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Putin in action against ’expensive sausages’
Barely two days after an opinion poll revealed that the main concern of 75 per cent of Russians was high food prices, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has swung into action.
Barely two days after an opinion poll revealed that the main concern of 75 per cent of Russians was high food prices, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has swung into action.
Putin stormed into a Moscow supermarket and excoriated the executives for their greed, ordering them to cut the price of their “expensive sausages”, leading British newspaper ‘The Daily Telegraph´ reported.
In fact, it all started when the Russian PM abruptly interrupted a meeting with senior retailers at the Moscow White House, the seat of the Russian government, to drag them on an impromptu visit to a nearby branch of the Perekrestok supermarket chain.
Striding angrily through the aisles with a retinue of glum executives in tow, Putin came to a halt in the cold meat section of the supermarket and gesticulated towards a packet of sausages priced at just under five pounds.
Rounding on Yuri Kobaladze, the chain’s head of corporate relations, Putin demanded, “Why do your sausages cost 240 roubles? Is that normal?”
“But these are high quality sausages,” Kobaladze replied, looking crestfallen. With a look of relief crossing his face, the executive spotted some cheaper sausages. “Look, these ones are just 49 roubles,” he said.
