This article discusses the evolution of retail prices in French outlets after the promulgation of the Chatel Act in January 2008. This study shows that industry/trade relationships in France bespeak a strategic focus of distribution channel around a specific market structure, which we call bilateral oligopoly with uncompetitive fringes, consubstantial to an overall rise in retail products prices. In France, the role of the market structure seems to be a development more decisive than the legislative history of the regulatory framework through the effects induced by the Chatel Act.