The proliferation of white label brands in large-scale retail results in a strategy based on the direct reproduction of already established formulas, where the cost structure is reduced to offer immediate economical alternatives to own-brand products. The problem identified by the article is that supermarkets gain more, manipulate prices and eventually close down the original companies that served as inspiration. In this way, the "merchants" eliminate producers and enslave the consumer to the White Line.
The article establishes an analogy between this dynamic and the impact of Artificial Intelligence, which consumes and reconfigures the work of human creators to generate derivative content. The white label cannibalisation model extracts value from those who assume the risk of creating, without bearing the underlying costs of the innovation and market development process.
This dynamic raises a paradoxical structural dependency, as the sustainability of those who copy depends entirely on the continued existence of those who create from scratch. As the margins of original manufacturers are suffocated by the advance of white labels, investment in research, design and new ingredients becomes unviable, threatening to paralyse traditional production centres. The article warns that when pioneering factories close down or refuse to produce for third parties under residual margins, the primary engine of innovation stops functioning.
The article concludes that it is time for brands to create their own supermarkets and move away from the cannibalism of white labels, because sooner or later these products end up on less accessible shelves. Supermarkets are killing production through consignments where they only profit while others assume the expenses, and through the systematic copying of successful products on their listings.
