2023-07-22 00:31:29
Myriam Delmée, president of SETCa in charge of trade, surprises with her unfailing calm and her precise and firm phrasing, while mass distribution has been in turmoil for several months. Flashback on 20 years serving distribution workers and on the main challenges of the sector.
Graduated in social law, Myriam Delmee always knew that his career would be aimed at improving the lot of workers. “Pure product of SETCa”, as she portrays herself, she now chairs the union of employees and managers. It is also on all the social fronts of the trade sector; a sector in turmoil with franchise files at Intermarché and Delhaize, the sale of Dreamland to Colruyt and discussions on theharmonization of joint committees that govern the sector.
How does a lawyer become a trade unionist?
When we study social law, we are very quickly led to “choose” a side in social dialogue: employers or workers.
I come from a relatively modest background in the Borinage, a left-wing background, without being an activist, but where we know what social conquests are. We therefore have no don’t want to be on the side of those who sometimes despise the workers. Now, this is not a quest to oppose employers. There are ways to build things.
In charge of distribution for 20 years, what changes have you witnessed?
Surely a less and less consultation. We are faced with groups that are increasingly distant from distribution in their shareholding. Our Belgian consultation is diluted in foreign groups. It is not uncommon in the non-food sector to no longer have HR in Belgium. It becomes complicated to explain why good consultation is an investment and not a cost.
“It becomes complicated to explain why good consultation is an investment and not a cost.”
We have also seen, especially in food, a price war to share the cake. Some brands are losing their DNA. Delhaize or Carrefour were brands with a quality of products and services, which translated into staff costs and product costs. They therefore might not compete in terms of price with the soft or hard discounters. This diversification has its place, but it does not lead to the same personnel/turnover ratio. To have the same ratio at Delhaize and at Albert Heijn is putting the finger in the eye up to the shoulder blade, because there are not the same services, products, the same loyalty and seniority of the workers and therefore the costs are different.
Full screen view ©Kristof Vadino
How to explain this Belgian attraction for foreign brands?
Part of the problem comes from the permissive settlement legislation large surfaces. The latest state reform has made it even easier by regionalizing the issue with the last locks that have been lifted in Wallonia.
The second is that Belgian customers easily shop abroad. The more the price differential increases – up to 50% on certain products – the more this trend increases. Intermarché and Jumbo arrived in Belgium via a brand that was known to us. However, these signs do not cross the linguistic border.
The shape of supermarkets has also evolved towards greater proximity
People are moving towards greater proximity and diversifying their shopping. Cora’s hypermarkets do not have fewer customers, but they spend less. The covid effect has also pushed circuit court or to the second hand for non-food.
Is the multiplication of franchisees a Belgian characteristic?
At Carrefour and Delhaize, development has been achieved for 10 years solely through franchising. There have been no more integrated created. Apart from Lidl and Aldi, the franchise is everywhere. What is striking at Delhaize is the decision to only franchise and be a distributor. At Colruyt, although 14 Okay stores have taken the opposite route, the franchise is also developing with Spar, smaller convenience stores that complement Colruyt.
Is a 100% franchised market possible?
Everything is possible. It remains to know how we are going to harmonize the joint committees (CP). If the goal of the franchise is to remove all collective labor relations and eliminate union organizations, it will not be so easy. If the harmonization of PCs aims for greater justice and equity, there are things to be done. It’s all regarding finding a balance avoiding social engineering and to have working conditions offering a career that allows you to live, not to survive for people with limited skills and qualifications.
We talk a lot regarding the reduced margins of brands. What should we expect?
Margins are tighter and tighter because there are more and more players and stores. The large distributors complain regarding the margins, but do not hesitate to multiply the stores and therefore amplify the reduction of the slices of the cake.
“The major distributors who complain regarding these tight margins are not shy regarding multiplying the stores even more and therefore increasing the reduction in the shares of the cake.”
As for negotiating prices with suppliers, we are in an ultra-capitalist relationship. Everyone wants to keep their margin. In the end, the extremes of the chain, producers and workers, are the least well off.
Is lax settlement legislation the crux of the matter?
Yes, but it is also a problem oftax harmonization of prices which pushes the customer abroad. The government is considering increasing VAT on certain products. It’s not going to bring money back to Belgian storesquite the contrary.
There is also the file of e-commerce, where it’s “open bar”. For more than 10 years we have been asking for a real debate with the sectoral organizations. We have had a collective agreement for several years on night work to organize e-commerce, but it is little used in business. Only Colruyt has introduced “voluntary” time slots from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. for order preparation.
However, in the meantime the giants plow the Belgian territory extensively Since neighboring countries. Those who, like Nike, managed to settle in Belgium, did so for logistics, not e-commerce.
Full screen view ©Kristof Vadino
Is Colruyt the right student, because it remains Belgian?
Colruyt knows its market, but Colruyt is not an easy model of social consultation. He just knows how to come up with solutions that aren’t bad enough to refuse.
Colruyt never deviates from its line as with its “best prices” and “red prices”. But it is a company in constant development and diversification. And as with Dreamland, where the stores are not profitable, Colruyt does not ask questions: it closes and moves on. Colruyt is right on just regarding everything: e-commerce, the collishop, raw developed in homeopathic and local doses-…
Finally, when we said “Jef (Colruyt, editor’s note) decides” – and it will be the same with his successor – we knew that it was a Belgian decision which allows a certain agility. At Delhaize, management is a “button press”. It’s not cynicism, it’s reality: the choices are not made in Belgium and it’s the same at Carrefour.
“When we said ‘Jef (Colruyt, editor’s note) decides’, we knew that it was a Belgian decision which allows a certain agility. At Delhaize, the management is a ‘button press’. This is not cynicism, it is reality: the choices are not made in Belgium. ”
Unions are often accused of defending their power? How do you respond to this accusation?
Power exists when the worker establishes a balance of power. At Delhaize, I hear that candidates are reluctant to take the franchise for fear of social unrest. But following the franchise, the unions will no longer be present. This does not mean that the workers will resign themselves. If it goes wrong, they will continue to fight. In the union’s legal department, one out of three visitors comes from trade. Affiliates will stay. But tomorrow, we will no longer be in a logic of compromise and consultation, but in a logic of individual conflicts.
How do you see the retail sector evolving?
Bad, unless the social interlocutors and the minister wet their jerseys a little to find solutions. But I’m quite pessimistic. I don’t sense a desire on Comeos’ side to sit around the table. Comeos and its principals are allergic to sectoral solutions and want turnkey, company by company.
More than 10 years ago, we negotiated wage premiums for extended opening hours for supermarkets. This was obtained in each company, but they refused to translate this at the sectoral level. So newcomers like Jumbo, Albert Heijn can use less expensive late hours. By refusing sectoral solutions, Comeos, under the pretext of the lack of unanimity of the members, is itself creating distortion.
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