2023-06-14 16:16:13
“The cherries, I don’t even approach them”, tackles Danielle Rose, retired. “Honestly, I do according to my means and that means that I have to deprive myself”, recognizes the pressed and annoyed octogenarian, who leaves with some sad yellow apples and two melons on sale.
To protect their budget, which has been heavily impacted by inflation, customers who slalom between the stalls favor fruits and vegetables from the summer season. Their prices have not skyrocketed for a year and have even sometimes dropped slightly, but they remain a “pleasure” product for the most modest.
Camped behind his peppers at 4 euros per kilo, Alexandre D’Arpa gives a few coins to a client. “It’s a… million euros, Madame, but I’m giving change”.
The young man has become a living distributor of jokes and spreads about soaring prices.
“We have to take the pill”, justifies the trader who gives himself the mission, after having dismissed his four salespeople, to “hold out while inflation passes”.
“No margin”
“But it lasts too long. The prices go up and the quality goes down. The baskets are smaller and smaller, we sell less, we make less margin”, summarizes the trader, also administrator of the union of sellers of the Parisian markets.
Unprecedented situation since the 1980s, the rise in consumer prices, which has been going on for months, again reached 14.1% for food products in France last May.
The government is trying with difficulty to put pressure on agrifood manufacturers who are reluctant to renegotiate with supermarkets the contracts concluded for 2023, in order to quickly lower prices on the shelves.
For the French markets, including that of Belleville, a historic oasis of bargains, these prices are negotiated between retailers and wholesalers at the Rungis market (Val-de-Marne), where almost all the products sold on its few markets come from. 200 stalls.
“Today I buy the potato 1.50 euro excluding tax per kilo and I resell it for two euros: there is no margin”, stings Mr. D’Arpa about his flagship product.
On certain other products, it is thus forced to catch up. A customer stands in front of the pile of garlic from Egypt and discovers its price on the slate: 9 euros per kilo. “My arms are falling off me,” she blurts out before fleeing.
The trader, who was still selling the condiment for three euros per kilo the previous week, got away with yet another pirouette: “He didn’t come swimming for the garlic, we paid for the plane ticket, Madam”.
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