Shrinkflation is corporate gaslighting – manufacturers must stop insulting us | UK | News
Many times in life we settle for the next best thing because the real deal is not available to us. For example, the Bootleg Beatles or Sir Keir Starmer as the Prime Minister (boom, boom! Have I Got News for You, here I come). Now we can add chocolate to this growing list. Cocoa prices skyrocketed to their highest level in 45 years, and major producers decided to cut corners. Lunchbox favorites Penguin and Club bars are no longer legally chocolate biscuits because they now contain more palm and shea butter than cocoa. “If you like a generous layer of chocolate flavored coating on your biscuits, join our Club” doesn’t quite have the same connotation, does it?
In fact, it triggered a traumatic flashback to my childhood – I excitedly opened an advent calendar window, only to find a strange, crumbly “chocolate” square that was definitely not Dairy Milk because my mother had picked it up at a bargain price at the Wood Green market. The culprit is so-called “downsizing.” It sneaks in disguised as new, improved recipes and revamped packaging. This is a form of corporate gaslighting.
Products are becoming smaller, cheaper materials are quietly introduced to the market, prices remain the same or even increase.
It’s like when Alice bites into the cake that says “Eat Me” and turns into a giant in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and turns into a giant, but in incredibly slow motion… (still with me?)
A recent supermarket survey highlighted two particularly dire situations: the price of Sainsbury’s Scottish Oats dropped from 1kg to 500g, while the price jumped from £1.25 to £2.10; and Freddo’s Cadbury multipacks have dropped from five bars to four but still cost £1.40.
Compare this to my student days when the Tesco Value range sold tinned baked beans for 3p and loaves of bread for 7p. Technically, you can feed yourself for a week for less than five dollars and spend the rest on cigarettes and booze. Every little helps…
Supermarkets could do a lot more to mark items that are under inflation, but why should they? There’s no incentive to shout about more for less. Manufacturers insist they are putting customers’ interests first by offering the best possible value in a difficult financial environment.
Call it what you like, but don’t insult us by claiming that smaller packages, higher prices, and cheaper ingredients are somehow to our benefit. This is really the logic behind the mirror.
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It’s possible that the greeting card industry is reaching its peak. Moonpig has launched an exclusive corporate service that offers workplace morale boosters in the form of greeting cards.
A survey found that more than half of employees do not feel valued. One in five people have never had a birthday celebrated at work, and a third have never had a work anniversary.
After a successful pilot, Moonpig for Business is going live, and it looks like parts of the utility have already signed on.
If Moonpig is looking for ideas, I’ve got a few: “Let’s touch base” over an image of Paul McCartney giving his thumbs up with his Hofner guitar. Or “Thanks for the note – I’ll definitely take action,” as a sweaty Jason Statham crashes into an office window wearing a drawstring vest. And for HR emergencies, it’s a “Wow, I didn’t realize you couldn’t use that word anymore” card – much cheaper than going to court.
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A disgruntled Brazilian chef offered to host a vegan banquet for Prince William’s Earthshot awards – and was rejected. Saulo Jennings was planning a traditional pirarucu, a huge fish found in the Amazon, in Rio de Janeiro next month and hesitated about the plant-based brief.
His haughty response was: “That’s like asking Iron Maiden to play jazz.” The next time someone asks me to do something I don’t want to do, I’ll adopt their tone: “Sorry, that’s like asking Adele to enter Eurovision.”
