Coles caught disguising price hikes as fake specials in bombshell court ruling

Published: 01:05, 14 May 2026 | Updated: 01:26, 14 May 2026 Coles misled shoppers with illusory discounts, a court has ruled after a landmark case brought by the consumer watchdog. On Thursday morning, Federal Court judge Michael O'Bryan delivered his ruling, finding Coles deliberately disguised price hikes as discounts under its 'Down Down' price campaign. '13 of the 14 'Down Down' tickets that were the subject of consideration in the joint liability trial were misleading because the relevant products were not sold at the 'was' price stated on the ticket for a reasonable period,' Justice O'Bryan said. 'As a consequence, the discount represented on the tickets was not genuine.' The decision could see the $28 billion company hit with significant penalties. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission brought separate but similar cases against the country's two dominant supermarket chains, with a Woolworths suit awaiting judgment at a later date. Both cases alleged the supermarkets misled consumers by increasing prices for a short time before lowering them to above the original price and marketing it as a discount. In one instance, a can of Nature's Gift dog food was on sale for $4 nearly a year before the price was briefly increased to $6. Coles misled shoppers with illusory discounts, a court has ruled after a landmark case brought by the consumer watchdog It was then sold under a 'Down Down' ticket for $4.50. The watchdog identified hundreds of products in the Coles campaign and a similar 'Prices Dropped' push from Woolworths that followed a similar formula. During separate hearings, lawyers for the supermarkets argued prices increased due to inflationary pressures and the discounts were genuine. ACCC barrister Garry Rich SC argued during hearings that Coles was trying to avoid losing customers by disguising price increases as discounts. 'Why on earth are you telling your customers your prices are going down? They're not,' he told the court. But Coles barrister John Sheahan argued 'ordinary, reasonable consumers' knew that prices generally trended upward due to inflation. The comments below have not been moderated. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.