Overview
- Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed HB 895, the Protection from Predatory Pricing Act, making the state the first to target individualized grocery prices, with an Oct. 1, 2026 effective date.
- The law covers supermarkets of at least 15,000 square feet and grocery delivery services, and it bars using a shopper’s personal data to set a higher price for food, a practice that mines browsing, location, device and loyalty data to predict willingness to pay.
- Lawmakers narrowed the measure during passage and added exceptions for promotional offers, loyalty and subscription deals, geography or cost-based differences, consent-based data uses, and pricing-error or outage-related resets.
- Violations are treated as unfair or deceptive practices under Maryland’s consumer-protection law, with Attorney General notice requirements, a 45-day cure period, and no private right of action.
- The move follows documented price tests on Instacart and New York’s 2025 disclosure rule, while Canada rejected a federal ban in April and is still weighing options such as Manitoba’s proposed prohibition.