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Draconian border controls in France are making it ‘almost impossible’ to get popular M&S sandwiches into its Paris stores, the retail giant’s chairman has revealed.
Boss Archie Norman said M&S is the biggest retailer of sandwiches in the city but lorries are being turned away because of ‘byzantine’ regulations.
He said the blockages are putting M&S’s French business under threat, with only two out of every three products successfully arriving in its 19 stores – mostly in Paris and one in Lille.
Boss Archie Norman said M&S is the biggest retailer of sandwiches in the city but lorries are being turned away because of ‘byzantine’ regulations
Norman said most sandwiches have a shelf life of 48 hours and any delays mean sell-by dates quickly expire
Taken across the year, Norman estimated that 1,000 tons of food would be wasted because of EU border controls on the Continent and Ireland causing delays or lorries to be turned away if they do not have the correct documentation.
Norman said most sandwiches have a shelf life of 48 hours and any delays mean sell-by dates quickly expire.
‘The French situation is very threatening to our business,’ he told The Mail on Sunday from one of the company’s stores in Dublin.
‘We sell more sandwiches in Paris than anybody. It might sound absurd, the French eating British sandwiches, but they are very popular.
Taken across the year, Norman estimated that 1,000 tons of food would be wasted because of EU border controls on the Continent and Ireland causing delays or lorries to be turned away if they do not have the correct documentation.
‘When you hear about these things, you think, “That’s just people whingeing. Surely, they can get their act together. Surely they just need the right documentation.”
‘But, when you actually understand what’s happening… in one case a driver had a ham sandwich in his cabin. They said “That sandwich is not on the list” so they told him he couldn’t get through.’
The M&S chairman has already written to Brexit Minister Lord Frost to highlight the myriad complexities of the situation