China’s Grocery Trolls Make Giant Piggy Banks of Wal-Mart and Carrefour
Bargain hunting in a Beijing Walmart.
Photograph: Getty Images
-Xue Yanfeng went shopping in a Carrefour SA supermarket in western China in May 2015 and bought 20 bottles of honey for a total of 892 yuan ($134). He then left the supermarket with his groceries and sued the French company. In court filings, Xue alleged the nutritional labels said each 100-gram serving contained 1,326 kilojoules of energy. But, according to his calculations using nutritional data on the label, each serving contained only 1,102.
Xue, who couldn’t be reached for comment, argued that the error violated China’s Food Safety Law, which guaranteed him compensation of 10 times the purchase price. The Xinjiang court agreed, and a week after his purchases it awarded him a refund of 892 yuan and compensation of 8,920 yuan.