Migros baby slippers: recalled for safety reasons
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Migros is alerting the public to blue and white baby slippers with a moose head decoration that it is recalling for quality problems: parts on the moose head can come loose and pose a safety risk to small children. The slippers have been sold since July 2010. Article number: 8923.023, price CHF12.90. Contact your nearest Migros to return them.
Migros has been making a push to encourage electric cars on the Swiss market
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – A 200m2 Migros m-way store opens at rue de Lausanne 54 in Geneva today, near the Cornavin station, in the same historic registered building that houses the Brazilian Mission.
It’s the first electric mobility shop for Migros in French-speaking Switzerland, and to make sure the public beats a path to it the store is offering 25 percent off on everything except cars to customers who spend CHF1,000 or more.
M-way is the public face of Migros’s push to encourage green energy and the shop sells electric scooters, bikes but also electric cars and home charging stations plus all the other accoutrements of a life that includes electric vehicles.
Summer, Grimsel Pass, Alpmobil partnering with Migros for silent, less polluting electric cars
The company is extending its programme of charging stations, and it’s been active in working with Alpine resorts to introduce fleets of electric cars for tourists, to reduce pollution in the mountains.
Hiking near the Jungfraujoch (baby gets a backpack ride), August 2011
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – WWF, the environmental organization, and Switzerland’s largest supermarket chain, Migros, are joining forces to help children learn more about and appreciate the Swiss Alps. Mountainmania is a seven-week online quiz programme that kicks off 13 September, designed to teach children more about the Alps.
The two organizations are ready to hand out 50,000 diplomas to “mountain champions” who correctly complete the quiz.
“We need to take care of our Alps,” says WWF chief executive Hans-Peter Fricker. “We’ll only be able to do this if we instill a love for the mountains in children, starting as early as possible.”
Migros will be featuring its bio brands during this period, aiming to increase their sales by 10 percent during the seven weeks. The mountainmania albums that are sold will contribute CHF1 per album to WWF Alpine projects that include restoring areas of the Rhone and Rhine rivers to natural habitats for trout and beavers, and helping encourage the natural return of large carnivores to their Alpine habitats.
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Migros, Switzerland’s largest supermarket chain, is about to start trialling two new shopping systems, both designed to save time in checkout lines, says the store. The first will allow shoppers to scan a limited number of large items themselves. The second will allow them to check themselves out by scanning a limited number of items and paying for them.
Ikea has had a similar system for some time, but not for food items. Migros is starting its Subito system in Zurich, Lucerne and several areas in eastern Switzerland 6 September before rolling it out across the country.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Supermarket chain Migros is doing its bit to make Switzerland more habitable for endangered hares, birds and plants by empowering Facebook users to help support TerraSuisse financially. Migros will supple enough seeds for an IP (integrated production) Suisse farmer working with the TerraSuisse programme to plant one square metre of wildflowers in 2012 for each Facebook user who “likes” the Terrasuisse FB page.
TerraSuisse is Migros’s sustainable development label. Farmers who apply integrated production methods, which are close to organic, make a commitment to provide small habitats, or safe spaces, within larger fields and orchards, for wild flora and fauna.
CHF/euro data from Reuters 27 August 2011 (http://www.reuters.com/finance/currencies)
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – You can pay less to colour your hair with Oreal and eat a Kellogg’s breakfast starting Monday. Migros and Coop have negotiated a second major round of price cuts with multinationals and some 2,000 products will cost less 29 August in their Swiss supermarkets and do-it-yourself stores.
The two retailers are pushing for multinationals’ lower import prices to be passed on to Swiss consumers. The Swiss franc has risen
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Switzerland’s largest supermarket chain, the Migros cooperative group, will cut prices on some 500 products Monday 22 August. The group says it has negotiated deals with several of its suppliers to pass on their currency gains from the strong franc to Swiss consumers, through price cuts. Coop and Denner, which belongs to Migros, have both cut prices this week, although Coop has said its 50 percent cuts are designed to get rid of stock on shelves from suppliers who have not agreed to cuts: once gone, the brands will not be restocked.
The Migros reductions of 10-20 percent include: Nestlé (San Pellegrino, Nestlé Baby, etc.), Ferrero (Kinder, Nutella, etc.), Beiersdorf (Nivea), Procter & Gamble (Braun), Unilever (Axe) and L’Oréal (Studio Line), the company says in a statement 16 August.
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Migros is recalling its Prosciutto cotto Gran Riserva, sold in several cantons including Basel, Vaud and Zurich, after the Zurich cantonal lab found evidence of Listeria.
The bacteria can be particularly harmful to pregnant women and anyone with immune system problems. Headaches, fever and nausea experienced after eating the ham should be reported promptly to a doctor.
Consumers should not eat the product and will be reimbursed when they return it to any Migros store.
Online shopping CO2 savings could light a city the size of Sion
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – LeShop in 2010 maintained its strong annual growth rate, with sales up 15 percent over 2009 to CHF151 million. Increased use of LeShop’s iPhone app, which accounted for 5 percent of December sales, was a strong growth factor.
Fresh food items last year were 25 of the 30 most popular products, putting to bed firmly the idea when online shopping began more than a decade ago that shoppers would buy little fresh or refrigrated food.
LeShop, owned by Migros, is Switzerland’s largest online supermarket, selling the store’s entire range of 12,000 products online. It has been making strong inroads since growth took off in 2004, with 38,000 households ordering from its online service for the first time in 2010. Some 3,000 household deliveries, with 200 tons of food, are made daily.
Anna's-Best products recalled
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – Migros has announced a recall of Anna’s Best “India Paneer Mutter” and “India Madras Fish Curry with Cocos Rice,” as they may be dangerous to people with allergies to a combination of fish and mustard.
The pre-cooked food items contain a combination of fish and mustard, and cheese and fish which could be dangerous to people with allergies.
Only products labeled as “à vendre jusqu’au 14.09.2010, à consommer jusqu’au 26.9.2010,” are affected by the recall.
Food products may be returned to any Migros store for a full refund.
For more information contact the Migros customer service: +41 (0) 848 84 0848 or via email: m-infoline@migros.ch
Wheat harvest the old-fashioned way
Update 12:30 Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Migros and Coop, the two largest food retailers in Switzerland have warned that food prices may rise because of the difficult weather conditions this summer, according to the Wall Street Journal 5 August.
Migros spokeswoman Olivia Luginbuehl explained that the wheat harvest in Switzerland may come in at almost 10-15 percent lower than expected, although almost 70 percent of the wheat for 2010 has already been harvested.
Switzerland imports about 15 percent of its wheat needs, about 70,000 tons, and does this via longer-term contracts. The strong Swiss franc has helped to keep import prices low for now, she says, and the price of bread should stay stable in the short term, but the sudden surge in world prices will eventually affect Switzerland’s prices too, she told GenevaLunch.
Coop spokesperson Denise Stadler says that Switzerland imports durum wheat for pasta mostly from Canada, which had serious flooding in Spring, and imported wheat for bread comes Germany, France and Austria. She points out that Coop tries to soften the impact of increased prices by spreading them out; retailers like Coop are also quick to pass on savings to consumers when prices drop.
Switzerland's favourite brand in 2010
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros has just moved up three places to take the top slot as Switzerland’s number one brand for the first time, according to Young & Rubicam’s “BrandAsset Valuator” 2010. The consulting agency, an arm of the advertising agency of the same name, surveyed 1,100 Swiss people who gave the Migros brand points for repesenting “Swissness” and traditional values. The supermarket chain which has a series of linked brands, such as Migrol for petrol sales, says its M-Budget label performed particularly well in the survey.
The BAV’s top 20 list includes names known well outside Switzerland, such as Coca-Cola and Google.
There is even room for the groceries!
Migros says electric cars will rent for CHF1,200 a month and scooters for CHF150 a month
Update 19:35 Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros is no stranger to transport, as one of Switzerland’s main suppliers of petrol, but the country’s largest supermarket is about to start selling us electric parks and a series of services for electric vehicles that will include: a “lively” Internet site, insurance, financing, regular car services and maintenance, advice.
The supermarket chain will kick off the new set of electric vehicle services through a partnership with Alpmobil in the Goms (Conches) Valley, east of Brig in canton Valais. The tourism project will offer visitors 60 electric vehicles supplied by Migrol, the petrol station brand owned by Migros. The cars will be spread around the Goms Valley, available at train stations and hotels, for example, says Alpmobil, which is a tourism planning project covering the San Gottardo region.
“The energy for this project is also coming out of the region and consists of hydro power and in future also increased wind power and PV power. The goal is to reduce the CO2 emissions and respirable dust and last but not least noise reduction,” says project director Dionys Hallenbarter.
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Supermarket cooperative group Migros posted a 20.8 percent increase in profits, CHF846 million, in 2009 despite a 3.1 percent fall in sales, the company announced Tuesday 30 March.
Turnover was CHF24.95 billion, of which retail sales were CHF21.04b.
Max Havelaar fair trade football
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Migros supermarket chain Friday 5 March starts selling a fair trade football made in Sialkot, in northeastern Pakistan, which has Max Havelaar fair trade certification. The men and women who produce the balls will receive a fair trade premium that gives them better access to healthcare and can be used to help send their children to school, says Migros.
New barcode reader with speech introduced by Swiss store Migros for visually impaired customers
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Supermarket chain Migros is offering visually-impaired and blind customers a world first: vocal readings of food labels, using a special scanner for food labels. “This will help make us more autonomous,” says Martin Mischler of the Union suisse des aveugles, Migros’s partner in the project.
The new reader will help customers identify a can of fruit versus a can of vegetables, for example, in the store but also once the goods are on the shelf at home.
Migros and the l’Union suisse des aveugles, a non-profit group for sight-impaired people, are using a tool created by Bones SA, a Swiss engineering firm that develops and sells products and projects to make life easier for the visually impaired.
The new label-reading system will be available in Migros shops in March 2010, with the readers distributed by the Union suisse des aveugles. A number of the readers will later be made available to shoppers in some Migros stores, on a test basis.
S1 Ortovox avalanche finder - contact them right away
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros, one of the stores where customers have been buying an avalanche finder made by Ortovox, is alerting consumers that the gear, if purchased in August 2009 or later, may need a software update to function correctly.
Ortovox provides images and details, in English, on its web site. Models affected have an orange on-off button and use software version 1.2.3073 or 1.2.3074.
The company urges owners of the S1 to contact them immediately for the update, for safety reasons. It will undertake the cost of updates.
Taking a bite out of Swiss bankers' bonuses
Taking a bite out of Swiss bankers' bonuses
Credit Suisse cuts bonuses to pay UK tax, UBS told by Finma to reduce payout
Migros takes in former big bank clients
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland’s two largest banks will be paying out bonuses, but the amounts are shrinking. Credit Suisse, has told several media 19 January that its overall bonus pool will shrink by 5 percent as it reduces payouts to senior managers to cover the new UK bank tax. The UK has announced it will levy a 50 percent tax on bonuses over £25,000, a one-time charge. Some 400 senior managers in the UK will have their bonuses cut up to 30 percent, Bloomberg reports.
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros is recalling a dehumidifier that has a manufacturing fault which can lead to the machine overheating and catching fire, without flames first showing. The machine has been sold in the Migros Do it + Garden centres. Details:
model DGM 10, number 6142.09
normal sales price CHF349
special offer price CHF174.50
Migros suggests you stop using the appliance immediately and return it to the store.
M-Infoline: 0848 84 08 48
E-mail: m-infoline@migros.ch
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Migros, Switzerland’s largest supermarket chain, has signed a new collective contract with its employees, covering 2011-2014. The company calls it one of the country’s best collective contracts, noting that it decided in March 2009 to invest an additional CHF5 billion in its Swiss business, taking the offensive – without specifically citing the arrival in Switzerland of large German cut-price chains. Migros became one of the leading companies based in German-speaking Switzerland to have a collective contract covering all its employees nationwide, in 1983. Such contracts are more common in French-speaking Switzerland.
Finishing touches 15 minutes before opening, and the customers are lining up!
Etoy, Vaud, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The once-sleepy farm village of Etoy, midway between Rolle and Morges, is rapidly being transformed into a business centre. The opening Wednesday 16 September of its new shopping complex on the lake road appears to seal the transformation. Several multinational companies are moving into the small but rapidly growing town, but the busy, main transit road’s new shopping area, with a larger post office, Migros, Denner and Sun Store, as well as Interio at the other end of the parking lot, was already putting Etoy on the map by the end of the day, with the parking lot full until closing time. The shops are open slightly longer than most others in the area, a boon to workers on the way home from the office.
Saint Prex, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Manufacturers are recalling two products from the Swiss market for safety reasons:
- Gorgonzola Dolce sold by Migros, pre-packaged and sold by the slice, due to listeria found in laboratory samples. Tel: +0848 84 0848
- Rossignol cross-country ski boots, models X-IUM et X11, whose sole can detach and cause the skier to crash. Tel: +41 41 618 0180
Fruit Bar, Etoy, final weeks, 2009
Etoy, Vaud, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – One of the fastest-changing areas along the shores of Lake Geneva in recent months has been Etoy, where an industrial zone that is rapidly expanding on both sides of the lake road (Route National 1) is about to obliterate a once-bucolic countryside and with it, some of the icons of its past. The Fruit Bar, an American-style truck stop and motel that was opened in 1957, before the autoroute existed, will close its doors 1 August and be torn down 10 days later. 24 Heures carries a profile and history of the business where all-night coffee and fruit juice made from the orchards out back were long the regular offer.
LeShop began delivering frozen food in June 2009
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Sales in the first half of 2009 at Le Shop, Switzerland’s largest online food store, were up by 14 percent over the same period of 2008, an indication of the extent to which Swiss consumers are adopting online food ordering. Le Shop, owned by supermarket chain Migros, had sales of CHF65.6 million, up CHF9.4m over the first six months of 2008.
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros has issued a correction to information it recently published in its magazine about galettes d’épeautre, to warn consumers who have celiac disease or an allergy to wheat that épeautre (spel in English) is not suitable for them.
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Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros is recalling a Wagner spray gun, models 650 and 660, that has been sold since 2007 due to a manufacturing default that can leave the electrical system exposed, with a risk of shock. Return the product to Migros or Obi stores. Call the Wagner hotline if you have questions: +41 0800 002321
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros has beat out larger competitors such as retail chains Marks & Spencers, Tesco and Woolworths for the title of Responsible Retailer of the Year, given in Barcelona 15 May by the World Retail Congress.
Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The Swiss are the largest consumers of paper goods in Europe, consuming 21 kilos of cleaning and hygienic paper products per person in 2007, says the Swiss WWF. The ecology group’s evaluation of stores in Switzerland gave 9 out 10 stores a mark of “insufficient” in their attempts to use and promote recycled paper goods.
A conservatively dressed Lindt chocolate rabbit was found in the editor's Swiss Alpine garden
Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Most Swiss media have picked up today on a story by wire service ATS about the changing chocolate bunny population in Switzerland. Holiday chocolates, including those for Easter, make up 4 percent of the 185,000 tons of chocolate Switzerland sells every year. Some 13-15 million Easter chocolate rabbits are produced as part of this.
Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Migros is adding, in coming weeks, a new product line that features high quality at a low cost, called M-Classic, says the company. The new lineup, with some 600 new products by the end of the year, will be easily identifiable by its packaging.
