Coles burnt over claims of freshly baked bread

The Federal Court of Australia recently handed down the decision of Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) v Coles Supermarkets Australia Pty Limited [2014] FCA 634 after complaints were made about the meaning of the phrases "freshly baked bread" and "baked today, sold today". These phrases were used in Coles' signage in relation to Coles branded bread which was partially baked overseas before the baking process was completed in Coles' stores.

Coles used three methods to prepare bread in-store which are:

• preparing bread from scratch including making dough from ingredients which were not frozen and then applying heat to the dough, in-store
• thawing and applying heat in-store to frozen dough obtained from a supplier