Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Smaller Size, Costs More, Consumer is Screwed Again!

Has anyone noticed what's happening to many of your favorite products in the grocery store? Right before your eyes, it seems, they're shrinking!

You think you're getting a great price on ice cream in those "half gallon" cartons? Think again! Many ice cream brands went from 2 quarts or one-half gallon to 1.75 quarts and many of us didn't really notice. But now, the size has dwindled to 1.5 quarts. Yes, you're losing 25% of the ice cream you used to get to feed your family, and the stores make it seem like it's a bargain when they put it on "sale"! It's not a bargain, friends, it's just the real price you should be paying for the product if you weren't getting screwed on content and sizing!

Same with orange juice, I purchased a carton of Tropicana Trop 50 less sugar juice and found the container to contain not 64 ounces as you would expect, but 59 ounces, although at first glance the container appears similar to a standard 64 ounce half-gallon juice Pure-Pak carton. Hmm, sleight of hand here in this fast switcheroo I guess. Even the Tropicana three-quart jug has shrunk to just 89 ounces, but executives say your juice is replaced by a snap cap and new jug style. I've found that hard to swallow, literally and figuratively. Besides, plastic is as hard to digest as is the marketing ploys of these companies.

Simply Orange, that used to come in a half-gallon size container is now also 59 ounces. No notice of the smaller size here either! Florida's Natural is still found in 64 ounce half-gallon cartons but the jugs are 89 ounces and not 96 ounces anymore. Yet Minute Maid, if purchased in the bottle is 59 ounces and in the carton is 64 ounces. Yet in most stores, the bottle costs more! Hmm, less product and more plastic for the landfill or recycle bin. Nice!

Cereal boxes contain less cereal, although some boxes remain large to give you the illusion of getting more cereal than is in the box. One ploy is for the manufacturer to say thgey're going "green" and decreasing their packaging material, but not telling you that your paid-for content also went out the window as well. Shrinkage works in mysterious ways, doesn't it? Some packages of other products have decreased in size, and the manufacturers say it's to keep from increasing the price to the consumer. Bulls**t! To put it bluntly. Seems they don't tell the supermarket that!

When fuel prices went up sky-high, the manufacturers and producers used that as an excuse to raise prices. Some of that was understandable, but now that fuel prices are about two dollars a gallon less than they were a year ago, the prices haven't dropped much, if at all. What's the excuse now? Are we paying for an all-new fleet of more fuel-efficient trucks and have to do it in one year? Isn't that part of the cost of doing business? Some bought fuel on open markets and got caught when prices went down and now we're paying for the tens of thousands of gallons of fuel they paid four-fifty to five dollars a gallon for and can't back out of deals.

I'd suggest consumers boycott companies who are ripping you off on their products. Do not purchase juices and ice cream, cereal and pizza and other products where the weight or volume had been decreased without a commensurate decrease in daily pricing! Not a single sale price, but daily overall pricing. And write the companies on their web site and ell them you won't but. Flood them with phone calls at their 800 numbers.

Don't you feel screwed enough by the government, without getting it from the manufacturers, retailers and corporate America too? Then do something about it!

Damn, America, you only have so many orifices!

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Obama and Economic Advisers...Throwing YOUR Money down the Drain!

Want to talk about throwing your money down the drain? Good Lord! Here's a good example of why we're in such deep debt and deep kimche in this country. A news story today from the Associated Press states:

"President Barack Obama, citing a new White House study suggesting that small businesses pay far more per employee for health insurance than big companies, said Saturday the disparity is "unsustainable — it's unacceptable."

"And it's going to change when I sign health insurance reform into law," the president said in his weekly Internet and radio address.

A new study by the White House Council of Economic Advisers said small businesses pay up to 18 percent more to provide health insurance for their employees. As a result, fewer of them do so and the number has been shrinking further in these hard economic times."

No Sh*t Sherlock. Anyone could have told you that. You didn't need a bunch of highly paid bureaucrats to do a White House study of small businesses, at god-knows how much money spent, to develop that information. It's simple economics and economy of scale!

When a large company negotiates with an insurance carrier, they do it on the basis of numbers. If they insure several hundred, or a thousand employees, they get a better rate than if they insure a few, It costs the insurance company less to process in bulk, they assign claims people based on customer numbers, and can project costs better when they have a solid base to do so. Plus, an insurance company can negotiate buy-down costs from health care providers from a position of strength when they have hundreds or thousands of employees in a plan, rather than a few. That's why an HMO can have the bill for a $19,000 surgery cut to $2,000 and the patient only have to pay several hundred dollars from their pocket. The negotiated pricing is gained from having a large client base, and you can't agglomerate all employees from every company into one plan. Thus each company and plan has different costs and pricing.

I'm not on the insurance company side here, but I do understand the cost/benefit relationship of bulk buying. If you go to a wholesaler and purchase in bulk you save money, thus the concept of Costco, Sam's Club, etc. Or the bulk packaging at some supermarkets. Buy more and save more. Go to the local store and get a small individual portion and you pay more. It's just simple economics that just about everyone understands.

Yet it takes an entire team of economic advisers on the government payroll to tell our supposedly intelligent president this? Nothing like spending millions when it isn't your money, eh?

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Obama and Stupidity...He has the Market Cornered

Obama continually does more to play the race card than anyone could have thought possible. Even those of his own race are sick of it. Worse, he runs his mouth even when, by his own admission, he doesn't know all the facts, and then goes on to make statements that apply racist overtones to an issue he shouldn't even be dealing with.

His latest asinine entry into a situation is that of the arrest of a black scholar, Henry Gates, Jr. in Massachusetts. Oh, wait, the scholar is a friend of Obama. That in itself makes everyone else stupid, doesn't it? The point that the professor was breaking into his house and someone called the police to report what they thought was a burglary, and the police duly responded. Mr. Gates at first refused to provide identification and accused the officer of racism. For what? Doing his job and protecting Gates' property? Just who the hell does Gates think he is...some celebrity that everyone is supposed to recognize at first glance and bow down to? No, just someone who is breaking into a house and needs to be identified. Since he refused and was allegedly abusive, he was arrested. The case has since been dropped. But Gates is demanding an apology from the sergeant who arrested him and it isn't forthcoming!

Then we have Obama spouting off that the police acted "stupidly". Then again, had there been an actual burglary or armed intrusion into his "friends" home, what would he have said then. The police were stupid because they were not there on time? Or should have done more?

Obama's statement at the end of his health care conference Wednesday night, without knowing the facts:

"I think it's fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry," Obama said. "Number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home. And number three — what I think we know separate and apart from this incident — is that there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately, and that's just a fact."

Yet I haven't heard Obama fry the obviously idiotic ex Virginia Tech campus clinic chief, Dr. Robert Miller, who took Seung- Hui Cho's mental records home more than a year before the gunman killed 32 people on the college campus before committing suicide. According to reports, Cho was counselled because of his "disturbing behaviour" and nobody knows why Miller took those files, along with the files for other students home with him when he left the University.

Maybe he hasn't had time to look into a "racist" element there to spout off with. I'm sure he can find something. A president, no less, who divides the country in more ways, than I can remember anyone ever doing. Politically, racially and morally, all within his first six months. Ain't that just grand!

Thursday, July 9, 2009

TomTom Does it Again - Lousy Customer Service

TomTom wanted to update their database, so they sent out an e-mail promising a $10 coupon off future purchases at tomtom.com if you updated your information. True to their word, they did send an online coupon supposedly valued at $10. That's where the good part stops.

Nowhere in the coupon does it state that it cannot be used for map upgrades or map downloads. But, when you try to use it, there is no place or space to enter the code in your shopping cart. Neither can you enter it as a promotional code.

So, I contacted TomTom asking how to handle this as I wanted to upgrade my current map and but an annual map update, at a cost of about $48.00 less the $10 coupon.

TomTom e-mails me a reply NO. The coupon is only good towards hardware and accessories. I tell them the coupon doesn't say, that and TomTom simply sends me another e-mail telling me that they understand my frustration and will "pass my comments on for review." Basically, another too bad, too sad that we baited you to do something for us, and we're now screwing you once again and not performing as promised. Hmm, seems they have done this in the past too. Must be a pattern with them.

Here's what the coupon states:

If you are having trouble viewing this email, view it online.
To ensure you receive our future emails, please add US.news@tomtom.com to your
address book now.

TomTom(R) Products Maps Services Support
Car navigation

Thank you for updating your email preferences!

Use the coupon code provided below next time you're shopping at TomTom.com, and we'll take $10 off* your purchase during checkout.

3UYP__grAqDGaa6QAAAEiw6wZdxjO

Thanks again!



*Product purchase total must exceed $10. Coupon must be used on TomTom.com.


Does anyone see anything about "must use towards hardware or accessories"? And isn't maps and map upgrades a "purchase"?

As usual, TomTom makes and changes the rules during the game, gets what it wants and then lets you stand out in the cold if you actually go to use the coupon for something you can use. Factually, why would anyone buy a GPS from their website when most retailers and Internet vendors sell for much cheaper? The only reason to go to TomTom is their maps, and their service, which leaves me cold. Maybe their customer service is offshore and that's the problem?

Time to put the TomTom on Craig's List and get a Garmin where they actually believe in customer service.