Coles ready to feed a million more Australians at home for Christmas

Coles is gearing up for catering to the grocery needs of an extra million Australians stuck at home and unable to travel overseas this Christmas.

Coles ambassador and TV cook Courtney Roulston and chef Luke Mangan get to work with the Coles Christmas food collection and new MasterChef Knives. Picture: Britta Campion

Coles is gearing up for catering to the grocery needs of an extra million Australians stuck at home and unable to travel overseas this Christmas, and believes it can ramp up its volumes to ensure there are no shortages on the shelves following the disruptions caused by COVID-19.

Unveiling the supermarket’s Christmas food range and a new collectables range of MasterChef quality knives on Wednesday, chief executive Steven Cain said consumer shopping over Christmas and summer should be bolstered by the economic stimulus provided in the federal budget.

He said the investment should help the nation get out of its economic dip a lot faster.

With some social restrictions still in place across the country due to COVID-19, he said Coles was positioning to benefit from more meals cooked at home and smaller family gatherings.

Fears the nation’s grocery supply chain would face bottlenecks due to restrictive workplace rules in Victoria after the second wave of the pandemic were now lessened as retailers made up some lost ground recently.

Mr Cain was confident Coles would be able to meet demand.

“The short answer is yes, the only challenge at the moment is … we are experiencing some delays in products from overseas. That is partly because of elevated demand overseas as well some of the issues on the docks and wharves here,’’ Mr Cain said referring to a recent union dispute on the docks that threatened shipping.

“Thankfully, more than 90 per cent of the product that we sell is Australian.’’

 

Following strict rules on the number of workers allowed at distribution centres and warehouses in August, there were concerns about food shortages at Christmas, but Mr Cain said his supply chain had geared up to maximise products getting on shelves. “We have been planning this for some time,” he said. “It is a bit different to what happened in March where we had the onset of panic buying and there was no warning.

“Christmas is something we take a long time in planning for and I think we have a good set-up.

“It has been helped by what the [federal] government has done on the Supermarket Taskforce and in Victoria with restoring volumes and the workforce back into DCs [distribution centres]. It would have been quite challenging, if not impossible, had those restrictions not been eased.”

A recent report from Credit Suisse analyst Grant Saligari forecast that due to travel restrictions, the nation’s population could increase by as much as 4 per cent, or about a million more mouths to feed over the summer holidays.

“We are expecting a good Christmas, a million extra Australians to feed,” Mr Cain said. “We are expecting the whole summer period will be about more family and friends gatherings in smaller numbers.’’

Spending would also be supported by tax cuts, wage subsidies and other stimulus measures in the budget.

“We are in as good a space as anyone from a country perspective and the money that has been invested quickly should mean that we come out of this faster as well,” Mr Cain.

Coles on Wednesday launched more than 275 new or improved products, including a Christmas food range and rewarding customers with MasterChef knives in its latest collectables campaign — the MasterChef Knives collection.