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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Food price inflation changes how Americans shop
  • Date: Tue, 01 Apr 2008 07:03:05 -0600

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2008-04/01/content_6582116.htm

Food price inflation changes how Americans shop
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-04-01 10:32

Steadily rising food costs aren't just causing grocery shoppers to do a
double-take at the checkout line -- they're also changing the very ways
Americans feed their families.

The worst case of food inflation in nearly 20 years has more Americans giving
up restaurant meals to eat at home. They are buying fewer luxury food items,
eating more leftovers and buying more store brands instead of name-brand
items.


A shopper takes her son along for the ride which shopping at the Heinen's
grocery store in Bainbridge Twp., Ohio in this Dec. 13, 2007 file photo.
[Agencies]

For Peggy and David Valdez of Houston, feeding their family of four means
scouring grocer ads for the best prices, taking fewer trips as a way to save
gas and simply buying less food, period.

"We do more selecting, looking around, seeing which prices are cheaper," said
David Valdez. "We are being more selective. We have got to find the cheapest
price."

Record-high energy, corn and wheat prices in the past year have led to
sticker shock in the grocery aisles. At $1.32, the average price of a loaf of
bread has increased 32 percent since January 2005. In the last year alone,
the average price of carton of eggs has increased almost 50 percent.

Ground beef, milk, chicken, apples, tomatoes, lettuce, coffee and orange
juice are among the staples that cost more these days, according to the
federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Overall, food prices rose nearly 5 percent in 2007, according to the US
Department of Agriculture. That means a pound of coffee, on average, cost 57
cents more at year's end than in 2006. A 12-ounce can of frozen, concentrated
orange juice now averages $2.53 -- a 67-cent increase in just two years.

And a carton of grade A, large eggs will set you back $2.17. That's an
increase of nearly $1 since February, 2006.

"The economy is having a definite impact on shopper behavior," said Tim
Hammonds, president and chief executive officer of the Food Marketing
Institute, a retail trade group. "People are significantly changing what they
do."

Soaring prices are causing shoppers to rethink long-held habits such as store
loyalty.

Wal-Mart and other supercenters that sell food now account for 24 percent of
the market, according to the most recent annual survey of shopping habits by
Hammonds' organization.

Gina Pierson, a music teacher in Columbia, Mo., buys her family's staples at
local grocery stores but makes regular trips to Wal-Mart to supplement the
weekly shopping list. Like many families struggling to get by, Pierson and
her husband, a public school teacher, are adjusting their approach to buying,
cooking and eating food. Restaurant meals are now almost a luxury.

"Between food and gas, it's just cheaper to stay home," she said.

In 2007, the FMI survey showed the average number of weekly shopping trips
falling below two per household for the first time.

Paula Curtis, a mental health worker in Montpelier, Vt., said her grocery
bill has been steadily climbing by $10 to $20 a week. She has cut back on
meat, fruit, vegetables and snack food, and buys milk at the gas station,
where she said it's cheaper.

"Every time I go, it's more and more," she said. "I make a list, but I don't
necessarily get everything on it because I can't afford everything."

Nationwide, a family of four on a moderate-cost shopping plan now spends an
average of $904 each month for groceries, an $80 increase from two years ago,
according to the USDA.

Those who can't absorb the added expenses are increasingly seeking help from
food pantries. America's Harvest, which distributes nearly two billion pounds
of food and grocery products each year to more than 200 food banks across the
country, estimates that its overall client load increased by 20 percent in
the fourth quarter of 2007.

The jump has been even higher at the Central Missouri Food Bank's pantry in
Columbia, a college town halfway between Kansas City and St. Louis.

The food pantry served 7,200 people in 2007, an increase of more than 50
percent over two years, said executive director Peggy Kirkpatrick.

Columbia used to be considered inflation-proof because of its high-paying
university jobs and proximity to the state capital, 30 miles away in
Jefferson City.

"That's not the case anymore," she said.

Shary Auer visits the Columbia food pantry once a month to help extend the
family's $800 monthly food budget. The mother of five children, ages 9 to 19,
is buying more canned food instead of fresh produce. Portions are smaller
around the Auer dinner table, and salads are added regularly to stretch the
servings of meat and poultry.

Auer, a part-time postal worker and supermarket cashier, said she
fastidiously tracks food prices.

"I watch for sales, save my receipts and highlight what I save," she said.

Not all shoppers are struggling with the changes. At the Whole Foods Market
in downtown Seattle, Beth Miller didn't think twice about paying $6.39 for a
gallon of organic orange juice, or $4 for a dozen eggs at the store, which
specializes in organic and natural foods.

"I'm used to having a small gasp at the cash register," said Miller, who
favors local produce and organic food for her husband and 12-year-old son.
"We try to be really careful about what we eat."

Among retailers, the surge in commodity prices -- from corn, now in high
demand because of increased ethanol production, to wheat that has tripled in
price over the past 10 months -- has some industry observers suggesting that
higher food prices aren't a temporary fluctuation but instead may be here to
stay.

"We don't exactly have a crystal ball," said Whole Foods' Perry Abbenante, a
senior global grocery buyer. "But I'm not sure (prices) are going back. We're
preparing for a new threshold."





  • [Livingontheland] Food price inflation changes how Americans shop, Tradingpost, 04/01/2008

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