Rerun

A thread on the Dollar Stretcher Community joggled some memories! It seems that we go through this every so often. "This" meaning the downsizing of products, effectively upsizing the cost, and doing it in such a way as to make it as unnoticeable as possible.

Anyway, I wrote about this the last time we went through it, so I'm going to republish part of it here:

Doing a little "in between" shopping, I looked for the generic bleach - the one I always buy for 89 cents a gallon.

The jug looked a little... short. Then I noticed that it was three quarts, not the four quarts of a full gallon. And it was a penny more. It doesn't take high mathematics to figure that at ninety cents for three quarts, it would cost a dollar and twenty cents for the same gallon I last bought for eighty nine cents. A thirty one cent raise in cost.

I suppose we're not supposed to notice that we're spending more money for less product. At least there wasn't any "New and Improved!" stuff splashed all over the place on this one (unlike the name brand of the same size), which really makes me think they were just trying to slip one by without our noticing!

Have you ever heard the phrase "It'll nickel and dime you to death"? A few nickels and dimes poorer won't hurt most of us now and then, but if it's a dime here, a dime there, a nickel here... thirty one cents there, the money adds up quickly.

It may not seem like such a big deal, but it's like a water pipe with a pinhole leak that doesn't seem critical until damage is done.

Remember when they started making smaller candy bars for the same price? The 12 ounce can of coffee? The four pound bag of sugar? Downsized products, all, and for the full price of the old, full size.

Sure, you could say it's inflation and everything has to rise in cost, but this is sneaky marketing. They're sure not shouting that there is less product in their containers - especially not for more money!
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I posted some ideas to the Community that might help keep you from paying these "new and improved" prices for awhile longer. If you have more ideas, we'd love to hear them. Consumers, unite! :)