It is a face that the French know well. That they see displayed on their television screen with each economic upheaval. Blue shirt, navy jacket, salt and pepper hair: Michel-Edouard Leclerc, boss of the shopping centers of the same name, is regularly received in majesty on the sets of continuous news channels. In recent weeks, in the wake of the outbreak of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he has even chained them at a brisk pace – often more than two a week – to explain price increases on a series of products in its stores. At a time when the risk of lasting inflation heightens concerns about the purchasing power of the French, his word is very listened to. Good customer, the man enjoys, like other CEOs of large retailers – Dominique Schelcher, boss of System U, or Alexandre Bompard, that of the Carrefour group – of a media treatment worthy of a minister bis of the Economy.
This observation is that of the latest study by the Jean-Jaurès Foundation: The supermarket society, role and place of mass distribution in contemporary France. From hundreds of establishments to tens of thousands, supers and hypermarkets have long meshed France. Companies which, in less than a century, have placed themselves urbi et orbi at the heart of the “fight for the purchasing power of the French”. They have captured the issues, often better than the political world. And while they seemed threatened by the rise of e-commerce, the health crisis, then the inflationary period which has just begun has placed these companies at the center of the game, with the power of action which sometimes supplants that of State.
Disruption of industry
Since its creation in the 1950s, mass distribution has had a DNA: to distribute products en masse and sell them at low prices. Armed with this credo, the brands have developed at breakneck speed. France, which counted 1,800 supermarkets and 200 hypermarkets in 1970, now has 10,000 and 2,000 respectively. And their influence is all the more significant as these distributors have become key players in employment. Intermarché has 150,000 employees; Leclerc 133,000, Carrefour 105,000; Auchan and System U, 70,000 each.
By comparison, industry is lagging, the number of employees of the country’s large companies (Airbus, Renault, Total) not exceeding 50,000. “In industrial society, it was the factory that structured local life When they closed, large retailers filled the void,” explains Raphaël Llorca, expert associated with the Jean-Jaurès Foundation, co-author of the study with political scientist Jérôme Fourquet. The local fortunes are no longer the bosses of the factories, but the Leclerc franchisees. Peugeot no longer sponsors FC Sochaux, but Auchan is still a partner of RC Lens. “As the industry has broken up, the local fabric has been structured around distributors, continues Raphaël Llorca. We have gone from industrial society to supermarket society.”
Meeting places
The workforce of large retailers is almost comparable to that of public services, while France has 282,000 postal workers, 150,000 police officers and 42,000 professional firefighters. “In the same way, when public services are declining, supermarkets are still open,” continues Raphaël Llorca. In a fractured France, these stores remain the place where different social backgrounds meet, “from the most sore to the most precarious”, notes the study. “By bringing together different ranges in the same place, mass distribution has provided common benchmarks for all social backgrounds, notes Vincent Chabault, sociologist and author of Store praise. Everyone goes to the supermarket.” Testimony of this central place of these places in our collective social imagination: in the fall of 2018, during the first upheavals of the yellow vests movement, the demonstrators did not block factories or squares village… But hypermarkets. The French are well aware of this: in an OpinionWay survey carried out in May 2020, 72% of them believed that food stores played an “important local role of proximity, ‘supply, link and encounters’.
During the first confinement, large retailers indeed took on structural responsibilities in health armament. From May, distributors marketed tens of millions of masks and then, later, self-tests. When the public authorities were struggling to meet the country’s needs, the supermarkets broke their logistical strike force. At the time, LR deputy, Damien Abad lamented: “What is incomprehensible is that Carrefour and Leclerc are more powerful than the state. They have the capacity to place massive orders.” In their communication, the companies also celebrated the famous “front lines” which enabled society to function at the height of the pandemic. “You are no longer just Carrefour, you are the public food service”, wrote Alexandre Bompard in a letter to his employees on March 22, 2020. “This did not necessarily result in salary increases, but the large distribution celebrated the first lines when the State was struggling to highlight them”, remarks Raphaël Llorca.
“Change the life”
Bolstered by their new “welfare-business” ambitions, capable of taking on responsibilities hitherto falling to the State, they did not stop there. On their original marketing credo – the defense of purchasing power – they are more than ever on the offensive. In August 2021, while the spotlight of the presidential campaign is on Eric Zemmour and the theme of immigration, the big brands insist on the subject of the expensive life, through interviews in the media, advertisements, actions price punches. From November 2021, Carrefour freezes the prices of 300 “everyday” products of its private label. Casino and Intermarché do the same with their prices at the pump. Rebelote in January 2022, when Leclerc boasts of his baguette “at a fixed price” at 29 cents to “defend the purchasing power of the French”. And this, even if it means arousing the ire of bakers and farmers, taken by the throat.
The presidential candidates will not seize the question before the onset of winter. “When a leader of a large brand explains that prices are blocked, the effectiveness of his announcement is immediate, unlike that of the State, which takes place over a longer period of time. This creates gratitude for the former, and bitterness vis-à-vis the second, deciphers Raphaël Llorca. Supermarkets give the feeling of being the last actor to be able to ‘change the lives’ of consumers.”
Megaphone
It also serves as their mouthpiece by capturing anger in its advertisements. “Everyone asks you for effort, but no one talks to you about comfort”, chants for example a recent advertisement from the Intermarché group. Each major brand takes on board the “populist codes”, trying to capture the annoyance of the population and take advantage of it. During the confinement, Monoprix displayed posters in several stores to ridicule the government’s decision on “basic necessities”. “A commission having just concluded that water is wet, we finally have the right to sell you umbrellas”, mocked an advertisement. Retailers are acting as players “in the field” in the face of elites “disconnected” from reality. A somewhat Poujadist rhetoric, and paradoxical, when you think about it: in the 1950s, Pierre Poujade’s protest movement was born among small traders, in particular opposing… mass distribution. “Today, it has a cathartic role as a receptacle for anger, deciphers Raphaël Llorca. Everything happens as if the large distribution sector was wearing this costume to extinguish any disputes. Which makes it an objective ally of the State.
This lightning rod function is also very useful to him. By absorbing the criticisms against the high cost of living, or by integrating the consumer’s search for “more authenticity”, the sector manages to mutate with the times. Several times announced in difficulty in the face of the onslaught of e-commerce, the model resists. But in a context of sharply rising prices, their promise to fight against the high cost of living may prove difficult to keep. Especially since the distributors are far from being blameless. On July 20, a Senate report singled out the sector for “questionable” practices, “artificially inflating inflation”. “Current negotiations are already very tough, including with small producers who are only trying to pass on their costs to their prices, remarks Philippe Moati, professor of economics at the University of Paris-Diderot and co-founder of the Observatory society and consumption What will happen if the demands of distributors lead small producers to go out of business? Difficult balance, which the brands claim to want to maintain during this turbulent period. “The plasticity of supermarkets and their ability to adapt means that they will be even more central in this moment of high inflation, assures Raphaël Llorca. The power of mass distribution still has a bright future ahead of it.”