“Look at this,” Kris said yesterday when she returned from grocery shopping. She held up two yogurt containers for me to see.
“So what?” I said. “Black cherry yogurt.”
“Look closer,” she said.
“That one’s smaller,” I said. “Did they change the container size?”
“Yes,” she said. “But they didn’t change the price.”
The incredible shrinking yogurt
I’ve received several e-mails lately from readers noting the same thing. They go to buy a product they’ve been using for years, only to discover that the container has shrunk. The price hasn’t changed — only the packaging. Reader David Cox, for example, wrote with the following anecdote that mirrors our own:
We went to the grocery last night and one of the items I wanted to get was yogurt. The store always seems to have their brand of yogurt on sale @ 10/$5.00. I was about to scoop up a bunch, when I noticed that they had redesigned the packaging with pretty new colors, but the package seemed a bit smaller. On closer examination, it was.
The new size was 6 oz. of yogurt, while the old style had been 8 oz. The price per package hadn’t changed, but the package now contained 25% less product. I thought it was very tricky of them to leave the big sales sticker on the shelf (10/$5.00!!!) just like we were used to seeing, without any thing to warn you of the repackaging. I guess they would claim it was obvious, but it still seems a bit tricky to me.
Is it tricky? I don’t know. I understand that manufacturers need to make a profit, but when they reduce the container size instead of raising the price, it does seem a little sneaky. It’s as if they’re unwilling to raise prices directly, so they take a circuitous route.
Standard operating procedure
I recently had a conversation with a friend who knows a great deal about this subject.
“You see marketing stories like this over and over,” Freeman told me. “Fabric softeners cut the sheets from 40 to 36 — same size box and same price. Ketchup switches from a glass bottle to a smaller plastic bottle and the price stays the same. Some companies mess with cap and lid sizes as a way to increase consumption. Want a bottle of laundry detergent to run out faster? Then increase the cap size slightly. (Many people use a capful per load.)”
Freeman then pointed out other ways companies subtly manipulate spending. “Think of the famous lather, rinse, repeat instructions on shampoo. Like you really need to do that. Same things happen with chips, cereal, and on and on. Just consider: maybe a box of cereal hasn’t gone up in price much in the past decade, but I guarantee you that the average box size has certainly decreased.”
Another friend, Jeffrey, chimed in: “I always wondered why, if the cost of packaging is so expensive, do cereal companies reduce the amount inside the box but the leave the size of the box alone?”
“They also do this with cereal bars,” Jeffrey said. “A while back, General Mills came out with Fiber One bars. The box is the same size as all the other boxes but there’s only five bars in the box, not the standard six bars that are in every other box. Nature Valley does the same thing with their family size box of granola bars. You open the box and only half of the box has product. It’s the same thing as lying but it’s disguised as ‘marketing’ so it’s okay.”
Savvy shoppers
Again, I’m not sure it’s lying, but it’s obvious that shoppers don’t like to be duped this way. But both David’s e-mail and Jeffrey’s comments reveal they don’t appreciate being tricked. They’d rather have the same package size but see the price increase. I would, too.
Food inflation is a hot topic in the United States right now. I think we’re all beginning to realize that the things we love cost more. But some of us would rather pay the increased price than have manufacturers try to hide the inflation with packaging.
For more on this subject, take a look at Nickel’s thoughts on product packaging. He observes that suggested portion sizes are increasing even as package sizes are decreasing. You may also be interested to read about unit pricing in the GRS archives.
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Grocery store prices are getting a little crazy. I noticed that the same bag of peanuts that cost .99 cents a year ago now costs $2.50
Everyone is claiming transportation costs are to blame, which is true but look where the food is coming from. I bought strawberries from California, Bananas from Costa Rica, and oranges from Florida……I live in Canada!
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This is truly unfair and deceptive. But by putting a warning label on it, just like on video games, is not going to change your mind of what you buy. The only thing that is effective in capitalism is to choose differently.
Now, we can’t help the backroom deals made between the supermarkets and the food suppliers, but we choose to select products with more quantity or a lower price. Don’t get caught with branded labels you know. True capitalism starts to fail when we limit the choices we make by getting what we usually get. That’s the danger of everyone buying brands all the time – whether it’s Sony, Gucci, or Nature’s Valley Granola. Actively choose differently and stick it to the man one penny at a time!
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Oh boy can’t believe they did. Bad for the consumer but good for the company. Maybe time to inform the guys at your country’s consumer welfare group? For me its all marketing from the company, albeit mixed with deceit.
Sam
Fix My Personal Finance
http://fixmypersonalfinance.com
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I know all the yogurt companies are shrinking the yogurt and Safeway was one of the last to shrink it to 6 oz. But the thing that got me was the foil lid on top says something to the effect of “new smoother, creamier recipe!” I thought at first maybe they made it more concentrated like the custard style yogurts but it looks and tastes the same as the ‘old’ recipe. I now buy Haggen brand yogurt as it is still 8 oz…for now at least.
The product that I get miffed at most is ketchup. It gets more and more watery all the time. You can’t shake it and then come back in a few minutes without all the water at the top needing shaking again. Rememember how thick and slow it was when it was in the glass bottles. Now I toast and butter my hot dog bun first and it still gets all soggy from the watered down ketchup.
Also Arby’s Roast Beef sandwiches have less and less meat on them and the bun’s top and bottom have gotten bun-ier to make it look like you are getting a lot more than you are and a price increase as well.
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Alex from Consumerist here. A couple readers mentioned that we’ve been covering the “grocery shrink ray” for a few months; for those interested, here’s a link to all of our stories: http://consumerist.com/search/grocery%20shrink%20ray/
The more attention this gets, the better, so thanks for covering it!
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Simple. Look at the unit-price, and completely ignore the item-price.
This has 2 benefits:
First, it makes you immune to trickery like this.
Second, it makes it trivial to compare prices for different-size packages.
If you look at the item-price it’s not that easy to say what is a better deal, 5oz for $1.38 or 8oz for $2.10
If you compare unit-price, it’s obvious that the latter, at 26cent/oz is cheaper than the former at 28cent/oz.
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With regards to the yogurt, I recommend getting a yogurt maker. They’re not expensive to buy and the yogurt works out much cheaper, plus the yogurt is tasty (and can be sweetened or flavoured to taste). You just mix a sachet of yogurt culture with water and it turns into yogurt overnight.
It’s also much better for the environment because the sachets use far fewer materials than individual plastic yogurt containers (most of which are made of mixed plastics so can’t be recycled).
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Once I discovered I could blend plain yogurt and frozen fruit of my choice, along with whatever sweetner I wanted to use, I stopped buying the little containers and started saving tons of money! Top it off with some Fiber One cereal and who needs the new FO yogurt OR FO bar!
Also there are tons of recipes out there for making your own laundry detergent with washing soda, borax and Fels Naptha soap. Easy and quick to do with a food processor, WAY cheaper than store bought and actually good for the HE front loader washers since it doesn’t suds up at all. A LOT cheaper, too!
Check out http://www.soapsgonebuy.com The ingredients can also be found at grocery stores, WM, etc.
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Very tricky isnt it?
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“Simple. Look at the unit-price, and completely ignore the item-price.”
Definitely. I just saved around £2 per kilo buy buying pre-grated cheese. The price per kilo is stated next to the unit price in almost everything where I shop.
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My parents have complained about this and shown me the significantly smaller loaves of bread and tubs of ice cream they’ve come home with lately. It upsets them. I can see their point. Sort of.
Look, prices are going up. Whether the price on the package size you’ve come to expect goes up, or the price stays the same while the product shrinks, we’re getting less for our money. It’s six of one, half a dozen of the other, in my opinion.
Is it sneaky? Maybe a little. But it only works because so many people shop (and do so many other things) on auto-pilot.
Actually, the shrinking sizes seem like they could have an upside to me. I’m reminded of the fact that the original glass bottle of Coca cola was tiny by current standards. What was it? Six or eight ounces? Portion sizes for food and drink have grown steadily, along with rates of dietary-related diseases, over the last several decades. Until now. And now we’re howling about it. Perhaps this portion size reduction might also contribute to lower rates of obesity and diabetes among a population that has no dietary compass.
Personally, I have yet to encounter a reduced package size for anything I buy. I grow or prepare from scratch the vast majority of the food we eat. So I haven’t seen it yet. My tomatoes and loaves of homemade bread are as big as they ever have been. Just saying…
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its simple–their goal is to get as much as of your money as possible, thats not sneaky, thats a fact. your job is not to believe anything they say (advertising) and make up your own mind
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My copy of the July/August issue of the Nutritian Action Health Newsletter came yesterday — it has an article on fiber and the Fiber 1 bars (mentioned often above) get a really negative review… the review notes that the fiber in these bars is priarly from inulin, whch is made from chicory root extract, and doesn’t supply the same benefits as “real” whole grains, fruits, and vegetables.
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Probably ought to give credit to the Consumerist for starting the dialogue and hammering away at this issue for months.
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“But some of us would rather pay the increased price than have manufacturers try to hide the inflation with packaging.”
The airlines are doing the same thing (ostensibly) by charging to check bags. They claim it’s to offset higher fuel costs. Why not raise the price of a ticket? It would accomplish the same thing. But this way they make us think we’re getting one over on them. The cost to fly is still the same, but we pay more to check a bag if we need to. And bring our own food.
(I say “ostensibly”, though, because my father, an ex-airline pilot, has said that the airlines hate passengers checking bags and have been looking for ways for years to get them to stop. By not checking your bag, they accomplish two things: 1, they can lay off that other baggage handler, freeing up salary and benefits and 2, they sell more cargo space. We lose. Again.)
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The so called reduced portion size impact is bunk, increased food prices will push more people to cheaper foods that are worse for you. More starches and carbs, less proteins and vegies.
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@Caitlin, you make yoghurt with water? How? Yoghurt is made from milk..
I also second the yoghurt maker idea, I picked one up for $14 at Amazon. Throw in some leftover plain yoghurt with a bunch of milk and it goes to work for several hours and you have fresh yoghurt. I use goat milk because of a dairy allergy.
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A lot of passionate responses here…
Judging by the number of overweight people in America, perhaps some smaller package sizes will be good for us? I understand that is only benefiting some of the population, but it is what it is. Packages will get smaller. You can choose to buy or not to buy.
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Don’t underestimate the sneakiness of the yogurts!
It’s true that they fudge sizes. Sneaky, maybe, but it’s hardly evil. Corporations are feeling the same crunch as everyone, and they’re looking for ways to pinch pennies.
The photo shows Lucerne, a great dairy brand. I love their yogurt. They’ve already been exploring ways to cut costs–about a year ago, they stopped using throw-away plastic lids, opting for a stronger foil wrapper.
Prices go up! They will always go up! It’s good to be aware, so thanks J.D.
Making you’re own yogurt? Genuis!
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Blame the issue of shrinking volume/raising prices however you want, but DON’t chalk it up to “well, we’ve got an obesity epidemic so they are looking out for us/it’s what’s good for us.”
Apples and oranges. Nobody but the individual is responsible for making eating choices for them. If the person doesn’t want to make healthy choices — it is a free country and they have a right to be obese if they want to be. Leave them alone.
And it’s not just about obese people. Speaking for myself, when I eat yogurt, 6 oz is fine if it’s a snack. If it’s a meal, like I eat it, 6 oz isn’t enough to satisfy my hunger. An 8 oz. carton is.
The result of a carton shrinking to 6 oz would cause me to eat 2 of them, not 1. Whereas with 8 oz I know I’ll be fine with 1 carton.
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If someone else hadn’t pointed it out you would have never noticed.
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Well, that’s inflation for you.
I, too, greatly dislike being duped that way. But we have to remember that these companies also have to pay the shipping cost. Since the price of gas is strangling everyone, they have to cut somewhere.
Customers (as a group, not as individuals) won’t buy the products if the price change. Why? Because it’s that big bold information written clearly on the shelf label that everyone looks (or glance) at.
By changing the product size or the amount in the content, companies win big. First off, a lot of customers won’t see the difference and will keep buying the product. Second, the business is fighting the cost of freight and rising gas price. One container of yogurt might not be heavy, but a whole skid (couple of hundred units) filled with them will surely have a considerable weight. Now, reduce the average weight of each unit shipped per skid, per store, and VOILÀ! the company just saved a whole lot of $$.
But the question remains: what can we do ?
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My ex-husband used to work as a stocker at a grocery store. You wouldn’t believe the “sneaky” stuff they pulled regularly and then claimed were “mistakes”.
I just got whacked at a Dollar Store – and did I feel dumb. I’ve been buying some vegetarian corn dogs I like there and thinking I was getting them like $1 cheaper than at the regular store. They also have this nasty little practice where the register screen is turned so you cannot see prices as they ring up, if you ask them to turn it they say it is store policy and they cannot or they say it won’t move (uh huh). I shoulda known…
So the other day when the total on a few items was more than I expected, I checked my reciept when I got outside. Sure enough, I paid over a dollar more for those silly dogs than I had expected. I went in to check the price on the shelf. The price is in BIG numbers. In tiny, tiny print is the brand name of the corn dogs. A different brand name than the corn dogs on the shelf behind the price tag.
By the way, this is a VERY COMMON PRACTICE (one of those things my ex-hubby told me they were taught to do some 20+ years ago). So if you complain, they show you that YOU are wrong, not the store…
And yeah, I’m more embarassed and mad at myself because I know better. :/
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Here are some of my favorite “marketing” tricks! Recently the detergent manufacturers reduced the amount of water in their products, reducing the packaging size, the amount required, and thus the cost of transporting the product, but RAISED the prices!!! Also, I love that they tell you to use to Line 1 for small loads and Line 2 for large loads, and then they put a Line 3 on there. They tell you to use more for heavily soiled loads, but I think Line 3 is there for you to fill it to Line 3 every time, when you don’t need to! In case you haven’t noticed, Dreyer’s recently decreased the package size of their ice cream, from 1.75 quarts to 1.5 quarts and left the price the same. Do you remember when we were kids it was a half gallon?!?! While they are not “lying” it is a deceptive practice.
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@123: Wow, that’s amazing. I used to be a stocker (many, many years ago in HS); and we never pulled stunts like that.
I guess times have changed.
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I seem to remember how crappy so many products were during the 70′s. I keep telling my wife that we should expect the quality–not just the quantity–of the products and brands that we usually consume to degrade during this economy slump.
There was a neat story on MarketPlace a few weeks back about these hidden price increases too. They also talked about how some marketing approaches will talk about how times are rough and how they can save you money, but it questioned how good a strategy it is to point out how broke we are!! LOL
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I wonder how the government treats inflation
like this? Are they smart enough to see it?
Is this why the ‘Consumer Price Index’ never
goes up more than a few tenths of a percent
a month? The poor government has to save
money on all those inflation indexed I-bonds
and TIPS…..grrrrr
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@Harm, the govt has to save on giving Social Security recipients too much of an increase every year, too.
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The shrinking yogurt containers caused a huge uproar on the Weight Watchers message boards. The plan calls for three 8-ounce servings of dairy a day…having 1 1/3 cup of yogurt is a pain in the donkey.
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Same thing happens with Girl Scout cookies – with each passing year the price goes up, or the box gets smaller, or both.
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@Daniel – but the Girl Scouts stay about the same age…how do they do that?
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You’re right, Justin, Social Security c.o.l.a.
increases are probably more of a consideration
than the TIPS and I-Bonds……
I hope the government sees it.
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Avoid their sneaky tactics by looking at the price per unit on the store labels next to the prices. There you can see how much it is per oz, lb, etc… and make a more informed decision.
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One common thread I see running through a majority of the comments so far is to use unit pricing to determine the best deal. What may not be obvious to everyone is that the Lucerne brand shown is the store brand and has always been the cheapest choice of the various yougurts available. Even after this recent change in package size, it is still the best deal – but that is not the point. The point is that for years (yes, literally years) the Lucerne yogurts have been on “sale” at my local grocery for 10/$5.00 (Is it a “sale” if that is the price all the time? That’s probably a different discussion)
Anyway, at our local store at least, the sales sticker on the shelf still reads 10/$5.00 and the displayed unit price is still better than any of the other choices – but there is absolutely no indication that you are now paying the same price for a container that is 25% smaller. There is no “check out our new eco-friendly package!” sticker, no “new and improved” label – nothing except a hidden 25% price increase.
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@Dave, yeah, it’s pretty sick.
Breyer’s has done this for years with ice cream though: first it was half-gallon containers… then 1.75 quart containers… now it’s 1.5 quarts. Yet the price has not gone down.
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I was wondering how this all would look if gas stations tried the same thing? You’re driving down the street, looking for gas, and the stations all are saying $4.50, $4.52, $4.49 – but wait – that station says $3.00! Jackpot! You pull in and get ready to fill the tank, but then you take a closer look, and realize that the price of $3.00 is for 1/2 gallon.
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Don’t give them any ideas!
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@dave, or the price says 1.35 and the units are in litres.
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My 20 lb bag of dog food is now 17.5 lbs AND the price is no longer discounted at my usual store. I think I got the double whammy.
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I have been doing an informal survey of this and have found that, among most of the products we buy, the average size of each package has gone down by roughly 10%. I have been surprised to see the store brands following the direction of national brands.
I noticed the grocery shrink ray again today with Doritos. I remember the 16 oz bags from a few years ago, which was downsized to 14oz. Now they are 12.5oz.
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One has a splenda logo though, could that lead to the size difference?
Plus, do you really need that much more yogurt? Who cares? With an obesity rate that’s so high, maybe we should be thankful that these companies are shrinking sizes.
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I rarely buy packaged foods but I noticed the SunMaid container of raisins I buy has shrunk by 4 oz. The 24oz red container for $1.99 is now $1.99 (on sale) for 20 oz. It was very subtle but I noticed the Walgreens ad mentioned the 20 oz.
The 24oz container I purchased was in Feb and 7 months later the same product has shrunk. I’m surprised because they’re California raisins, a very local product. But the cost of paper, packaging and transport fuel are going up so something had to give.
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Northern bathroom tissue (toilet paper) just lost 3/8″ in width. Even your arse isn’t immune from hidden price increases.Big Al
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As always, well written article. I’ve noticed this for the last year or so. It’s very annoying but it seems it’s across the board for most brands (even store brands). I’ve always been one to notice the price per ounce/pound/etc. Now it’s more important than ever to do your shopping this way.
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I forgot to mention that my favorite indulgence–Andy Capp Hot Fries–are only available at Dollar General. Bags were $1. They still are but are MUCH smaller. I believe they went from 7 oz to 3.5!
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