The highest drop in prices from grocery products was recorded for flour, tomato juice, sugar and mayonnaise. Meanwhile, in the category of dairy products, price declines has mostly affected cheese, cottage cheese and glazed cheeses. Such changes in prices were recorded at Maxima stores, comparing product prices during the first half of 2018 and 2017.
“Main factors for customers to choose one or another product are always a wide assortment, especially of fresh food, quality of goods and low prices. During the first half of this year, customers benefited from price changes in fruit and vegetable departments. And although these changes were largely caused by seasonal and climatic conditions, long-term close cooperation with suppliers allowed us to offer our customers some products cheaper than they cost in the first semester of the last year”, says Vilma Drulienė, Chief Commercial Officer at Maxima, Maxima press release wrote.
According to her, the most significant price decline was recorded in the departments of vegetables and fruit – as much as 10-49 percent. In the first half of this year, the most significant drop of prices was noted for garlic (49 percent or EUR 2.20 on average), green zucchini (41 percent or EUR 0.51 on average), leeks (40 percent or EUR 0.89 on average), mandarins (37 percent or EUR 0.68 on average), small red grapefruits (32 percent or EUR 0.50 on average) and potted lettuce (32 percent or EUR 0.23 on average).
In the dairy products category in the first half of 2018, compared to the same period last year, the recorded price decline was 10-27 percent. The greatest drop in prices was noted for cow dairy cheese (27 percent or EUR 0.35 on average), vanilla cottage cheese (27 percent or EUR 0.87 on average), semi-fat cottage cheese (18 percent or EUR 0.12 on average), Brie cheese (17 percent or EUR 0.16 on average), and glazed chocolate cheeses (32 percent or EUR 0.06 on average).
In the grocery category, the price decline of 10-34% was registered in the first half of the year. The biggest drop in prices was noted for wheat flour (34 percent or EUR 0.29 on average), tomato juice (28 percent or EUR 0.31 on average), sugar (25 percent or EUR 0.17 on average), pasta (24 percent or EUR 0.11 on average), mayonnaise (22 percent or EUR 0.61 on average), margarine (21 percent or EUR 0.21 on average), raisins (16 percent or EUR 0.10 on average), and vegetable oil (32 percent or EUR 0.17 on average).
V. Drulienė says that Maxima is constantly striving to ensure that customers find all necessary products at the best prices at Maxima stores. The retail chain is committed to “Low Price Guarantee” – ensuring the lowest prices in Lithuania for one thousand best-selling products, i.e. if Maxima finds that a product in another network costs lower, Maxima immediately reduces the usual price for the same good. The prices of some popular items are compared not only with the prices of Lithuanian but also Polish trade networks.