Hawke’s Bay baker says wholesalers should be ‘stepping up’ as butter prices spike again

Another Kiwi butter price spike is frustrating Hawke’s Bay bakers, with one saying wholesalers should be “stepping up” and provide relief.

Increasing prices, changing brands, or switching to American butter are options. However, Courtney Booth, who runs and operates Cuteneys Cakes and Desserts, says that’s not palatable.

Foodstuffs and Woolworths say butter increases are influenced by overseas markets, beyond their control.

Booth shopped for her weekly butter last week – a salted 500g Woolworths block had jumped from about $7.30 to $8.39.

She said on a typical week, the business – which has Hastings and Napier stores – buys five boxes of butter from Woolworths for about $800.

She said the increase made margins “even tighter”.

“It’s a bit frustrating when you’re trying to budget on everything every week, and then turn up to the supermarket and see butter’s gone up.”

Booth said supermarket prices were lower than wholesalers, “which is really weird”.

She said wholesalers typically charge about $9 per block of butter when including GST, despite advertising prices online without GST.

Booth prefers Woolworths – she was put off Pam’s butter at Pak’nSave after black mould was found in the product in October.

She said there was also a limit on blocks per customer at her local Pak’nSave.

Booth wanted to see wholesalers “stepping up” and lowering prices.

A Foodstuffs spokesperson says the focus of its wholesaler Gilmours is on affordability and quality, rather than individual pricing.

“We work closely with suppliers to manage costs where possible.”

The spokesperson said prices on the Gilmours website are shown excluding GST, which is added at checkout.

“That’s standard practice for wholesale businesses serving GST-registered customers.”

A Foodstuffs North Island spokesperson said Pak’nSave stores were owned and operated by locals who occasionally limited items per customer.

“These limits are set by the store to ensure customers have fair access to certain products.”

Booth said she was reluctant to use cheaper American butter starting to appear on supermarket shelves as she only uses “good quality” products.

Booth spoke with Hawke’s Bay Today in November when the high price of chocolate was tightening the business’ margins.

She has since increased cake prices, but is reluctant to continue doing so.

“We might see it out for a couple of weeks and see if it goes back down, but otherwise we’ll just have to do it again.

“[But] at what point do people stop coming and buying stuff?”

From left: Baker John van den Berk and cake maker Courtney Booth are struggling with the high cost of dairy, particularly butter. Image / Composite

In Hastings, John van den Berk of John’s Bakery and Cafe said butter was a “real staple” of his baking.

He also bought butter from supermarkets, but purchased good quality Australian butter “about $2 a kilo cheaper” through a wholesaler.

He hadn’t tried the even cheaper American butter, but was willing to give it a go.

Van den Berk said the butter had “to keep the quality up”.

He said people were sick of rising prices and he was trying not to raise his.

“It’s so hard.”

A Woolworths spokesperson said butter pricing was influenced by several factors, primarily the fortnightly Global Dairy Trade (GDT) in US dollars.

“So the recently weaker NZ dollar has further raised the cost of dairy.”

The spokesperson said Woolworths suppliers review costs quarterly, allowing the supermarket to set retail prices every three months, “providing customers with greater price stability”.

Jack Riddell is a multimedia journalist with Hawke’s Bay Today and has worked in radio and media in the UK, Germany, and New Zealand.