Bakery Election

photo author

It’s obvious that deals like this are prepared for at least several months, but there is something symbolic in the fact that the announcement of the agreement came a week and a half after the outbreak of the war in Iran, when it was already clear that this wasn’t a quick strike and that it would bring serious negative consequences for the global economy.

Two global giants from the bakery and pastry industry — Puratos and Dawn Foods — announced their merger, or more precisely, the takeover of Dawn Foods by Puratos.

If the names of these global champions don’t mean anything to you, that’s perfectly normal. These companies don’t operate in the consumer market. They are suppliers of products for the baking and confectionery industry**.

And despite appearances, these unknown companies decide what kind of bread you eat. If not today, then very soon.

We’re not yet at the ideal state that capitalism / the free market strives for, but everything is moving in the right direction — and war and crisis act as catalysts.

In such situations, small companies collapse first, while large ones grow by taking over failing businesses.

I wrote about a similar mechanism recently when discussing the chain Mixue.

An immanent and permanent feature of capitalism is the concentration of capital, which means a tendency to eliminate the market and move toward a situation where only one player remains in a given industry, the one that ultimately decides how the market works.

Yes — that’s probably the basic contradiction of the free market: It always strives to eliminate competition, and therefore the market itself.

Chains such as Mixue, McDonald’s carry out this destructive work openly. We see the domination — the sheer number of locations everywhere.

But in this case, we don’t notice it.

We don’t know where our bread supplier gets its ingredients.

And unless you belong to the middle/leisure class, you probably aren’t buying artisan bread priced like half a used car per loaf. That bread might indeed be made with flour from a small local supplier — assuming any of them still survive nearby.

Most people buy bread in various stores, chains, or even bakeries (which themselves are increasingly becoming chains). And those businesses will soon be sourcing from the consolidated moloch Puratos–Dawn Foods.

You think you are choosing between different sellers.

But underneath it all, it’s one huge global company.

Doesn’t that remind you of other kinds of choices?

Because it certainly does for me.

After all, who funds political campaigns, if not exactly companies like these?

photo author