29 March 2024, Friday, 2:11
Support
the website
Sim Sim,
Charter 97!
Categories

Inflation in Action: Manufacturers Come up With Trick to Circumvent the Price Freeze

29
Inflation in Action: Manufacturers Come up With Trick to Circumvent the Price Freeze

It will affect the wallets of Belarusians.

What used to be a theory, now can be easily found on the shelves. If the manufacturer is forbidden to raise the price of a product, this product disappears from the market or takes the guise of a new product (more expensive). To be a new product, one needs to change a little in recipe or packaging, writes onliner.by.

Although we have got used to 0.9-litre milk and 85-gram chocolates, life is still a surprise. Recently, one can notice some unfamiliar products on the shelves.

- I have noticed it is increasingly difficult to find a pack of sour cream or cottage cheese with an "even" fat content. It is 22 per cent, then 14 per cent and even 9.5 per cent. At the same time, the price for a less fat product is often higher, and the packaging hardly differs. Moreover, sour cream of 14% turned out to be more liquid than 10%! That's how one controls prices and takes care of the consumer," complains the reader.

For example, instead of sour cream of 15% fat content, they replaced it with 14%, instead of curd of 1% we have it of 1.5%, and instead of milk 900 ml, they sell 890 ml. A new product, 45% fat cheese, appeared. Milk Ochen from Molochny Mir with a fat content of 3.2% cost 1.78 roubles per litre, and then the fat content was reduced to 3% and the price went up to 1.88 roubles per litre.

- I think it's a marketing move to sell 1.6% milk instead of 1.5%, and 2.6% milk instead of 2.5%. We'll all get fat soon," laughs a buyer of Minskaya Marka.

A buyer has also noticed the Prostokvashino milk. Earlier, it was sold in bottles of 900 ml (Br2.54 per litre), and now it is 890 ml (at Br2.80 per litre). The fat content is the same - 2.5%.

- I bought a bottle of milk and didn't even notice the difference. In the morning, when I was drinking coffee, I noticed that the milk was not even 0.9 litre, but 0.89! Then, just for the sake of interest, I compared the price: the smaller pack is more expensive," says Natallia.

Molohnye Gorki sour cream, unlike the others, has radically changed the colour of its packaging to bright orange. Therefore, the customer will notice the new product, even if it is more expensive. Sour cream used to be 25% fat. Now it is 22% but more expensive (6.58 and 6.83 rubles respectively). The manufacturer also now offers 14% fat sour cream in addition to the usual 15% and 4% cottage cheese.

The "old" and "new" fat content on the same product occasionally appear right next to each other on the shelves. For example, almost all of the Hutorok cottage cheese from Savushkin Product has added 0.5% fat content and become more expensive. Now a package with a 1% fat content (6.4 rubles per kilo) and one with the same fat content but 1.5% (7.07 rubles per kilo) are sold next to each other. Buyers wonder if it's another way to make more money or to bypass price regulation. Let us try to find out.

What about the prices?

Let us remind that Belarus controls prices to curb rises in prices of essential goods. The list of such goods varies, but dairy products are always on it. Their prices are restrained in two ways. Firstly, by limiting the trade mark-up in the shops to no more than 15% (cheese - 30%) of the cost. Secondly, since this March, the price of dairy products may not rise faster than 0.2% a month.

Write your comment 29

Follow Charter97.org social media accounts