Not only did Kettle Chips cut their size from 200g to 185g without dropping the price, but now also Goulburn Valley have reduced their 1kg fruit content from 67% to 62% whilst maintaing the previous price.
What other examples have people found?
New Smaller packaging, Less Stuff inside, but Same Old Price
tonester on 08/08/2011 - 11:59
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Some of them came up with some very interesting reasons… From the CHOICE mag:
We asked manufacturers to explain the reduction in size. Some offered creative explanations. According to Uncle Tobys, the smaller packaging is to “ensure our products remain affordable” (though the logic of this escapes us when the cereal actually costs more per serving). Cadbury says the “improvements” to their Dairy Milk bars “have been driven by one simple reason – consumer value”.
Meanwhile, Trish Hyde, chief executive of the Confectionery Manufacturers Association, adds another spin to it: “The entire industry is doing it voluntarily. We are reverse engineering our portion sizes in order to better align them with how much is responsible to eat.”
Does Trish Hyde have even half a clue what "reverse engineering" actually means? Because it sounds an awful lot like she thinks it means "making them smaller" in a stupid, fancy way.
Yep, that's the new price-rise strategy and we're seeing it everywhere.
I'm guessing some marketing boffins (read: unholy undead) figured out a while back that most consumers react when you increase the price, but decreasing the amount causes less backlash.
In response I've started snipping tiny pieces off all my folding money. Then after 8 notes I've usually got enough to make a new note, thus negating the loss.
Doritos seem to have dropped in size. I don't eat them but picked up a packet the other day for the first time and noticed the size reduction.
smiths chips
thins
all 175g now
before 250Another (older) example is Alcohol - spirits used to come in 750ml bottles, now they are 700ml.
BTW - the stupid thing about the size reduction is that the supermarkets are all following each other to add the "unit price" on the ticket. For example 175g chips for $2.50 would say "$1.43 per 100g"
i actually like the unit pricing. saves me pulling out my phone to calculate :)
I realise it's a way of tricking us, but it does work to make me eat less! If I open a pack of chips it lasts me 2-3 days (max) and then it's gone. I don't crave the next pack any earlier than if I'd eaten a bigger pack of chips.
As a marketing student (and thus generally hated member of the community) this is all very interesting.
Just so you know what the companies are trying to do, they're working off the psychology of 'just-noticeable difference' (jnd), that is, the lowest level of stimulation that an average person* can detect half the time.
In other words, what they try to do is either increase prices or decrease amounts in increments small enough that people don't really notice a difference. And it's been happening for a while now. Remember how Mars bars used to be <$1? Now they're closer to $2 for less than what was originally given. And this was all done in small increments.
The same also applies in the reverse, so when companies want to publicise the decrease in prices or increased amounts they usually do it in a way so it is above the jnd, so that is noticeable. This also is often supported by ridiculous advertising campaigns with claims that 'down, down, prices are staying down..'
*But of course, OzBargainers notice everything ;)
A bit off topic, but the "Colworths" take-off advert on Gruen Transfer last week was very good:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1dUgqg21fU
Its not exactly that much of a trick though.
Take inflation alone, a business has two choices occasionally
Increase price
reduce sizeTaking a chip packet and reducing the size, this is valid because a chip packet has multiple serves in it.
But look at a chocolate bar, they only have 10g or so to play with before its no longer satisfying and looks much smaller then the original, besides the fact that reducing chocolate bar size doesn't help much for profits.
But either way, we already see enough of a certain particular garbage on Today Tonight.
A business is almost asking to go bankrupt by raising a product price because somehow this means nobody can buy it and the business is evil or something….
Its MUCH safer to reduce the product size.
Not always. With food the best is usually quality & quantity. If the price is reasonable you go for it. There is only so far that they can shrink a product. Pizzas are a good example.
Poor business management forces costs up reducing profit. They then cry poor and want to rise prices and reduce product qualtiy and quantity. Not the way to go.Any smart business manager that has the best quality product at a reasonable price is doing the right thing, not screwing customers like they are fools.
dropping cadbury from 250 to 200 was a "super noticable difference".
i remember going into woolies and they had both the 200 and 250s in stock, the 200's on special so the price was proportionate to the 250 value, and the 250 on clearance, so it was the same price as the 200. i dont think cadbury did a good job with the noticability on that one.
Kellogg is in this list.
Enjoyo meals. Used to be 450 gram serves. Price dropped slightly but the content is now… wait for it … 300 grams.
Thus they are substantially less Enjoyo-ble.
Saw McChicken shrink literally within hours a couple of years back. Purchased at 3am on sun morning and by evening the same day it had shrunk by a third….seriously wth! Ofcourse the price remained the same.
Pizzas…
Used to love a good pizza but dont bother any more.
At the current shrink rate I wonder how long it will be until they disappear completely.
I would pay what is necessary for a decent pizza, the ones now a days are like a pre dinner snack.We've given up on the Pizza Hut / Dominos / Eagle Boys pizzas now. Irrespective of how desireable they make them feel, we're always dissappointed.
We buy from the local "designer pizza joint". It costs almost $40 for a large, a small, and a bread! I literally shudder every time we pay… but afterwards when I am eating it, I forget the price - the difference in quality is mind boggling!
Thats exactly what I want.. I don't care about the $4.95 special or the cardboard box, I just want a decent pizza. No decent shops around here except for the "box boys" you mentioned.
I never mind paying for good food but it boils my blood when you see the crap the box boys shove out. If only we could all stop buying their crap and make them start giving a bit of real "size" with some bloody topping on it! I would gladly pay double.
… aaannddd before the box boy lovers jump on here and say you can pay for extra topping… done that, been there… just another joke!
To the OP… Agree with what you are on about.
The company bean counters and spin doctors that get paid to find ways to screw customers are exactly the ones that bring companies down.
We are so sick of prices rising and sizes shrinking. We just don't buy their rip off products whenever we can. We now cook our own biscuits and have a lot more home cooked meals as we are so fed up with either getting rubbish or so small a serving. I think a lot of us are doing this?
Cadbury Chocolate dropped from 250 to 200g blocks..
There's 2 reasons:
1) The "snack food" companies argue that they're reducing the portion size so it's better for the consumer..
2) it also allows them to maintain a pricepoint that the supermarkets demand even though the manufacturing costs have risen. Australian supermakets are VERY demanding… they can hold any food manufacturer to ransom effectively cause if you're not selling to Coles or Woolworths/Safeway, you are selling to only 20% of the population!