Letter to K. Mitsotakis dated "Veneti": "We’re dying from the cost of energy and raw materials"

In a letter to the Prime Minister, the well-known bakery chain Veneti complains to the government that it is facing serious problems due to the price of electricity and raw materials. The rise in prices is explained solely by the sanctions imposed by the government on Russia.

We are talking about a large company that has 120 stores under this brand throughout Greece, 60 of which are franchised. Owner Panagiotis Monemvasiotis and the staff of the chain expressed their concern about the situation in a letter to the Prime Minister.

Full text of Monemvasiotis’ letter:

“Dear Prime Minister!

We are compelled to address you with this letter because we believe that it is you who can solve this problem.

In a little retrospective, we would like to recall that after the 10-year crisis of the memorandum, 2 very difficult years followed, caused by the Covid-19 crisis. Since September 2021, we have entered a new energy crisis that looks set to be decisive and jeopardize the viability of businesses that managed to stay afloat from previous crises. At the same time, Mr. Prime Minister, in recent months we are entering another new crisis, the so-called food crisis, as a result of which we are beginning to experience shortages and a gradual increase in prices for basic raw materials and necessities.

For example, commodity prices change every 3 days only upwards. With the food crisis that seems to be coming very quickly, we would like to point out that in the very difficult days that we expect in the coming months, it is wise to save what we can from companies and shops that produce basic food so that at this critical moment they can stay alive and be able to serve consumers.

Companies in our industry, in the bakery, confectionery and food service sectors, need energy to produce products for food fermentation, for baking, for preparing food and assembling the necessary products for the daily life of consumers. EThese SMBs are currently suffering from exorbitant bills and excessive energy costs. For example, for an enterprise where monthly electricity costs were 2,000 euros, today these costs have risen to 9,000 and 10,000 euros per month. Thus, in a few months, our business will be destroyed.

The government has announced that cheaper energy will be offered to bakeries due to this big problem. And then we were told that this regulation will only apply to certain categories of stores that have the code 1071. That is, it will not apply to the entire sector of the bakery sector – bakeries, restaurants or food service outlets. Therefore, we would like to emphasize the need for codes 4724 and 5610 to also be included in this regulation, whether they are listed as major or minor codes.

The day-to-day efforts made by many industries and businesses to contact the relevant ministers are time-consuming and inefficient because the ministers simply cannot offer a solution to the problem. Mr. Prime Minister, we are sending you an SOS and urging you to propose a solution today as you acted quickly and effectively and personally saved the bakery and food service industries during the critical period of the pandemic. Therefore, we urge you to do the same with regard to the energy issue, which in a few weeks will be the tombstone for these enterprises.

Sincerely yours

members of the Board of Directors,

employees of the production departments of VENETI AVEET.

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