Anyone Else Notice Your Food Is Shrinking?

[orleans]

breyers ice cream 1.75 quart has recently shrunk to 1.5 quarts. anyone notice? i noticed the new, slimmer design, but it didn't dawn on me that the price was the same but the container was smaller until i was making black cows today.

reese's peanut butter cups are smaller.

hostess snack muffins (comes in individual pouches all in one box) has gone from five mini muffins down to 4 in each little package.

US manufacturers beat inflation by selling less for same price
Jun 26, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — As Americans struggle with soaring fuel and food prices, it must come as a relief that the cost of some items in their shopping baskets are staying the same. Or are they?

While the price of some processed food may be staying put, the amount Americans get for their money is surreptitiously shrinking as manufacturers shrink quantity sizes.

snip

Hellmann's mayonnaise -- a vital ingredient in the egg- or tuna-salad sandwiches that feature prominently in US bag lunches -- has seen its jar trimmed from 32 ounces to 30 ounces, Dean Mastrojohn, the US spokesman for Unilever, the global conglomerate that makes Hellmann's, told AFP.

Country Crock margarine tubs were reduced by around six percent, from three pounds to two pounds 13 ounces, and Breyers ice cream by 14 percent from 56 ounces to 48 ounces, Mastrojohn said.

"Package size reduction is mainly focused on the US, and is only one of our responses to dramatic input cost increases," he said.

"It's a last resort, with several other approaches coming first," Mastrojohn added.

Package-trimming is thinly disguised price-boosting, not to mention underhanded, said Deirdre Cummings, legislative director at consumer advocacy group MASSPIRG.

"They want to increase the price without the consumer realizing. The way they do that is with a smaller package, but when they put that package out, they don't advertise that it's smaller," Cummings said.

"So many times, they put 'new improved package' on the label but they would never put 'new, improved and smaller'," she said.

Popken said manufacturers are "hoping you won't notice".

"Some of them do it at the same time as they change the package design. They're hoping to distract you with a new feature, but fail to tell you that, oops, by the way, it happens to be smaller," he said.

Breakfast cereal boxes have become smaller; orange juice jugs have shrunk.

Consumer advocacy website Mouseprint.org has posted photos of the new, sleek, smaller Tropicana orange juice jug alongside the older jug to illustrate how some manufacturers try to sneak what is effectively a price hike past the consumer.

"While (consumers) may notice the shape is different, they may not realize they are getting almost a cup less of OJ. According to one supermarket dairy manager, the price has stayed the same," Mouseprint, which was founded by consumer lawyer Edgar Dworsky in 2006, wrote.

Tropicana defended the shrinkage, saying on Mouseprint.org: "Oil costs have skyrocketed. Oil is used to make plastic bottles, fuel our factories, and ship our juice across the country in refrigerated trains and trucks.

snip

The price of navel oranges increased from around 90 cents in January to nearly 1.01 dollars in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).


snip

Meanwhile, Consumerist reported that some restaurants and bars are using thick-bottomed glasses to serve beer -- shaving two fluid ounces off the usual 16-ounce serving size.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5i8puexdqqL1MR3mRhcq5agpzAYsQ

As ice cream manufacturers try to keep pace with rising ingredient costs, some containers — the sort so well-suited to the skinny freezer side of a side-by-side fridge — are getting smaller.

The thinking: Although you might forgo $6 or $8 ice cream, a slightly smaller container priced around $4 might still be in your budget. That's why, some companies acknowledge, they have reduced the amount of ice cream per package but have kept prices roughly the same.

One Omaha shopper noticed the change recently at the Wal-Mart near Interstate 680 and Blair High Road. Her favorite Edy's Slow-Churned cost the same, but the cylindrical container was about an inch shorter than it used to be. It now contains 1.5 quarts, when the taller container contained 1.75 quarts.

Breyers also has scaled back its 1.75-quart rectangular tubs. The bottoms of the new containers are narrower, and they contain 1.5 quarts.
http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_page=1219&u_sid=10373496

and finally

Companies said the food price increases are to blame. The price of milk has risen about 26 percent in the last year and the cost of eggs is up 40 percent. When dairy products cost more to produce, they cost more for shoppers.

Food companies are also dealing with the rising cost of fuel. Some manufacturers said they have a choice: shrink the product or increase the price. One estimate showed that about one-third of packaged goods have lost content over the last year.
http://www.click2houston.com/money/16629050/detail.html

apparently i just haven't been paying attention. this one article goes back to june 17. (i've been too busy sticking my head in the ground i suppose.)
-----------------

and on a less pissy note--hello everyone. how are you today?

:hi:

[Sherman A1]

1. Yes,

I noted the 25% decrease in size of the Edy's / bryers Ice Cream, but I must also mention that prices have increased like crazy since the first of the year. I do the "advances" each week at the store where I work and in grocery it is usually about 300 to 450 per week. Last year it was on the scale of 10 to 20 per week. Most things are going up as they come off an advertised price such as baked beans yesterday which were on the ad for the 4th. The ad tags come down to be replaced with new higher regular retail prices, so if there is something seasonal that you like and you can stock up when it's on sale, I encourage you to do so.

[orleans]

3. thanks for the tip. n/t

[Sherman A1]

35. Also

Look for sections to go up in regular retail just before an event that includes that product. Many of the Mexican theme items went up in regular retail a few weeks before Cinco de Mayo. They were then put on sale as specials for the holiday. Other items such as cereal and rice have been going up as we all know (sometimes every week). You might also look at the tags and see if there is a date on the regular retail section that indicates when it was last changed (not the "sale good thru date". but the date on the tag near the bar code used for ordering, it may help you keep up on how long it has been at that price).

Hang on 'cause it's gonna be a bumpy ride......


:hi:

[Catch22Dem]

22. Blue Bell ice cream

Blue Bell is the BEST and a 1/2 gallon is still a 1/2 gallon. :D

[Maddy McCall]

2. Hellman's Mayo...From 32 oz to 28 oz....and the same price.

[truthisfreedom]

4. Maybe we'll all be skinnier?

[unblock]

17. hey, yeah! and the atomic clock people could shift a few minutes

then maybe we'll all be on time instead of always being a few minutes late!

[BB1]

5. Not just in the States.

In Europe, it started with cigarettes and tobacco. Instead of paying more, now you get less cigarettes. Or 2.5 grams less tobacco.
And there's more. Washing soap, for instance. But there the trick is that it's more environment friendly to pack tighter.
Mind you, The US is the country of BIG everything. So downsizing wouldn't that bad. Maybe catch a few citizens downsizong on the way to the bottom.

[dipsydoodle]

6. Check the food content too

I've noticed that here in the UK that the amount of pork in pork sausages is diminishing as the rusk etc increases.

[Lasher]

9. Had to look up rusk.

Food additive in the UK. Dry biscuit or bread elsewhere. We are separated by a common language. :hi:

[dipsydoodle]

13. The only reason I only know its name is

because 40 years or so ago I used to use it for groundbait when I went coarse fishing on lakes. I was in a TV repair workship which backed onto a butcher's shop so we had an infinite supply. Such stuff, for fishing, has since become a science in its own right.

Indeed - two nations separated by a common language. :hi:

[trof]

23. "groundbait', "coarse fishing", oh dear.

My two closest friends are an English couple who transplanted to the U.S. about 35 years ago. I thought my Brit-speak was pretty extensive, but I'll have to brush up.
;-)

[JI7]

7. didn't portion sizes go up by huge amounts if you compare by decades ?

i'm not sure it's a bad thing if it's mostly junk food.

[orleans]

40. well, even if it is junk food (which it all is NOT) i don't like being

duped into paying the same amount of money and getting LESS for my dollar. even if it is junk food

(couldn't we say everything is junk food if it is not a fruit or vegatable?)

shrinking packages also include some orange juice and cereal--and i'm sure a lot of other items besides candy and ice cream and country crock.

[Hardrada]

8. Yogurt containers are a lot smaller. There seems also to be

less chocolate milk mix in those containers and cans of mango juice aren't 12 ounces anymore. Watch cans of juice and stuff since they might be the same size but have less in them. My wife is sharper about these things than I am.

[ForrestGump]

10. Cadbury's bars are smaller, too

For the same price or more.

Then again, although still very good, there's a slight difference in taste and texture between US Cadbury's chocolate and that elsewhere (not to mention the huge array of flavors elsewhere, particularly Down Under) that I can only put down to the spiritual pollution attendant with Cadbury's in this country passing through the portals of a Hershey plant.

[dipsydoodle]

11. I think your Cadburys may even be different from ours in the UK

Something to do with actual milk content under EU regs.

[dipsydoodle]

12. Maybe someone could extrapolate the reductions in size

in order to figure at what point the carton size will become negative and hence only imaginary. :rofl:

[spinbaby]

14. What will happen...

At some point, the old regular size will come back as the new giant size.

[watrwefitinfor]

20. That's exactly what they did with toilet paper, years ago.

I know, it's not food, but try living without it. What used to be a regular roll got smaller and smaller until it barely existed. Then they came out with new DOUBLE rolls. Wham, they held the same amount of tp that was on the old regular rolls, only now you got to pay double the price for it.

They are still playing versions of that game. I see rolls of tp on the shelves now that probably contain enough paper for one good swipe. The ULTRA rolls are not even as large as the old regular ones were, at about five times the price and rising every day.

Wat

[SoCalDem]

24. Grocery stores will become Aromatoriums

Every "product" is strictly Scratch & Sniff.. Charge admission at the door..

Pictures of the foods are displayed on the shelves, and under each..as tear off "sniffstrip"

Tuesdays are "Double Sniff" days :)

Wednesdays, kids sniff free

[dipsydoodle]

39. Even then

it won't be too long before its "buy two get three" etc. :hi:

[BadgerKid]

15. Yes. A point on the ice cream containers.

One of our grocery chains kept the 1.5-gallon container at the same price as the 1.75. Interestingly, WalMart (sorry, had to look) reduced the price proportionally.

[unblock]

16. often, the "new and improved" refers to the packaging and the profit, not the product

[yellowwood]

18. Here's What to Do

Several of the food items mentioned in this post are highly processed and/or highly advertised names.
Don't buy them!
Krogers, for instance, sells a perfectly good store-brand ice cream that still contains a half-gallon.
Stop buying processed foods that you don't have to have. This is where the food companies make their money. I make my own pancake mix, bread, desserts, etc., at a fraction of the cost of processed food. Yes, we eat leftovers.
A diet without chips and Twinkies will be healthier anyway.
The price of unprocessed, unadvertised food will raise, too, but at least we get more nutrition for our money

[dysfunctional press]

29. not all items are compareable in quality.

if you think that the store brand is a satisfactory substitute for breyer's- you don't know ice cream.

[Graybeard]

19. I haven't seen a pound of coffee in a long time.

The can looks the same but it is 11.5 oz. for most brands.

[Thothmes]

41. Cannot remember a 1# can of coffee since the early 90s

[ixion]

21. yep, I noticed my Tropicana container had shrunk... and the 'new' design sucks

not to mention the 7oz less OJ I'm getting for my money.

[MiniMe]

25. This is nothing new, they started it years ago

Sorry to the guys, but I remember when a box of tampons held 40 tampons. Then, magically, it only held 32, but the prices didn't change. Since that one affected me it was something that I really noticed. That was 10 or more years ago. Consumer reports used to (not sure if they still do or not) have a blurb on the last page of the magazine on truth in adverting, and those kind of things were in there all the time.

[kentuck]

26. A box of Cheerios is same heighth but not as wide...

So the boxes hold less but at first glance, appear to be the same size... :shrug:

[mdmc]

27. I've been doing most of my shopping at ALDI

so I haven't noticed

[conspirator]

28. Welcome to the euro size :) n/t

[tnlurker]

30. This trick has been used for years

It is especially bad for the chip manufacturers. They start with 16 oz chips for $1.39. Then over the course of a couple of years they slowly lower the amount to 14.5 oz, then 12 oz, then 10 oz and finally 8 oz all for the same price of $1.39 while not making then packaging any smaller, just more air in the bag. Finally they make the "New" 1 lb bag for $2.39 and they start the process over again.

[raccoon]

31. Now selling 4 lb bag of sugar at my local grocery store; used to be 5 lb. nt

[knitter4democracy]

32. Duh. This has been happening for years.

I see it all the time. Produce prices have gone up. What you used to be able to get for a dollar went to 4 for $5 to 3 for $4 to 2 for $3. Boxes are smaller with bigger graphics. You really have to watch what you get at the store.

[undeterred]

33. I've noticed that I spend the same amount of money

and come home with less food. So I buy whats on special, instead of what I want.

[Neshanic]

34. Yes, this is exactly what happened in the 70's inflation gig.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

36. The size of cookies shrunk

I buy house brands at my Stater Bros. grocery in Southern California. Chocolate Chip and Oatmeal cookies used to be the size of the average palm. Now, they're about the size of a silver dollar, definitely smaller. The price is unchanged but the size is. Bread slices of the house brand have also shrunk in size.

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

37. It's called passing the costs down...

[ThePowerofWill]

38. Nothing new...

It's been going on for sometime. One example i have is Lil' Debbie snack cakes. Used to be 12 in a box for .99. Then it was 10, now it's down to 8.

Oreo's started by using the same size package, but with less slots. Now the creme has been reduced so far you have to get double stuffed to get the original amount of creme that was in a regular.

Also when i was a kid a standard bag of Cheeto's were 15ozs. That then shrunk to 10, then 9, and it's all the way down to 7oz's nowadays.

My pipe tobacco was in 1oz packages originally, then down to 3/4's oz, now down to .65 oz's.

They really started this heavily in the mid to late 90's. i wonder how much longer they think they can hide inflation in this manner.

[bulloney]

42. That $5 footlong special that Subway continued? The sandwiches are now narrower.

Maybe Jared will lose even more weight.