Democratic lawmakers accuse companies of shrinking product sizes while charging consumers the same price
It’s becoming a common experience for Americans going to the grocery store: your bag of chips seems lighter, your favorite drink comes in a slimmer bottle, and you’re running out of laundry detergent more quickly than usual. And yet things are staying the same price.
On Monday two Democratic lawmakers launched an attempt to get to the bottom of the phenomena, accusing three major companies, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and General Mills, of shrinking the size of products while charging consumers the same price – a price-gouging practice known as “shrinkflation”.
…
“Shrinking the size of a product in order to gouge consumers on the price per ounce is not innovation, it’s exploitation,” Warren and Dean said in a statement. “Unfortunately, this price gouging is a widespread problem, with corporate profits driving over half of inflation.”
Hey, let’s go one better. Let’s require manufacturers to design product containers that don’t waste product. I genuinely want to write a letter to whatever government organization oversees this type of stuff (in the US) at some point once I can figure out where, who, and gather documentation.
I’m talking everything. Salsa containers with a lip at the top that keeps all product from pouring out. Thin-necked mayo, tomato sauce, alfredo, etc. food containers that make even using a spatula and beatings difficult.
Then, lets move onto other things like bodywash, household cleaners, even the poop sprays. Airwick’s poop spray is a good example. When the package is half-empty, tilting it to spray will pull the hose out of the liquid unless you rotate the container to resubmerge it. You can’t even get half the product out before it is troublesome. Its whole life will be spent tilted at a 90 degree angle to spray in a toilet bowl. Why even use a hose? Oh, wait…for the profits.
More minor things, Bodywashes like Suave that switched from squeeze bottles to pumps. Most hand soaps also end up here too. The container is shaped with a dome in the bottom for structural reinforcement and the hose touches the reinforcement instead of extending all the way down to the bottom. Or every lotion bottle ever made.
Net sum, you end up with a few ounces of product that can’t be used. Most people probably just chuck it and buy a new one. Just to spite them I try to use up every last drop of whatever, but it is an annoying effort every time.
The manufacturer doesn’t care because the product being sold is the least expense of the entire supply chain, but think of the supply chain…
Let’s talk body lotion and estimate 4oz of unused product in every lotion bottle (probably closer to 6, but even 1 adds up) and a 16oz lotion bottle.
I used AI to scrape the web for some numbers, so huge grain of salt here, but, it estimates a 40 foot cargo container and a packaging efficiency of 80%, that 37,000 bottles of 16oz lotion could fit in one container.
That’s 148,000oz (1156.25 gallons, 4376.9 liters) of unused product being pointlessly shipped around per cargo container, with intent that it will be thrown away, per container. That is fuel in ships, trucks, aircraft, trains, delivery vans, peoples’ cars all being burned to transport something that will never be used.
Multiply that by every kind of product line that does the same thing, it’s a boondoggle of energy waste, pollution, CO2 generation, and customer ripoffery.
Mandatory changing of the design of packages for food, body, and other products could all by itself help with climate change on a planetary scale, as well as keeping the shrinkflaters more honest.