Kraft shredded cheese now comes in a new package and a new size, 7 oz instead of 8 oz. While I'm sure 99% of people who notice this are going to be annoyed by the downsizing (evil marketers! reducing the quantity and trying to fool me! why don't they just increase the price...wait, I don't want them to do that either! raising prices in unAmerican! why isn't Barack Obama stopping this price gouging! doesn't he know there's a war on! wait, I don't want to sacrifice anything! doesn't he know there's a recession on!), I'm not.
My first thought was, All those recipes that call for 8 oz of shredded cheese will now get 7 oz; if I save 1 oz of (2% milkfat) cheese over a dish that makes 4 - 6 servings, that's saving me 13-20 calories per serving, and I probably won't be able to tell the difference at all.
20 calories may not seem like a lot, but "it is estimated that 80% of the population gains weight because of a calorie excess of less than 50 calories a day" (Wansink and Huckabee, 2005).
Since this downsizing is occurring against a backdrop of increasing serving sizes in recipes, restaurants, and "giant" candy bars, boxes of cereal, trail mix, potato chips, etc., in stores - which are culprits in the obesifying of America - well, we need all the help we can get. I choose to view Kraft's decision to decrease the amount of cheese in the package as an inadvertent aid to me in my goal of reducing my calorie intake as painlessly as possible.
I mean, slightly decreasing my cheese consumption beats all hell out of eating compressed timothy hay pellets for breakfast, as dictated by the Rabbit Diet.
Source:
Wansink, Brian and Mike Huckabee, 2005, De-Marketing Obesity, California Management Review, 47(4): 7-18.
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5 comments:
A lot of food packages have decreased in size lately - ice cream, for instance. The packages that used to be a quart are now more like 3 cups.
What does the package say is the cup measurement? If 8 oz is 2 cups, then what is 7 oz? Or do they even put that on the package any more?
Tam, that's true, though for me, that ice cream container is still functionally 1-2 servings (hence I don't buy it). A product that I could be (but I'm basically choosing not to be) more annoyed about the size reduction is canned tuna.
Mom, they do put the correct amount, 1 3/4 cups, on the front, as well as showing on the Nutrition Facts label that it is 7 servings of 1/4 cup each.
But what about MY goal of increasing my calcium intake as painlessly as possible?
**
My ice cream comes in a container that is still a half gallon.
**
The tuna has annoyed me, too. The only way I've figured out to tell how much is really in there is not by weight (they're making that up with water) but by protein content. I'm waiting for them to start adding protein so that will look the same too.
The most annoying one to me is the canned pumpkin. I really liked the Libby's Famous Pumpkin Pie recipe when the can had 16 ounces, and not so much when it held only 15 ounces, even though the evaporated milk companies reduced the size of their cans as well. The new recipe calls for the same spices. Fortunately, cutting the cloves in half makes me love my pumpkin pie recipe again.
What really matters is that the HEB Creamy Creations Texas Seasons Poteet Strawberry Ice Cream still comes in the 1/2 gallon size for the usual price. Yay!
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