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Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

theguardian.com

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Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#291

Post by mytailorisrich »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #151
badcppdev wrote: post #37

This is such a good idea. I know that everyone in the Western World is told that they eat too much but people need to be able to buy food and eat it. And if the same packaging this week has 90% of what it had last week then then consumers are going to suffer. In the UK many people rely on Food banks and parents skip meals to feed their children. Cutting the amount of food in a package in a manner that is not even vis…

I wish there was legislation in place that sets legal standard sizes; for one, it would allow for more uniform packaging, allowing reuse between brands and reducing trash. It would be more predictable box / pallet sizes, reducing transport costs. And it would give consumers more security, even with the mandatory price per liter / kilo notices which are often hard to read. One example of shrinkflation / cost fuckery h…

Enforcing legal standard weights/sizes for everything that businesses cannot deviate from would be ridiculous... and that wouldn't reduce inflation, either.

List the price per litre or per kg, for instance, for every item in addition to the item's price and people can then compare between different brands on the shelf. This is already done in many cases though I do not know if there is a legal obligation.

People are not stupid by the way, they notice when an item they are used to buy shrinks.

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#292

Post by Manuel_D »

lm28469 wrote: post #266
Manuel_D wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Record profits in a period of inflation is not surprising. If the value of the Australian dollar halves, then a company doubling it's raw profit figures is really just staying maintaining the same profits in real value.

Prices are rising because inflation because pricing are rising because inflation Smart.

Except that really is what happens. If the prices of your inputs increase, then you have to raise the prices of your goods. And then companies that use your goods isn't puts have to raise their prices, and so on.

In terms of labor and wages, it's called a wage price spiral: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage-price_spiral

Similar dynamics exist for physical goods.

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#293

Post by mannerheim »

effingwewt wrote: post #285
astrange wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wages by definition also increase with inflation. (Inflation is a general increase in prices and wages are a price.) Though you can have both unemployment and inflation at once, called stagflation. Also in the US, the lowest 10% of real wages has grown significantly since 2020, lowering income inequality vs the middle class.

I'll need some citations on those numbers. In states like Texas minimum wage is still $7.25/hr and many places pay just that. How do you reconcile your numbers with that? Bills have outpaced wages to the point nearly a whole generation of young adults have given up on home ownership and have had to move back home. Mortgages are increasing in years and rates, even new cars have. Income inequality has never been higher…

https://equitablegrowth.org/u-s-income-and-wealth-inequality...

> In states like Texas minimum wage is still $7.25/hr and many places pay just that.

> How do you reconcile your numbers with that?

'Assistant Commissioner for Regional Operations Stanley W. Suchman noted that the 196,000 workers earning the federal minimum wage or less made up 3.1 percent of all hourly paid workers in the state. Nationwide, those earning the federal minimum or less accounted for 2.3 percent of the hourly paid workforce.'

And that's only those paid hourly, not salaried.

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#294

Post by Clamchop »

anononaut wrote: post #194
EduardoBautista wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you just mentioned the companies that own about 90% of what is in Walmart. So, I wouldn't say, "lots".

My point is stop eating highly processed garbage and start eating whole foods from local sources.

These are companies that dominate markets like pet food, infant formula, and personal hygiene products. (Did you forget that you can't make laundry detergent or toothpaste from whole foods?) They are hard to avoid.

And anyway, remarks that are flip about changing consumer behaviors are beyond useless, for ignoring all of the complexity and difficulty in pulling it off. Or are you really giving advice to this educated and privileged audience that doesn't need to hear it because they already know and can?

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#295

Post by erulabs »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #151
badcppdev wrote: post #37

This is such a good idea. I know that everyone in the Western World is told that they eat too much but people need to be able to buy food and eat it. And if the same packaging this week has 90% of what it had last week then then consumers are going to suffer. In the UK many people rely on Food banks and parents skip meals to feed their children. Cutting the amount of food in a package in a manner that is not even vis…

I wish there was legislation in place that sets legal standard sizes; for one, it would allow for more uniform packaging, allowing reuse between brands and reducing trash. It would be more predictable box / pallet sizes, reducing transport costs. And it would give consumers more security, even with the mandatory price per liter / kilo notices which are often hard to read. One example of shrinkflation / cost fuckery h…

Be wary of engineering society as you would a machine. You don’t know which efficiency you’re destroying in favor of whatever efficiency you may or may not be getting.

A grocery story where all the isles are filled with identically sized boxes full of standardized products sounds pretty depressing, for one thing.

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#296

Post by JumpCrisscross »

h1fra wrote: post #69

For those wondering if it's truly representative, it's estimated that 50% of the inflation in Europe is due to margin increase not bc of the inflation itself. https://www.imf.org/en/Blogs/Articles/2023/06/26/europes-inf...

> it's estimated that 50% of the inflation in Europe is due to margin

Is this just constant margins being spun as conspiracy?

Say I have a 10% margin on a $100 product. Costs rise 10%, i.e. to $99. If I want to keep a 10% margin, I raise prices to $110. How much of that price rise was inflation versus margin increase? Will someone now claim that 90% of cost rises were due to inflation and 10% margin? (Keep in mind, too, that inflation is forward looking.)

Put another way, how enviable have manufacturers’ margins in Argentina, Turkey or Zimbabwe been?

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#297

Post by _ea1k »

aimor wrote: post #226
_ea1k wrote: post #23

I'm still shocked at how quickly and easily most of the industry shifted away from half gallon ice cream containers.

With Milk so expensive I expect the smaller "gallon" will come out soon. It's already happening to half-gallons, some are at 59 oz now but that's not widespread yet. Alternatives (oat, almond, etc) I think simply started at 54 oz. and never offered full half gallons. Here's the ice cream comparison if anyone's interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kr-oq79iur4

It is funny that it came from a store that sells "bulk" items. What used to be the standard is now oversized. :facepalm

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#298

Post by yunohn »

enoch_r wrote: post #250
h1fra wrote: post #69

For those wondering if it's truly representative, it's estimated that 50% of the inflation in Europe is due to margin increase not bc of the inflation itself. https://www.imf.org/en/Blogs/Articles/2023/06/26/europes-inf...

This argument is completely incoherent. You can't study the cause of inflation by looking at the distributional effects of inflation. For example, in 2020 there was a huge increase in demand for used cars, and the price of used cars increased by ~40% within a few months. But people who sold used cars did not have their costs increase - they were, after all, selling an already completed product. The IMF would therefor…

Your comment also seems incoherent.

You’re comparing the concept of economy-wide inflation with the basic supply-demand economics for one item.

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#299

Post by JumpCrisscross »

Brybry wrote: post #287
MostlyStable wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Works" in the sense that it keeps prices from going to high. Fails in that it prevents people from preparing adequately for forseeable disasters and bringing in more of the things people need in a disaster. In my opinion, disasters that have some level of predictability (hurricanes are the best example) shouldn't have price gouging laws. If you were allowed to raise your prices arbitrarily high, and you knew a hurri…

I think implying people aren't able to adequately prepare for hurricanes in Louisiana is begging the question. I've lived here for almost 40 years, through a lot of hurricanes, and that is not my experience. Sure, some shelves might be bare the day before the storm but that doesn't mean people aren't prepared, that they aren't able to get the things they need, or that the current method does not work. And when the po…

> some shelves might be bare the day before the storm but that doesn't mean people aren't prepared

I remember a study on New York following Hurricane Sandy. Fuel was out. Drugs were supplied. Because nobody was incentivised to bring in extra fuel before the hurricane hit; there was no margin to incentivise it. But there was an incentive to bring in drugs, because dealers could make a killing selling at a premium.

Price-gouging laws are the price of keeping the peace with a population illiterate in basic economics. (And in any case, there is always a black market in play.)

Re: Carrefour puts ‘shrinkflation’ price warnings on food to shame brands

#300

Post by anigbrowl »

enoch_r wrote: post #250
h1fra wrote: post #69

For those wondering if it's truly representative, it's estimated that 50% of the inflation in Europe is due to margin increase not bc of the inflation itself. https://www.imf.org/en/Blogs/Articles/2023/06/26/europes-inf...

This argument is completely incoherent. You can't study the cause of inflation by looking at the distributional effects of inflation. For example, in 2020 there was a huge increase in demand for used cars, and the price of used cars increased by ~40% within a few months. But people who sold used cars did not have their costs increase - they were, after all, selling an already completed product. The IMF would therefor…

It's the same with corporate profits.

LMAO no. It's foolish to equate an individual selling a single asset like a car with businesses that can range from little niche supply workshops up to dominating whole industries. Pure laws of supply and demand only hold true under conditions of perfect competition, and much of what we call 'business' is about playing the meta-game - out maneuvering competitors financially, creating moats and other barriers to entry to keep competitors out of a market sector, using marketing to maximize product differentiation and shape consumer perception, leveraging regulatory complexity in one's favor or lobbying for it to be reduced in order to gain some cost advantage.

Real world markets are a lot more complex than the little toy ones used to explain fundamental economic concepts.

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