Another ice cream president, Quintin Frey of Turkey Hill Dairy, suggested that the higher cost of transportation and ingredients could only be offset with sacrifice. The options for Turkey Hill included using cheaper ingredients, hiking up the price, or outsourcing manufacturing to a place where production would cost less; according to Martin, Frey “said that reducing the carton size was the best option among several bad choices.”

Of course, the sacrifice comes at the expense of the consumer. Since, as Martin points out, “food companies are in the business of making money,” they’re not the ones who’ll be bearing the brunt of rising costs. According to an analyst at Morningstar, packaged-food companies haven’t suffered much. “[Higher costs have] been passed on pretty successfully,” he says.

I’m all for smaller packaging, because buying food in big packages leads (in my case, anyway) to overeating and waste. But this is just another classic case of maintaining margins. I swear, if food companies could get away with selling empty packaging they would—and they’re getting closer and closer to it! The best way to check for the real price of an item, according to the article and common sense, is to examine the “unit price.” 

In another article that appeared in the Times this week, the same Andrew Martin looks at shrinking supermarkets. Safeway, Wal-Mart and Giant Eagle, following Tesco’s Fresh & Easy model, have all opened smaller-format stores, hoping to appeal to consumers who don’t have time to trawl aisles containing “50 feet of ketchup.”  Most of the new stores discussed in the article emphasize chilled and frozen prepared foods and bagged produce, another example of retailers giving an illusion of quality at a higher price.  “It’s not that fresh, but it is easy,” said one consumer.  Natch.