Remember when we could go to the grocery store to buy a half gallon of ice cream or a pound of coffee? Have you read a recipe that calls for a 15 ounce can of whatever only to find that now the can contains something like 12.4 ounces instead? How will that affect my recipe? Do I have to buy two cans and figure out how much of the second can to use? I purchased a large jug of water recently and noticed that instead of a gallon it was 3 liters. Is that a way of letting me know that a gallon is no longer a gallon? Oh, and have you tried to buy a one pound bag of M&Ms lately? OK, I’ll admit that I noticed quite a while ago that I haven’t been able to do that. What gives? Are we being ripped off?
I’ve seen many news stories about this topic – the shrinking of packaging so manufacturers don’t have to raise prices. Huh? Aren’t they raising prices just by shrinking packages? I’m paying a lot more for my M&Ms now than when I shelled out the same amount of cash and got an extra handful. (And yes, I do miss that extra handful!) I now buy my coffee by the pound – yes, the pound – directly at Dunkin Donuts. I want the 16 ounce bag, not the 12 ounce bag from the grocery store.
As far as I know, a gallon of gasoline is still a gallon. Hmm, look what has happened to the price of gas lately. (OK, as I write this the price has dropped a few cents per gallon.) But here is another pet peeve – a really big one! Why is it that when the price goes up it goes way up and then when there is a reprieve we read that we won’t see the effects for months? I have a hard time believing that my local gas station gets a delivery overnight and another one in the middle of the day. I recently drove past the station one evening and noticed the price had gone up. It was even higher when I went by on my commute the next morning so I thought that I would fill up on the way home to avoid another increase over night. Wrong! It went up again during the day. How could that possibly be? Just because the price of a barrel of oil went up during the day? Certainly that barrel hadn’t reached my station yet. Then the price of a barrel plummets and I read that it will take time for the prices to adjust. Huh? Makes no sense to me.
Oh, and that brings me to another thing. Why is it that on one stretch of a road about a mile long the price of gas varies by as much as 19 cents? Really – I want to know. And they say there is no price gouging? Am I really supposed to believe that?
So, now one of the grocery stores is offering a discount on gas based on the amount of money you spend at the grocery store. You can save 10 cents per gallon for every 100 dollars you spend. You can accumulate savings that expire after 30 days. (I’m not sure the details matter here.) Anyway, my point is that I can overpay for groceries by buying smaller packages then go to the gas station and save on gas. I’m wondering how much sense this makes. I suppose it makes a lot of sense since I have to eat no matter what size the package of food might be. I have to buy gasoline because my car won’t run without it. I suppose I may as well overpay for my not so half gallon of ice cream and not pound of M&Ms so that I can afford to drive my car to an expensive gas station to save money there. OK, I guess it all works! Oh, yeah, did I tell you that the gas stations offering the discounts are among the most expensive around? As a matter of fact, as of this morning one of those stations was charging 12 cents per gallon more than the station I’ve been going to for many years. So, I would have to spend $200 at the grocery store in order to really be getting a discount on my gas. Hmm, the plot thickens!
Note to self – walk to Dunkin Donuts to pick up a pound of coffee! While you are there treat yourself to a latte – they claim that price hasn’t gone up in a few years. The cup appears to be the same size. Now I have to wonder!