Mercadona hits the brakes: customers are comparing prices

Mercadona slows down, and the customer does the math

How much does it cost to stop buying at Mercadona? The answer isn't a round number: it’s time. Discovering whether chicken or yogurts are better in Lidl, Aldi, or Alcampo requires a dedication that many families aren't willing to pay for. This calculation—the cost of information—explains why the Valencian chain's slowdown isn't a collapse, but a trickle. And why Juan Roig’s company can no longer assume loyalty that used to come free for years.

The hidden price of comparing seven supermarkets

The argument repeated by loyal customers is rarely about money: it's rational inertia. Efficiently comparing seven chains requires almost absurd logistics, with estimates reaching 56 hours of weekly deal hunting. No one dedicates that time. This is why the private label brand—Hacendado—continues to operate as a guarantee of medium quality, and the customer stays.

Until they have Lidl and Aldi blocks away. There are cases where local competition takes up to 90% of the family shopping basket. The underlying diagnosis is simply that prices, according to many customers, have risen sharply.

Fresh produce: the sustancia ilegal the private label can't seal

Where trust breaks down is in meat and fruit. Many who defend the private label buy fresh produce from neighborhood butchers and greengrocers because Mercadona, simply, doesn't compete there. It doesn't lose on the till; it loses at the counter, in sections where quality is visible to the naked eye. It is a silent, sustained fissure.

Sundays, holidays, and double standards

Mercadona has been open on Sundays and holidays all summer, in tourist areas until three in the afternoon and in capitals like Málaga without being a beach destination. When a Consum franchise does this in Valencia, there is little criticism. When the Valencian chain does it, it becomes a target. The supermarket has stopped being just a business and has become a board where every decision is read through a territorial and political lens.

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With these challenges, anyone would say Mercadona is on the brink of an abyss. Yet it remains number one. It’s just that the yoke, like the price of chicken, is no longer borne solely by her.