Energy - "Shrinkflation": shrink packs make food more expensive
According to the consumer advice center in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the increase in food prices due to less package content is also widespread in the northeast. Such hidden price increases would have posed major challenges for consumers in the state in 2023, the head of the consumer advice center MV, Wiebke Cornelius, told the German Press Agency. The phenomenon is also known as "shrinkflation", a combination of the English words for shrinkage and inflation.
According to the consumer advice center, industrially manufactured foods and everyday products, such as snacks like potato chips, sweets, cheese, frozen foods, but also detergents, shower gel and other drugstore products, are particularly affected.
Cornelius said that the products often became 20 percent more expensive due to the reduced filling quantity, some even by more than 75 percent.
Consumers should report discovered deceptive packaging to the consumer advice center, which maintains a corresponding list. Special care should be taken with new product packaging and information on new sizes and recipes. It makes sense to compare basic prices per kilogram or liter, for example. Another phenomenon is so-called "skim inflation" (from the English "skimp"). This also reduces the quality of the product because ingredients are replaced by lower quality ones.
Overall, rising food prices were a problem for many people in 2023. Alongside high energy prices, it was the most important issue for the consumer advice center. According to the information provided, consultations on the topic of energy were seven percent higher than in the previous year. Cornelius had already spoken of a record year for 2022 with regard to inquiries and consultations in the area of the energy and price crisis.
Although energy prices for private households had fallen again compared to their peak in 2022, they were still well above pre-crisis levels in many cases. In particular, the heated discussion about the German government's heating law has resulted in an enormous demand for advice from the consumer advice center in the past year. According to Cornelius, energy supply and food prices will remain key issues for the consumer advice center in MV in 2024.
Homepage MV consumer advice center Information on shrinkflation Deceptive packaging list
Read also:
- A clan member is punished here
- Traffic lawyer warns: Don't talk to the police!
- Will he be convicted as Jutta's murderer after 37 years?
- He also wanted to kill his cousin
- The increase in prices of Confectionery and other everyday products, such as snacks and cheese, has become a concern for consumers due to the practice of 'shrinkflation' in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
- Rising Prices, driven by energy costs and 'shrinkflation', posed significant challenges for consumers in Rostock and other parts of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in 2023.
- Consumers in Rostock and across Mecklenburg-Vorpommern have been facing Rising prices in the food sector, particularly in industrially manufactured products like sweets and snacks.
- According to the German Press Agency, the consumer center in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern warned that consumers should be wary of products with a decrease in size leading to an 'increase in price'.
- Inflation, coupled with 'shrinkflation', resulted in a 20% increase in the price of many everyday products for consumers in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
- The turn of the year saw Consumers in Rostock and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern grappling with the impact of energy prices, food price inflation, and the practice of 'shrinkflation' on their budgets.
Source: www.stern.de
