Fruit pricing by piece

srhope

I've noticed that all supermarkets have recently changed to pricing almost all of their fresh fruit by the piece rather than by weight. This is to discourage comparison between retailers and to disguise inflation by shrinking the size of fruit while keeping the cost the same. I strongly suspect that small greengrocers and market stalls, who all still price by weight, are still considerably more expensive, as they have been for a long time.

Is there anything we shoppers can do?

Cornucopia

They've always sold some fruit individually - for people who want one or two items as a snack.

There's been no change at Lidl or Aldi - Aldi still sells most fruit in sealed multipacks and Lidl sells a combination of sealed packs and loose items by weight.

srhope

I was in Aldi, Lidl and ASDA today and I looked on mysupermarket.com. They're all at it: almost all the fruit is priced per piece, especially apples. Check them if you don't believe me.

Cornucopia

I was in Lidl yesterday - no change. I bought a pack of Strawberries and of Apples - both priced per sealed pack.

Do you mean that sealed packs of Apples are being sold as "5 fruit" rather than "1.5Kg", for example? There's a simple answer to that - weigh them using the scales that must be provided if ANY products are being sold loose by weight.

jeanmd

Cornucopia wrote: »

I was in Lidl yesterday - no change. I bought a pack of Strawberries and of Apples - both priced per sealed pack.

Do you mean that sealed packs of Apples are being sold as "5 fruit" rather than "1.5Kg", for example? There's a simple answer to that - weigh them using the scales that must be provided if ANY products are being sold loose by weight.

Must admit to weighing them in Lidl on Thursday as I noticed it didn't say the weight on the pack. Easy to do though.

[Deleted User]

srhope wrote: »

Is there anything we shoppers can do?

yes, vote with your feet if you are unhappy with things

robin58

Went to my local Asda. Apart from a token tray of loose carrots it was all in prepacked.

Well being someone who doesn't want 1 kilo or so many of something, they have lost my custom.

meer53

It's not all supermarkets, i've been in Aldi and Tesco today, you can buy both prepacked multiple fruits and single items. It's always been that way, you can select a bag and buy one item if you wish ?

robin58

meer53 wrote: »

It's not all supermarkets, i've been in Aldi and Tesco today, you can buy both prepacked multiple fruits and single items. It's always been that way, you can select a bag and buy one item if you wish ?

You say that but at one time you could buy loose product at COOP, then thry went prepacked.

Ok you can buy loose at other supermarkets but if Asda shows they can up thier sales and keep down thier costs other main supermarkets may take it up.

The only plus with prepacked is if your lucky you may get a bargain yellow sticker at the end if the day as they try to offload stuff.

MysteryMe

Luckily my Co op sells fruit and veg loose as well as pre packed which is handy, I often only want to buy a small quantity not a whole pack of something.

System

I live alone so some produce lines, I'm happy to buy in prepacked. Others such as onions, I just buy 3 loose.

I have seen people splitting a pack of four jacket potatoes and select three of them. They cost 15-20p more than buying the pack of four. Serves them right!