5 lb bag of sugar is 4 lbs...

hob said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5 pound"
bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price PER
BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc. rather
than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost 100%
over last year.)

ha! I noticed the same thing yesterday too. Really irritating. I also noticed
a while back that the Breyers half gallon is now 1.75 quarts.

Sugar has gone up in price and so has flour.

--
..:Heather:.
www.velvet-c.com
Step off, beyotches, I'm the roflpimp!

"hob" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5

pound"

Quoted message said:

bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price

PER

Quoted message said:

BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc.

rather

Quoted message said:

than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost

100%

Quoted message said:

over last year.)

--
------

Well, I know for a fact that the sugar industry in Hawaii is slowly moving
to Costa Rica, Filippines, and Thailand. I'd say within 10 years, there
won't be anymore sugar produced in U.S. islands. Could that be affecting
part of the price?

kili

hob said:

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity
without any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars
put out in new displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when
did the "old standards" like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up
almost 100% over last year.)

The sugar industry is a terrible racket, maintained
by large donations to corrupt politicians. You may
pay double what you did last year, but people outside
the U.S. pay less than half for the same thing.

Quoting from this article:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0408/p01s02-usec.htm

"Here in the US, consumers – including candymakers – pay
at least twice the world-market price. That's why
America's soft-drink makers long ago shifted from sugar
to corn syrup to sweeten their beverages.
Candymakers usually can't make that change,
especially in high-sugar-content hard candy."

Quoting from this article:
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0320-02.htm

"Kraft Foods Inc. is closing the plant and moving its
operations to Canada, where sugar is half the price
and its work force will be nonunion. The move will
wipe out 600 union jobs that pay an average of $15.50
an hour."

hob said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5 pound"
bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price PER
BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc. rather
than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost 100%
over last year.)

I started buying flour in larger sizes. A 5 kg. bag doesn't cost much more than
a 2 kg. bag, and a 10 kg. bag doesn't cost much more than a 5 kg. bag. I never
used to buy the larger bags because it seemed like I would have a lot more flour
on hand than I needed, but when I realized that it costs about half as much per
pound I was easily convinced.

Mark Thorson said:

The sugar industry is a terrible racket, maintained
by large donations to corrupt politicians. You may
pay double what you did last year, but people outside
the U.S. pay less than half for the same thing.

It was the sugar business that was responsible for such gross
mismanagement of the Cuban economy that it was ripe for rebellion.

I think American consumers get ripped on a lot of things. I used to do
a lot of cross border shopping and when our dollar was worth about 25%
less most fruits and vegetables were the same price. At the time, a
head of lettuce was 99 cents. I could buy it at home for 99 cents or
cross the border and pay 99 cents US... $130 Cdn. CDs, computer
programs, jeans ... all the same price figure in Canada as they are in
the US.

hob said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5 pound"
bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price PER
BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc. rather
than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost 100%
over last year.)

They try it with everything. My buddy did some design work for a local
plant that cans stuff for Wally. He said they set up a line at Wallys
request to package 4 packs instead of 6 packs. The stated intent was
that if it had the usual plastic ring carrier no one would notice they
just bought a 4 pack for the 6 pack price.

Mark Thorson said:

wipe out 600 union jobs that pay an average of $15.50
an hour."

Why do you think our Southern borders are not protected? Illegals
have been busting our unions since the late 70's. You don't really
think all these illegals are due to our govt just being lax, do you?

nb

Mark Thorson said:

The sugar industry is a terrible racket, maintained
by large donations to corrupt politicians.

You can blame the HFCS lobby for that. Not only Kraft, but many
candy makers have moved to Canada (LifeSavers, ie), putting
Americans out of work all to fatten the politicians pockets.
Somebody gimme a gun... I *HATE* politicians.

-sw

hob said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5 pound"
bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price PER
BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc. rather
than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost 100%
over last year.)

Just wait until you take a closer look at your favorite one-pound (or 2
pound or 3 pound) can of coffee!

Bob

In article <[email hidden]>,

hob said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5 pound"
bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price PER
BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc. rather
than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost 100%
over last year.)

<cough> that 5# bag of sugar has weighed 4# for several years.
The two pound box of graham crackers doesn't weigh two pounds anymore,
either. OTOH, the 1# box doesn't weight a pound, either. Tricky price
increases.
--
-Barb
<http://jamlady.eboard.com> Updated 4-20-2006 with our visit
to Kramarczuk's.
"If it's not worth doing to excess, it's not worth doing at all."

Melba's Jammin said:

<cough> that 5# bag of sugar has weighed 4# for several years.
The two pound box of graham crackers doesn't weigh two pounds anymore,
either. OTOH, the 1# box doesn't weight a pound, either. Tricky price
increases.

I do wish they'd make the packaging smaller just to use less resources.
I would appreciate carrying less home to dispose of, as well as less
waste in the environment.

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

You can blame the HFCS lobby for that. Not only Kraft, but many
candy makers have moved to Canada (LifeSavers, ie), putting
Americans out of work all to fatten the politicians pockets.
Somebody gimme a gun... I *HATE* politicians.

Don't be ridiculous. If a company moves it's to fatten their own
pockets. If you want to fume at anyone for plants moving out of the US
then at least figure out who is really to blame - greedy corporations.

--
Peter Aitken
Visit my recipe and kitchen myths pages at www.pgacon.com/cooking.htm

kilikini said:

Well, I know for a fact that the sugar industry in Hawaii is slowly
moving to Costa Rica, Filippines, and Thailand. I'd say within
10 years, there won't be anymore sugar produced in U.S. islands.
Could that be affecting part of the price?

kili

There will always be a large beet-sugar industry
in the U.S., as long as taxpayers are willing
to support it. It would disappear tomorrow
if it was forced to compete in international
markets against cane sugar, BUT THERE'S NO WAY
THAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN.

Steve Wertz said:

Mark Thorson said:

The sugar industry is a terrible racket, maintained
by large donations to corrupt politicians.

You can blame the HFCS lobby for that. Not only Kraft, but many
candy makers have moved to Canada (LifeSavers, ie), putting
Americans out of work all to fatten the politicians pockets.
Somebody gimme a gun... I *HATE* politicians.

You can't blame the HFCS industry for creating
the sugar racket. They merely exploited the
price supports created by the sugar beet industry.
Essentially, HFCS is an end-run around the
sugar price supports, and now that it is an
established industy, they certainly don't want
to see the pricing regime change.

Mark Thorson said:

"Kraft Foods Inc. is closing the plant and moving its
operations to Canada, where sugar is half the price
and its work force will be nonunion. The move will
wipe out 600 union jobs that pay an average of $15.50
an hour."

In the meantime the head honchos at the top of the corporate ladder
will still make their questionable 6 and 7 figure salaries.

Quoted post said:

In the meantime the head honchos at the top of the corporate
ladder will still make their questionable 6 and 7 figure salaries.

Hey, if they advance the stock price,
why should any stockholder care?

It's like the recent fuss about the $400M
retirement package for the head of Exxon.

If that guy made $401M for Exxon that it
would not have had otherwise, he was worth
every penny. That's why I'm not bothered
by the money that sports and movie stars
make -- if one of them makes $10M extra
profits for CBS (or whomever), I'd be
in favor of him or her getting as much
of that $10M as possible.

In article <[email hidden]>,

Goomba38 said:

Melba's Jammin said:

<cough> that 5# bag of sugar has weighed 4# for several years.
The two pound box of graham crackers doesn't weigh two pounds anymore,
either. OTOH, the 1# box doesn't weigh a pound, either. Tricky price
increases.

I do wish they'd make the packaging smaller just to use less resources.
I would appreciate carrying less home to dispose of, as well as less
waste in the environment.

Indeed, the boxes (graham crackers) are smaller. So is the cracker.
Same number of packets within, though. Like I said. . . . tricky little
buggers. And the 4# bag of sugar is smaller than the 5#. Not a lot --
about a pounds' worth. "-)
--
-Barb
<http://jamlady.eboard.com> Updated 4-30-2006, Dead Spread
& latest church review.
"If it's not worth doing to excess, it's not worth doing at all."

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5 pound"
bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the price PER
BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
Since I almost always buy by the "unit", e.g., can, bag, box, etc. rather
than by the weight, I don't really pay close attention to the "unit's"
weight

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity without
any commensurate lowering of price (a lot of candy bars put out in new
displays in the past few weeks, e.g., ), but when did the "old standards"
like sugar make that change?

(FWIW 2 - It also looks like the price per pound of sugar is up almost 100%
over last year.)

That's odd - the Shaw's branded sugar is still in a 5lb. bag.

But I have noticed the downsizing in ice cream of all things.

at Sun, 30 Apr 2006 18:46:27 GMT in
<[email hidden]>, [email hidden]
(hob) wrote :

Quoted message said:

I was walking through the store yesterday, and I noticed that the "5
pound" bags of sugar (of all producers) were now all 4 pounds.. (and the
price PER BAG was also up from last year, fwiw).
...

I realize there has been a lot of "downsizing" of the quantity
without
any commensurate lowering of price

Ultimately, most of these manifestations (in sugar, candy bars, coffee, ice
cream, just about anything else), are nothing more than inflation. Time
goes by, things cost more. The manufacturer then has 2 options:

1) Keep the same weight and increase the price
2) Reduce the weight while retaining the same price.

It's common to opt for the latter because more consumers will stop buying
if the price goes up. To a certain extent, it's the result of unrealistic
expectations - the belief that prices will stay static forever.

Reducing the weight without mentioning it appears deceptive when noticed by
the consumer, but if they said boldly "new smaller size", and then sold it
for the same price, people would buy still *less* than they would had the
price been increased for the same size.

Not that in the case of sugar, at least in the USA, that might not be such
a bad thing, but there is the rationale.

--
Alex Rast
[email hidden]
(remove d., .7, not, and .NOSPAM to reply)