Do you ever get the sense that your favorite steak at that Quick Service Restaurant of your choice keeps getting thinner and thinner all while your check size at the end of the night continues getting larger and larger. Well, it is. How else are publicly traded chains going to continue to deliver margin growth to wall street in the midst of rising labor costs, rising commodity costs and shrinking customer traffic?
As a new study in the U.K. just revealed, shrinking portion sizes among food manufacturers is actually way more common than you might think and you probably never even noticed it. In fact, according to data from the Office for National Statistics, over 2,500 consumer products in the U.K. shrunk in size over the past five years despite being sold for the same price.
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But it’s not just food manufacturers that are shrinking portions while maintaining price as many consumers goods items from chocolate to coffee to toilet paper are all experiencing the same trends. Known in grocery circles as ‘liar packs’, shrinking portion sizes became an attractive alternative to simply raising prices back during the great recession when consumers became particularly sensitive to price. Of course, the net effect is exactly the same but it’s much more difficult to notice that fine print on the bottom corner of the packaging than it is the price tag at check out. Per The Telegraph:
Mark Jones, a food and drink solicitor at Gordons law firm, said: “Shrinkflation was borne out of the recession and has gathered staggering pace since 2009. The ONS’s report confirms this. Against the back drop of a weak economy, commodity prices have been rising over the last five years.
“The recession made people very price sensitive and you can see the evidence of that by looking at the impressive growth of discount retailers in the last five years, no retail sector has grown faster.
“Suppliers and retailers do not want to raise the ‘on the shelf’ price, but both have had to adapt to increasing commodity prices.
“Shrinking the size of the products being sold, whether that is toilet paper, chocolate or cleaning products, is just another way of pushing through a price increase, but in a more subtle way. How many of us noticed Andrex reduce the number of sheets on a toilet roll from 240 to 221?”
And here is the breakdown by month over the past 5 years:
But it’s not just British consumers getting duped by “shrinkflation” as all the same games are played in the U.S. markets as well. For example, who is actually going to notice that 10 sheets of paper are missing from the Bounty rolls on the right versus those on the left? Yet, assuming that both packages are sold at the same price this small reduction in size equates to a substantial 9% price hike on a per sheet basis.
Meanwhile, these containers are completely identical aside from some tiny print in the bottom right hand corner.
Conclusion: Caveat emptor…there is a whole army of Harvard MBAs working in consumer goods companies all around the world whose sole mission in life is to get you to pay more for less without ever noticing.
I admit to a weird liking of McDonalds filet-o -fish sandwiches. Over the years, the size of said fish has blatantly been reduced so it now appears to cover only half the reduced size bun. It is approaching White Castle size Truly unbelievable and blatant as well .
Nothing weird about liking the Filet-O-Fish. I can only afford them during Lent.
Isn’t less of a bad thing a good thing? But then, if you like it, is it really bad? Oh no, I am so confused now.
The SO has noticed. Going to the grocery store is typically accompanied by a ticker tape of non stop bitching. UGH!
Nothing new. Margaret Thatcher, as a newly minted chemistry graduate, was employed by a British ice cream maker. Her job was to see how much ‘air’ could be pumped into a batch of ice cream such that it would fill the carton but have less weight and not be detected by customer.
I’ve noticed Nestle’s playing games with Butterfingers. Instead of the small ‘Fun Size’ bars I was buying they are trying to fob off a bag of ‘Bite Size’ bars but the chocolate veneer is thinner and the inner peanut candy not as ‘hard’. Hey Nestle’s, keep your fingers off my Butterfingers. I’ll pay for the product just don’t adulterate it.
“How Food Companies Implement Massive Price Hikes Without You Ever Noticing.” Believe me; I notice! I may be powerless to stop this, but I’m not stupid.
The best and most blatant was the Hershey bar they were selling and advertising as the ‘next best thing’………..is was filled with air ‘bubbles’ ! (and it cost more!)
While I agree this is bad, at least you are getting the same product, just a smaller amount. What Hershey did to chocolate is much much worse.
http://sweets.seriouseats.com/2008/09/chocolate-cocoa-butter-replacements-hersheys.html
Well yeah. Those aerating machines cost money. So do the shithead engineers that invent them.
How about just buying as little as you can of these things?
Use cloth instead of paper towels. I just found a lone striped Indian cotton curtain at the thrift store and made four dishtowels out of it. Cost: 50 cents.
Quantity as well as quality. We recently stopped eating at our favorite chain burrito shop “Moe’s” because they swapped out the organic white meat chicken with some mystery dark meat sludge. About a year ago we stopped going to Panera bread – same thing. Smaller portions and salads that used to contain a fair amount of steak or chicken would have barely any. They also swapped out their giant smoked turkey sandwich for a tiny sandwich with some absolutely terrible packaged turkey that tasted like shoe leather. Could go on and on. Bojangles, Wendys same thing. Bojanges with their Cajun Filet and Wendys with their homestyle chicken sandwich both were pretty good but are now unfit for human consumption. Subway never gave you much before, but you sure don’t get much now. Jimmy Johns will give you a nice loaf of bread with a couple tiny slices of meat in the middle.
There is now 14 1/2 oz of tomatoes in the same size can that held 16 ozs. My wife (who was pissed off – didn’t believe she would get an answer) emailed them asked what to do for recipes that call for 16 ozs. They told her to add water!
What a bunch of cock suckers.
The smaller sizes of food don’t seem to be making smaller obese people.
I’ve noticed that to.Fat people are everywhere. Anonymous you should get off you butt and do something about the total breakdown of America.
It’s called the Sin of Gluttony.One of the 7 deadly and the son of Lust.I bet you thought the Lust was all to do with Sex .Now you are enlighten.
This is a direct result of the Federal Reserve and the continuing debasing of our currency. This is also the reason for all of the sickness that the western world suffers. Food manufacturers have to constantly figure out ways to cut costs of ingredients, but still fool people in to thinking they are getting the same thing. Thus, processed food additives are born. Not out of want, out of necessity.
Sugar is expensive now due to having to pay workers, ship it in, etc. The solution – High Fructose Corn Syrup. Bonus, it is subsidized by the government. We are actually paying for our own death. Neat huh?
Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. Cheese is expensive, what do you do? Well, you remove some of the cheese, and substitute cellulose. What is cellulose – wood basically. You are now paying for something with 30% wood instead of cheese.
Honey is now 75% high fructose corn syrup. If you want REAL honey it is around $10.00 for a normal size bottle. Maple syrup vs. the high fructose corn syrup Aunt Jemima shit. Same thing, about $8.00 to $10.00 for the real thing.
Welcome to Murika. This is what ignorance of math and being a sheeple has gotten us. No free lunch, even if the fed can make you believe you are rich with more printing.
I agree. Fast food chains are screwing with their products. The better half and I don’t go often so we really noticed the difference. Wendy’s is especially guilty. Almost impossible to eat. Hadn’t been to one for over 6 months, and wow, what a difference. Never going back.
And substituting ingredients, that is borderline criminal. We have definitely changed our habits. Way more cooking “treats” from scratch and copying products and making at home. Geeze, starting to feel like a pioneer ??