Better Food Inflation data with Melanie Morrison, CEO BetterCart Analytics, and Trying Stuff featuring Fressy Bessie Ice Lollies

Welcome to the The Food Professor podcast episode 35, I’m Michael LeBlanc, and I’m Sylvain  Charlebois!  In this episode our special guest is Melanie Morrison, CEO & Founder of BetterCart, an online grocery comparison engine that has some voodoo that captures prices on the shelves and enables retailers, brands and shoppers to compare prices, and for our popular new Trying Stuff segment, we have a fun selection of Ice Lollies from Fressy Bessie - 100% real fruit.Reminder to everyone about our YouTube channel where you can watch the entire first part of our podcast with bonus content and the whole Trying Stuff segment**Inflation Nation: Are we capturing food inflation correctly?Latest Research from Dalhousie Agri-Food Lab on  Food AllergiesThe Newfoundland and Labrador government plans to implement a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages next year, .20cents a litre, raising $9Million for health educationThere isn't enough strawberries in strawberry pop tarts: alleges that the products contain more pears and apples than strawberries. The case asks for $5 million in relief.  BTW, there are no plums in Plum sauce either, it's mostly pumpkin!Weston sells majority of its bakery to FGF brands for 1.2Billion: what do we know about the purchasing company?If you liked what you heard you can follow us on Apple iTunes , Spotify or your favourite podcast platform, please rate and review, and be sure and recommend to a friend or colleague in the grocery, foodservice,  or restaurant industry.   I’m Michael LeBlanc, producer and host of the all new Conversations with CommerceNext podcast and a bunch of other stuff, and I’m Sylvain Charlebois!
Have a safe week everyone! Melanie MorrisonI love working in the tech industry and in my capacity as CEO and Founder at BetterCart. BetterCart operates in the Food and AgTech space and is a big data company providing pricing data and advanced analytics to grocery retailers, manufacturers, and producers across North America. Creating disruptive technologies that help companies better understand their competitive landscapes, as well as the utility of price analytics and data science to enhance profitability, is what drives and inspires my team. Come see us at BetterCartAnalytics.com, or reach out directly anytime.At BetterCart, we also use our technology for the local, better good. Based on our experience and observations, we know that comparing grocery prices across stores is hard to do, and that people end up spending too much money at the grocery store because they don't have adequate grocery price comparison tools. At BetterCart, we're addressing the price comparison tool deficit in the grocery space, and have developed a free price comparison web app called BetterCart.ca. Helping people save money at the grocery store so they can better meet their daily food and nutritional requirements is one of BetterCart's social impact goals.   About UsDr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Visiting Professor in Food Policy and Distribution at McGill University and a Professor in Food Distribution and Policy in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University.Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. He is one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the prestigious Trends in Food Science Technology journal. He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and which is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada. Every year since 2012, he has published the now highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends for the coming year. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, nationally as well as internationally. He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.With extensive experience collaborating with businesses, governments, and NGOs, Dr. Charlebois combines academic rigor with practical expertise, making him one of the most influential voices in the global agri-food landscape. His work continues to advance the understanding of food systems, fostering innovation and resilience in a rapidly evolving industry. In 2025, he received the prestigious Charles III medal recognizing his tremendous work in informing Canadians about food issues. Michael LeBlanc is a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and media entrepreneur. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions hosted senior retail executive on-stage in 1:1 interviews worldwide. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including The Remarkable Retail Podcast, The Voice of Retail, The Food Professor, The FEED powered by Loblaw and the Global eCommerce Leaders podcast.  He has been recognized by the National Retail Federation (NRF) as a global Top Retail Voice for 2025 and 2025, and continues to be a ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert for the fifth year in a row.