Supermarkets are bracing themselves for a busy time on the first day of their ten percent discount deal for shoppers.

Lindo’s, MarketPlace and Supermart agreed to offer the special deal — a step up from the traditional five percent discount offered on Wednesdays — after talks with Government on how the stores could help to alleviate economic stress in the community.

Zach Moniz, manager of Lindo’s flagship store in Warwick, said extra cashiers would be on duty today.

He added: “We anticipate it will be a little bit busier than a normal Wednesday. But we are ready for it either way.”

Mr Moniz added that Lindo’s, which operates another store in Devonshire, decided to get involved in the discount scheme as a way of easing the burden on families.

He said: “Tredwick Gorham from Supermart went to the Government and asked what we could do and Government reached out to the three big supermarkets.

“Collectively, we decided that we could help.”

Mr Moniz added: “We got involved because it’s a way we could try to help alleviate the tough challenges people face today. People have financial pressures on them like never before.

“We thought we should help try and alleviate some of that financial pressure in the coming year.”

A spokeswoman for the MarketPlace chain, which has eight stores across the Island, declined to comment until tomorrow.

Tredick Gorham, president of Supermart on Front Street, was yesterday off the Island and could not be contacted for comment.

Stephen Dunkley, general manager at food importers and wholesalers Dunkley & Pioneer Dairies Ltd — one of the participating stores’ suppliers — said he was “waiting to see” how the increased discount would work out.

He said the deal did offer the opportunity for individuals to save some money, and while it may just amount to a few dollars a week, over the course of a year it will add up. “Bermudians are capable of getting through this thing, but they have to be wise about spending money,” he said.

Mr Dunkley said wholesalers have been making strenuous efforts to keep costs down, and those efforts have meant they’ve experienced thinning margins since 2009/2010.

He explained: “No one in the food supply chain is making massive margins. A packet of cookies on the grocery store shelf which costs $5, from that amount, the grocery store gets their cut, the wholesaler gets his cut, and the price must cover the original purchase of the goods — the first cost — freight and duty, and then on top of those landed costs, trucking it to the warehouse, storing it in chilled storage rooms, delivering it by truck to the grocery stores, and the administration costs as well.”

The fluctuating cost of goods is another variable. He gave as an example corn, which is currently rising in price. A commodity that is found in countless items because the oil that is extracted from it, along with the demand for the grain itself, the price rise increases the cost of numerous goods.

While a company like Dunkley will pass on that same increase to their customers, as a percentage of their total cost, their margin is shrinking.

When it comes to commodities such as eggs, chicken and beef, whose costs are driven by the market and so will change, the problem becomes more complex. He said Dunkley’s works to keep prices stable, but: “The price of eggs changes weekly. We’re running into the Christmas season and the price of eggs always goes up at Christmas time. There is a shortage of brown eggs in the US at the moment, and Bermuda is brown egg country.

“The demand goes up, and so the price goes up. If the demand goes down, then the price goes down. We have no control about that.”

However, Mr Dunkley said running the business is not all about the cost of eggs.

“It gets to a point where you have to function more efficiently, and you’re also dealing with the fact the population has decreased — eight percent of the population is gone.”

However, the infrastructure to run the Bermuda economy remains the same. “When you’re in the distribution business, you still have to send the trucks out with smaller loads — your costs don’t shrink,” he said. “You have to keep the chill room chilled if you have one pallet of eggs in there or 10 pallets of eggs — that’s eating into your margin,” he said. “I don’t think the average person realises this.

“And freight costs are astronomical because the ship that brought the containers of food into Bermuda is going back empty.” He said it means you are paying twice the freight costs that you would be if Bermuda was an exporter of goods.

On top of all this, Bermuda does not have the buying power of a place like Wal-Mart, for example. “Therefore we are paying more for our goods than they are, because we are so much smaller. People compare prices with what they see in places like that, which isn’t fair.”

Mr Dunkley said: “I don’t know how long this is going to go on for. We have learned to be more efficient — and we try to learn from all of this.”

Mr Dunkley, who described himself as an optimist, said at Dunkley’s they have managed to maintain their staff levels, — importantly for the economy. “If someone loses a job, then the rest of their lives will crumble,” he said. “Our staff have been very good at working with us to make things more efficient.”

Sustaining the effort as time goes on, he said, means “having to be able to take our knocks — we have to be sensible about everything we do.

“Every day brings a new problem — and a new solution. We have to keep plugging along — you can’t give up.”