[DrCaleb]

[Strutz]

/\ Holy crap!

I just looked back at a receipt from December from Safeway where we bought a pack of Strip loin steaks, 2 of them, for $11.04 on sale that day and the receipt shows "you saved $17.34" so that would mean regular price would have been $28.38, which sounds about right and at that price is the reason why we don't buy that particular cut. I don't recall the weight (maybe 8oz each) but one was enough for us for a dinner so we did get 2 meals out of them and they were fantastic.

When we were just there on Wednesday I saw the equivalent package for $37.xx. We laughed and bought a lesser cut.

[bootlegga]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

I noticed on my Costco run yesterday that the normal 2 cartons of 18 eggs has now become 30. Same low price though!

I think we buy the same eggs, and I normally buy the same pack of eggs every couple weeks. Throughout the pandemic, it alternated back and forth between the two sizes, so I'm inclined to believe it's a supply chain issue (in packaging). But I'm pretty sure the 30 pack is a buck or two less than the 3 dozen pack.

But I have certainly noticed that some items at Costco are much higher than they were this time last year - sadly even they are not immune to the issues we've been seeing with food inflation.

[raydan]

I'm almost glad that I'm allergic to beef now.

[herbie]

They froze the price of their no name products, they have to make up the difference out of us somehow...
$105.80kg - I've seen beef cuts at SaveOn for $58 and thought that was gouging.

[DrCaleb]

It's been 5 years since the bread price-fixing probe started. We still don't have any answers

[Scape]

[DrCaleb]

‘Eggs Are Luxury Items, Avoid Buying Rice in Bulk’: Egypt Heads towards a Financial Crisis

[Strutz]

Loblaw ends No Name price freeze, vows 'flat' pricing 'wherever possible'

$1:

Loblaw announced in mid-October it would freeze prices for 1,500 products sold under its No Name private label. At the time, Loblaw chairman and president Galen G. Weston said the price of an average basket of groceries was up about 10 per cent, something he said was much out of Loblaw's control.
...

Canada's grocery chains have been under fire for making steady profits amid high inflation. Third-quarter profits at Loblaw Companies Ltd rose nearly 30 per cent compared to a year ago.

Oh yeah, that 10% increase to the consumer is out of their control... Do they actually believe people are that stupid?

[DrCaleb]

Strutz Strutz:

Do they actually believe people are that stupid?

Yes. Yes, they do.

[Strutz]

The grocery price freeze is over — so brace yourself for even bigger food bills soon

$1:

Most of the biggest increases right now are in fresh fruits and vegetables, and there's a very good reason for that, according to Mike von Massow, a food economist at the University of Guelph.

"If you look out your window there's snow on the ground [so] we're not producing ... fruits and vegetables to a significant degree."

Almost all the fresh produce Canadians consume in the winter comes through the U.S. either directly or indirectly, so that makes them subject to higher costs all along the supply chain. The transport costs alone are significant, but this year has seen major price hikes for things like tomatoes and lettuce because of what's happening in the Salinas Valley in California.

Well duh! It's the same thing at this time every year but perhaps to a higher level this year. We have been able to still buy local apples (though that is dwindling down) and some produce (like tomatoes) from local hothouse operations. I did some shopping yesterday and bananas were on sale and the 4 I bought were only $1.24 but the 2 not very big tomatoes were $2.33.

[bootlegga]

Loblaws decided to go after people blaming them for food inflation yesterday:

$1:

Very interesting comms strategy unfolding in real time. Looks like as of 10 a.m. ET today, the @loblawco is scouring Twitter for any mention of the price freeze on No Name products coming to an end today.

Quite a spree they're on, too. Can't see this changing any sentiment!

https://twitter.com/AndrewJoePotter/sta ... 3413641217








For more terrible PR examples, check out Loblaw's replies feed:

https://twitter.com/loblawco/with_replies

[bootlegga]

[DrCaleb]

Speaking of No-Name (tm) billionaires, how is Adani today, Galen?

[Strutz]

When shopping at Safeway yesterday I decided to skip on buying apples as they were $2.99/lb for BC Galas. I decided this afternoon to walk down to this little produce/Asian specialty store nearby and bought the same Gala apples for $1.69/lb. Quite a difference and you would think Safeway (Sobeys) would get a bigger volume discount than a small stand-alone store. Oranges were only $0.99/lb as well. I'm going to check in there more often as even though it's a small place and they don't always have everything what they do have is clean and good quality. I noticed they had beautiful bunches of Italian parsley, which I buy occasionally when I need it fresh for making soup stock and dry out the rest to use in this and that but I still have some but will keep it in mind when I need to do some more.