Hochzeitsrabatte, wedding rebates, is the German term for the better terms that a buyer demands from its suppliers after a merger. At the end of 2008 the supermarket chain Edeka took over about 2,300 Plus stores from Tengelmann. It compared the purchase prices of the two chains for about 500 suppliers and asked each supplier for the better of the two terms. It also asked for a Partnerschaftsvergütung, a “partnership payment,” to fund the renovation of the Plus stores. On 23 January 2018 the Federal Court of Justice ruled that much of this was an abuse of buying power. A buyer may not pick only the best items from each contract, which the court called Rosinenpicken, picking out the raisins. It may also not ask for payments that give the supplier nothing in return. The law behind the ruling is the Anzapfverbot in Section 19 of the Competition Act. Anzapfen means to tap, as one taps a barrel. A powerful company may not demand advantages from others without an objective reason.
The court also said that hard bargaining remains allowed, even for a dominant company. What the law stops is taking something for nothing.