OK, folks, I know a lot of my articles at Money Crashers lately have been a bit off-topic for this blog (alternatives to debt settlement, saving at the emergency room). There are some I haven't even been posting about here because they have so little connection to ecofrugality, like "What Is a Cashier’s Check and What Is It Used For?" (Yeah, fascinating topic.) But this one is genuinely useful and, I think, enjoyable to read about. The topic is shrinkflation.
Shrinkflation, if you're not familiar with the term, is inflation’s stealthier cousin. It's what you see all the time at the grocery store: the cereal box gets a few ounces lighter, the toilet paper loses half an inch from the side of each sheet, or, as in one notorious case, the Toblerone bar suddenly has a huge gap between the chunks of chocolate, but the price remains the same.
My piece explores the causes behind shrinkflation and the sneaky tricks manufacturers use to disguise it (tweaking the shape of the package is a popular one). And I also explore the strategies that can help you detect shrinkflation and defend yourself against it, such as checking unit price, keeping a price book, and switching to other brands (including store brands).
These techniques can't always help you sidestep higher prices. When prices are rising across the board, as they are now, sometimes there's no way to avoid paying more. But at least you'll know you're paying more, rather than just wondering why you seem to run out of cereal so much faster than before.
Shrinkflation Defined – Are Companies Tricking You Into Paying More?
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