Danish gourmetkæde loses lawsuit: Customers fuppet

It looked like the beginning of yet another Danish gourmeteventyr, as Laura's Bakery in 2016 was going to open its fifth baker.

Laura had had great success with ’sourdough and pastry baked in butter’ and ’good old traditions’.

But something went very wrong.

Now there are just two shops left. Ekstra Bladet can today tell you that the downturn, according to Laura's Bakery because the customers disappeared, because they were exposed to fødevarefup.

A sub-contractor, as Laura dragged in the Maritime and Commercial court with the requirement of 350,000 dollars, the accused namely, to have the baked pastry and bolledejsprodukter on margarine instead of pure butter, which is many times more expensive.

’the Use of margarine instead of the butter has been found of Laura Bakerys staff, and confirmed by consulting the bakers with great expertise, and subsequently granted by Them (subcontractor red) itself,’ argued Laura in the right.

to be sure in his case had Laura's Bakery hired the Danish Technological Institute to analyse the croissanterne. Institute specialists wrote the report ’Fedtsyresammensætning in croissants from Laura's Bakery’, which reinforced the suspicion, that rather had used margarine instead of pure butter.

According to Laura complained many customers over the bread and cake in the months in 2016, since you used the subcontractor.

Laura's lawyer claimed in the Maritime and Commercial court:

’the Problems took focus away from the business, and today they have only two stores, one in Torvehallerne, and a on Værnedamsvej. Their previous shops in Gentofte and Roskilde suffered, that almost all of the customers were local and were very consistent with switching to a different baker, if the products have not lived up to expectations. In Torvehallerne (the Surviving business, red.) many tourists and thus one-time.’

’the Use of butter instead of margarine and inadequate supplies led to a decline in turnover for a longer period of time for Laura's Bakery which today only has 2 shops opposite the 4 in the past,’ wailed Laura in the right.

Ekstra Bladet described in 2017, how gourmetkæden Lagkagehuset consistent pøser margarine and additives in its products.

This article presented Laura's Bakery in court as an example of how this can have an impact, if a company is found to use margarine instead of butter.

It ended up that Laura lost the case, for Laura had not clearly required by the subcontractor, to be used 100 percent pure butter.

the Subcontractor had in fact used the so-called rullesmør, a practical blend consisting of margarine and butter.

Margarinefabrikken Dragsbæk placing the mixture product 'rullesmør' with the advantage that it may be declared as butter. Rullesmør can contain between 20 and 40 percent butter and vegetable oils for the rest. It is unknown what type of rullesmør, Laura subcontractor has used. Photo: Screen shot from Dragsbaek.dk

the Court's reasoning and result

'After the present information is emerging it is unclear whether that would be used 100 % pure butter or so-called rullesmør, ie. a blend of butter, in the grove wienerdej. The court has a particular emphasis on that in the recipe on the serious wienerdej are both 'butter' and 'rullesmør'. It is therefore already for this reason not established that the delivered products suffered from significant shortcomings.'

Source: the Verdict of the Maritime and Commercial court

Ole Sune Ebb Karpf, director in Laura's Bakery, will provide to Ekstra Bladet, the bakery has appealed against the Maritime and commercial court judgment to the high Court, and will only comment when the high Court has spoken.