Major consumer goods groups are coming under scrutiny from the Polish Competition and Consumer Protection Authority, which has launched an investigation into the "shrinkflation" practices adopted by Danone, Mondelez International, Nestlé, and Unilever for some products marketed in the country.
The investigation, conducted by UOKiK, the Polish Office for Competition and Consumer Protection, covers not only food, but also household cleaning and personal care products, and will determine whether companies have clearly and precisely communicated any reductions in the quantity or weight contained in their packaging.
The regulator's attention is focused primarily on cases in which the format has been resized without significantly altering the appearance or dimensions of the packaging, a circumstance that could lead customers to believe that the product has remained unchanged and make it less immediately clear that the actual price increase has occurred.
Shrinkflation refers to the practice whereby a company reduces the contents of a package while keeping the selling price stable, or nearly so, thus avoiding a directly visible price increase on the shelf but still determining an increase in the cost paid by the consumer for each unit of weight or volume.
“Reducing weight without changing the price effectively means that consumers pay more for the product,” said UOKiK President Tomasz Chróstny, who believed this approach makes it more difficult to compare available offers and risks undermining customer trust in companies.
The audit will therefore have to establish whether the information on packaging, shelves and other tools used to present the products is sufficiently visible and understandable to allow buyers to immediately recognise the change in format.
The Polish authorities' initiative follows a ruling issued last April by the Court of Justice of the European Union, which the UOKiK identified as a particularly important step in assessing shrinkflation from the perspective of EU consumer protection rules.
The Court clarified that compliance with food law does not prevent the competent authorities from verifying whether the way a product is presented could be misleading, thus paving the way for an examination of weight reductions also in the context of the rules against unfair commercial practices.
An item may therefore formally comply with the provisions regarding labelling and food safety, but still become the subject of a dispute if the information provided does not allow the consumer to understand with sufficient immediate clarity that the quantity contained in the package has decreased.
“The downsizing of packaging is not a new phenomenon,” Chróstny observed, underlining however that the recent European ruling has unequivocally confirmed the possibility of examining such practices also from a consumer protection perspective.
According to the UOKiK president, companies should accompany each change in weight or volume with clear, easily understandable, and immediately visible information, so that customers can correctly evaluate the product's value and compare it with available alternatives.
The authority's investigation is currently in the preliminary phase and does not constitute a formal complaint against the four multinationals. However, if sufficient evidence emerges to demonstrate that consumers have been deceived, the UOKiK may decide to initiate formal proceedings.
Mondelez Polska confirmed that it is cooperating with the Polish Office for Competition and Consumer Protection and has provided all requested clarifications, while no statements from the local divisions of Danone, Nestlé, and Unilever have been released so far.
The case demonstrates how shrinkflation is becoming increasingly important for European authorities, especially at a time when households are paying particular attention to the prices of everyday goods and trying to defend their purchasing power.
Reducing quantities can be a way for companies to absorb at least part of the rising costs of raw materials, energy, packaging, and distribution without directly affecting the displayed price, but it risks becoming problematic when the change is not communicated transparently.
From a consumer's perspective, packaging that maintains its shape, graphics, and dimensions virtually unchanged can make it difficult to notice a decrease in its contents, especially during frequent purchases made quickly and without checking the weight on the label each time.
The question at the heart of the Polish investigation is therefore not whether companies can change formats, but how these changes are presented to the public and whether the available information allows for a truly informed choice.
Poland is thus joining a debate already underway in other European countries, where governments and regulatory authorities are evaluating tools to make packaging reductions more recognizable and strengthen transparency in relationships between producers, distributors, and consumers.
In 2024, France introduced rules requiring medium and large supermarkets to display specific notices in their stores when the quantity of a food or drink decreases while the price remains stable or increases.
The aim of these provisions is to allow customers to immediately identify the variation and more easily calculate the true cost of the product, preventing the maintenance of apparently identical packaging from hiding a price increase per unit of measurement.
UOKiK's action could now help define new communication standards on the Polish market as well and push consumer goods companies to make changes in weight, quantity, and volume introduced into their portfolios more visible.
For Danone, Mondelez, Nestlé, and Unilever, the audit represents a delicate step, given the breadth of their product lines and the widespread presence of their brands, but the outcome of the review could have broader implications for other manufacturers operating in the country.
At the heart of the comparison remains the right of consumers to know the actual cost of the products purchased and to compare the different offers on the basis of complete, comprehensible and transparent information, without the reduction in quantities being masked by the substantial continuity of the price or the appearance of the packaging.
