Loblaws operates their primary banner stores in all the most populous areas of Canada, and they operate grocery stores under some sort of banner in every province and territory.
Safeway is American and only operates in Western Canada, Save-On-Foods is also in Western Canada only. Both are much smaller than Loblaws.
So basically, scale & name recognition. I know people hate the “GTA is the centre of the universe” thing as well, but Loblaws is the “expensive” grocery store in southern Ontario, which contains our national capitol and the capitol of our biggest province, which is also the HQ of all of our national newspapers and public TV station. So it will get special legislative & media attention too.
Agreed, I’m just explaining why Loblaws gets undue attention. Sobeys is half the size of Loblaws and Loblaws has a way bigger presence in Southern Ontario.
I don’t think they get off the hook exactly, I just think journalists go for the bigger target. I can’t count how many times I’ve seen a headline like “Your iPhone is about to explode and kill you!” and it turns out it’s literally about any device with a lithium-ion battery. It’s just to grab attention.