2018: $766M on $46.7B in revenue
2019: $1.08B on $48B in revenue
2020: $1.11B on $52.7B in revenue
2021: $1.88B on $53.2B in revenue
Last 12 months: $2.14B on $55.3B in revenue

So revenue went up by 18% and Net Income went up by 179%.


Empire (who owns Sobeys, Safeway, FreshCo, etc.) has seen similar growth:

2018: $160M on $24.2B in revenue
2019: $387M on $25.1B in revenue
2020: $584M on $26.6B in revenue
2021: $702M on $28.3B in revenue
2022: $746M on $30.2B in revenue

Revenue saw 25% growth and Net Income roughly tripled (2018 was a down year, so I compared 2022 to their average net income in the years around then).

Now the companies claim that the huge increase in margins is because they're seeing more business in their their higher profit areas (pharmacy and whatnot), but neither has provided any evidence of that and their financial statements don't show that.

Damn. Thanks for the data. That's more info than I would have expected.

I cannot imagine pharmacy accounting for all that much of the increase. Frankly, when people's money gets tight they're less likely to buy vitamins and so forth, it seems to me... also, we just had a couple of years where the rate of cold and flu was massively down. So... yeah, not making much sense there.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Damn. Thanks for the data. That's more info than I would have expected.

I cannot imagine pharmacy accounting for all that much of the increase. Frankly, when people's money gets tight they're less likely to buy vitamins and so forth, it seems to me... also, we just had a couple of years where the rate of cold and flu was massively down. So... yeah, not making much sense there.

I’d think the pharmacies would be making profits from filling prescriptions, not in the selling vitamins or neo-citron. I mean, if money was tight I’d certainly cut down on vitamins, but not medication that’s covered by insurance anyway.

[JohnnyB]

There has been no shortage of price hikes to increase profits on products with inflexible demand. Inflation has provided a strong narrative to misdirect blame, and most of the people who suffer will never look at earnings reports.

The efforts to control inflation would have been much better had they come with price caps on essentials such as groceries.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Damn. Thanks for the data. That's more info than I would have expected.

I cannot imagine pharmacy accounting for all that much of the increase. Frankly, when people's money gets tight they're less likely to buy vitamins and so forth, it seems to me... also, we just had a couple of years where the rate of cold and flu was massively down. So... yeah, not making much sense there.

I mean, I'm sure there's some truth in what they're saying. Public companies can't really flat out lie to shareholders about their operations. But at the same time, they don't actually provide any concrete numbers to back up what they're saying.

And also, to be fair, Net Income can be greatly affected by accounting tricks and whatnot. But even just looking at Loblaws' EBITDA (which eliminates most of that), that has gone up about 80% in the last 5 years while revenue has only increased 18%.

[Fuzzy14]

Discussion with Calgary transit officials (and transit protection officers) reveals that most of the "tweekers" have a valid ticket (a fare evasion ticket can apparently lead to police warrants)

Thus we could spend millions creating /retro fitting fare barriers but probably won't actually induce much change on the situation.

I have no data to back up my response to this, but there’s no way this is true lol.

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy14

I have no data to back up my response to this, but there’s no way this is true lol.

There was an article written about this within the last couple months and I remember seeing it and the discussion on the topic on Reddit. It was pretty surprising because it goes against conventional expectation. I'll try to dig around and find the reference.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by opendoor

I mean, I'm sure there's some truth in what they're saying. Public companies can't really flat out lie to shareholders about their operations. But at the same time, they don't actually provide any concrete numbers to back up what they're saying.

And also, to be fair, Net Income can be greatly affected by accounting tricks and whatnot. But even just looking at Loblaws' EBITDA (which eliminates most of that), that has gone up about 80% in the last 5 years while revenue has only increased 18%.

Well the numbers on Loblaws bear what they're telling you. I looked at their figures, and the front store (not food or pharmacy) same store sales are up an enormous amount, just in 2022. That segment was up by about 10.5% the quarter ended September 30 and another 7.5% (estimated) for the quarter that ended Dec 31. It's over 100% growth in sales in that area, and pretty clearly a significant impact on the bottom line.

When you look at food and the year over year figures, you're seeing a projection for 3.9% growth. That's revenue...which would include the higher prices. Front Store is looking 7% through 2022 and the pharmacy 5.3%.

And I'm not a big fan of EBITDA, personally, because I care about valuing the business (removing interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization for that purpose always struck me as a poor idea). At any rate, the growth there is only 7.8%/year. I say only, because while that works out the same metric (the 80% increase), it's not really egregious. If you compare them to a company like Metro (in the same sector), they have an EBITDA over five years of about 13.6%/year.

Lest anyone think that they're really cranking up prices though (an basically just don't believe me), you can see their margins. While they're up in the past five years on both a gross and net basis, it's not extortionate. The gross margin has risen about 2.6% since 2017, and the net is up about 0.3% (both through the end of 2021). Again comparing Loblaws to Metro (because I used them earlier), their gross margin is up by about 5.2% in the past five years (through notably way lower than the margin for Loblaws), and the net margin stayed level. It would appear to me that Loblaws just sells a lot more items with better margins, plain and simple. That's not food or things of that nature, it's in that other "half" of the store.

So, while Canadians should definitely be upset about the bread pricing scandal (that seems to have disappeared from a few years ago!), the truth is they're not making an unreal amount of money with the current inflationary run.

Thought that I'd update this with Empire that was discussed earlier in the thread. They're also holding their net and gross margins almost flat from 2017 through 2022, so nothing to see there. Their margins are also quite a bit lower than what you see with Loblaws, and likely for similar reasons. Also wanted to note that when you read the report for Empire they note that they had an increased cost in Sales and General Admin expenses. That's specifically the cost of fuel and general inflation that is digging into their profits. That was partially offset with higher fuel sales for them, but it still impacted them. They say their gross margin (which rose about 0.3% in the quarter) would've been up 58bps if that was a non-factor. What that means, is that the fuel sales are lower margin than some of the other things, and pulled that figure down as a result.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy14

I have no data to back up my response to this, but there’s no way this is true lol.

It may cost them as little as $5.60 per month

https://www.calgarytransit.com/conte...thly-pass.html

[Cecil Terwilliger]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

It may cost them as little as $5.60 per month

https://www.calgarytransit.com/conte...thly-pass.html

Even if it does, it’s not relevant. Smoking meth on the train isn’t allowed just as long as you paid your fare.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

Even if it does, it’s not relevant. Smoking meth on the train isn’t allowed just as long as you paid your fare.

It gets rid of the moronic idea of barrier stations as a potential solution.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

Even if it does, it’s not relevant. Smoking meth on the train isn’t allowed just as long as you paid your fare.

Sure, but what about all the time leading up to the smoking?

[Fuzzy14]

I believe smoking meth on the train lines you up to have your bus pass revoked, which would then bring the conversation about barriers back into the spotlight wouldn't it?

[JohnnyB]

What are barrier stations?

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by JohnnyB

What are barrier stations?

I think he meant turnstiles and gating entry to the platforms.

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by Wormius

I think he meant turnstiles and gating entry to the platforms.

They don't have turnstiles and gated entry?

[Fuzzy14]

They don't have turnstiles and gated entry?

Apparently, from what i'm reading, we don't need them because the same people that violate the rules around drug use on the train observe rules around paying to use the train, which would make turnstyles "moronic".