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Smaller packages; same prices
Store shelves are seeing smaller packages without smaller prices.
Meanwhile, consumers are dealing with a new problem - paying more for smaller portions.
It is costing companies more money to make and deliver goods today. So manufacturers have two choices: raise prices or put less product in packages.
"We just have to eat a little less, I guess you could say, of the item,' said Clifton Patrick while shopping in Hillsborough County. "I have to cut back on my ice cream. That's gone from a half-gallon to 1-and-three quarters pint, so I just eat a little less."
Companies like Edy's and Kellogg's are all downsizing their products.
When it comes to Edy's ice cream, larger size containers are being phased out for smaller ones. And the smaller containers are costing the same as the larger ones.
And it's happening all across store shelves.
This month, Kellogg's started shipping new, smaller cereal boxes for five different brands - with no price change. Company leaders said the move was to "offset commodity costs for ingredients and energy.'
University of South Florida marketing professor James Stock said the prices likely won't come down due to rising oil prices and transportation costs.
"If we don't see any kind of abatement in the transportation costs, there's going to be a point in time where price increases are just going to be more common place,' Stock said. "Because companies cannot absorb the price increases with the kind of small margins that many of them still have."
Companies have also said part of the transition is an increasing effort to go green, having less packaging to recycle. And the floods in the midwest are also being blamed as millions of acres of crops like corn have been flooded.
Higher prices for ethanol, grain products, cereals and other agricultural products have all pushed groceries higher, officials said.
Stock said consumers are going to have to shop smarter and look at the "cost per unit" price on packages instead of the overall price.
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