That reminds me of a comment I made to someone back 2023ish about how those of us who had lived through the 70s and early 80s might not be quite as rattled (though still not liking it).
I remember in the mid-00s through mid-teens a website called Midtown Lunch or something like that, dedicated to places in Manhattan where you could find decent lunch for under $10. Wonder what would be the threshold today.
Ran across this site purporting to give the price of a Big Mac in all 50 states. Runs from $4.67 to $6.72.
Makes me feel old and out of touch.
What do you think it was in 2019?
I do know that in 2019 I was paying 4.99 for a McDonalds Quarter Pounder with Cheese, $5.42 with tax. This was in NYC.
I remember this well because the little no-name takeout place on the corner would sell me an 8oz cheeseburger for $5.00, no tax if I walked in and ordered it - they did charge more for deliveries and online orders.
And when it comes to the prices of canned soda and selzer ( the canned selzer in my local grocery, all brands, is considerably more than it was a year ago)….I’m going to hazard a guess that aluminum prices might be the driving factor behind those increases.
I assume that in NYC it’s now ~$7. It is $6.59 in the nearest McDonald’s (the Boston area).
My impression is that restaurant food has gone up around 30% as well in the last six years.
But now people are ordering DoorDash and saying waaaah, a value meal is $20. No it’s not. It’s $10.29. And if you use the app it’s $8 (once per day per app).
The place I see this is with plastic cutlery. There are like 5 different “levels” of quality of plastic cutlery that my brain sorts them into. “3” is my ideal: large enough to eat with comfortably, and sturdy enough to not break, but not so thick and rigid that it bumps up the price through using so much material.
But I can only find levels 2, 4, and 5 in grocery stores*. “2” is like “3” but flimsy enough that it can break. “4” are those heavy, clear plastic ones that you’d take to a picnic, and “5” are those fake-silvered ones that are so expensive that on the packaging they basically say “yeah, these are pricy, but you can wash them and reuse them!” So I could either pay just as much as I did before for worse quality, or a lot more for only slightly better quality.
I did find packages of “3”'s at Staples and they are so cheap that the cashiers sometimes even comment on that. Cheaper than "3"s ever were per fork in grocery stores since they come in packs of 100. But I don’t always need to pick up other stuff at Staples, and the cutlery isn’t always in stock, so I don’t go there that often.
While the recent inflation is/was bad, I confirm it isn’t as bad as the late 70’s.
Back then we didn’t have dollar stores to buy cheaper items. Generics and store brands were of terrible quality. There were no Aldi’s around here. And interest rates were really high. Prices rose daily.
And unemployment was higher.
I eat out infrequently, and never at McD’s. My comparison point is something around $1.49 when I was a kid.
Now that’s a thread shit.
If you don’t want political comment, say so upfront in your op.
This reminds me that Vitamin Water used to nominally be $1.25 each though they were almost always on sale for $1 each. Now they’re a pretty firm $2.29 a bottle[1]. I buy cases of the Kirkland knock-off brand but would supplement with grocery store purchases if I was running low before my next Costco trip. Now I can’t bring myself to spend over two bucks on a bottle of flavored water.
Price taken from local grocery store app, non-delivered/pickup. Looking online, Target says they’re $1.89 which is better but still a decent hop. ↩︎
That totally makes me think of a useless product nobody wanted, much less needed, until it was invented.
So first they sell it well below cost and hype the heck out of it to boost sales, then once enough of the public just has to have their daily fix of [whatever], they raise the price to their target price all along.
It’s the long con version of “bait and switch”.
When did Folgers decaf coffee get so expensive? I prefer decaf because I like the taste and health benefits of coffee w/o the anxiety, but a 19oz can is $15 now.
Its not so much the price of the coffee, its the price of the folgers brand. By comparison a 12oz bag of a more premium brand of decaf coffee (starbucks, dunkin, etc) is about $10 for a 12oz bag. So the price per oz is about the same. I don’t get when folgers became as expensive as the better stuff. I might as well buy the better stuff at that point.
however a 36oz can of store brand decaf is only $13 still. So theres that. I have no idea whats going on with folger’s business model.
Also little ceasers $5 hot and ready pizzas are $7 now. So a 40% increase. The detroit deep dish pizzas are almost $15 now.
However I saw on the app that if you buy 2 hot and ready pizzas its only $10. So thats not bad. I think that’s how McDonald’s did it at first though. When they got rid of mcdoubles and mcchickens for a dollar, they started selling them 2 for $2.
My recollection is when I was a young kid, you could buy a 24 pack of coke or pepsi for $6. Then when I was in my late 30s you could still buy a 24 pack of coke or pepsi for $6 (or maybe get two 12 packs for $3 each). Now the price is doubled and a 24 pack is $12-14. Looking at the grocery flier for kroger, a 12 pack of name brand soda is $11 now. Which when a 24 pack is $12, isn’t a very good deal.
I’m not sure what happened to soda to cause such a rise in price, since the ounce per ounce equivalent of a 24 pack of 12oz cans of soda is about 4.3 two-liter bottles. Which if you buy kroger brand 2-liters, is still only about $5.40.
I do remember in 2005, store brand 2 liters of soda from Kroger were $0.60. Now they’re $1.25, which isn’t bad. The price for kroger brand soda doubled but it took 20 years. But it feels like name brand soda prices have doubled in just a few years.
Also bring back Sierra mist.
On the flip-side, they are practically giving eggs away now. Kroger 18 count $2.99 with digital coupon. Up to 5 per transaction.
One of the things about price hikes during changing times, such as these, is they can be driven by many things beyond necessity.
I posit that tv talking heads daily pounding the, ‘prices will surely rise!’ drum, drive more price hikes than anyone sees.
If everyday the news is banging on about all prices increasing, and you’re a retailer of any shape, you’d be a fool to NOT be raising your prices. Even if there is no reason to, your costs haven’t risen, your manufacturers aren’t raising costs, etc.
Someone else has conveniently primed the pump for you! Consumers are truly EXPECTING prices to soar. Your buyers won’t be shocked, they’ll be remarkably accepting, because, ‘it’s happening across the board!’. When, no, it needn’t be. But if everyone is already anticipating it, vendors would be silly NOT to!
They can always drop a discount or sale, to make it look a great deal, when it’s still actually a price increase.
Wendy’s $5 Biggie Bag® is a pretty sweet deal. You get a burger (like a Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger), 4 nuggets, small fries, and a medium drink. All for five bucks! I tried it. I liked it. I may have whispered “I love you” to the bag. My cats love it too: they each get a nugget, leaving me with one. Still enough to fill me up.
Fast-forward a week. I roll up, craving that same Biggie magic. I order what I think is the same thing… the “Biggie Deal®.”
Big mistake. Biggie mistake.
I get to the window, and the cashier says, “That’ll be ten dollars.”
I blink like I just woke up in an alternate universe where nuggets are a luxury item.
Turns out, I ordered the Biggie Deal®, not the Biggie Bag®. Same items, but apparently the Biggie Deal is the evil twin that charges you double.
Moral of the story: Always say “Bag.” Never “Deal.” Your stomach may be full either way, but your wallet will know the difference.
You mentioned the app. The fast food chains seem to limit the best prices to those using their apps, so those of us without them don’t get those offers.
EVERYONE is trying to price discriminate based on guessing what it will take for that particular customer to buy. It totally trashes the “consumer surplus” that is supposed to make every transaction a “good deal” for both buyer and seller because the seller isn’t selling at the absolute minimum price they would take, and the buyer isn’t paying the absolute maximum price they would pay.
There is a joke going around on LinkedIn that the first three most compelling use cases for AI are fraud, porn and price discrimination. For decades sellers have been trying to utilize purchase data to price discriminate better than just offering weekly specials and mass mailing coupons. They had very little success. But now it is exploding.
The “sale” price on 18 eggs at the local store is $5.99 (dollar off!). Two things I’ve noticed is that Costco doesn’t sell eggs cheaper; they must assume enough people will buy just because you’re already there, and that buying more eggs doesn’t net you a discount. It’s 33¢ an egg whether you’re buying 12 or 18 or 36 and you just get a bigger box of 'em.
Pop (soda) has become outrageous! Some of the 12 packs are close to $9. I was always an “only Diet Coke” girl but if Pepsi is on sale for $5.99, I can be a Pepsi girl.
We used to go to McDonald’s because it was the cheapest fast food option. Not anymore (and frankly I don’t care for it much anymore). The best pizza in our area was something we’d only get on special occasions because it was expensive, now we get the pizza because it’s cheaper than FF.