Help! I’ve been eco-napped!
I was walking through the store the other day when I realized what was once a known experience for me has become alien and strange. I have been a mom for 23 years, and within those two-decades and three-years I have been the sole grocery acquisition specialist. Oh the stories I could tell of my hours spent cross comparing brands to check for quality and value. The labels I have read, the boxes I have tossed atop a loaded basket, and the cookies I have used to bribe tired children in order to get through the check out and to the car before a total melt down ensued. Yes, I am the Royalty of Retail, the Mistress of the Market, the Vixen of Vending!
A couple of weeks ago I slid my feet into my favorite pumps, clasped on my best pearls and headed out to the grocery store in order to buy delicious and nutritious food for my troops, not to mention the need to replenish the wonderful supplies that sit under my kitchen sink that keep the entire household sanitized and smelling wonderful. Our clothes are white, bright and we smell like lavender-white-lily-roses -on-a-sunny-May-morning. I needed to get more of that liquid miracle maker that keeps the sheets of a potty training toddler smelling April fresh!
I arrive at the Kroger. I am in my zone. I crack my knuckles and wrap my limbered hands around the push bar on the grocery cart. I begin to guide my cart with the precision that only a seasoned shopper possesses. I started down the ethnic food aisle when I begin to notice that the really small changes I had noticed in shopping trips of the past were accumulating and changing my shopping experience. Sure, I had noticed the little “Eco” this and “Eco” that on bottles. It took a while, but the small, slow and subtle changes finally took full effect this past week. It looked like the Eco-Fairy had fluttered through the local Kroger and vomited a bunch of glittering eco-hype all over my once normal grocery store.
Oh geez! Where does a grocery-goddess go to get a real sized bottle of liquid detergent for a reasonable price? What is this new fad of shrinking bottles with price tags that go in the opposite direction of the size and volume of the product? I could only assume it was the work of the Eco-Fairy. Anytime there is a little hype put out about a particular subject we suddenly have a whole new media induced fad that winds up screwing up my grocery budget.
A bottle of my favorite detergent used to weigh more than my 7-month old baby, but it cost less than diapers for the tot. Now that same brand weighs as much as a loaf of bread, and it cost me as much as a month’s tuition at the now grown tot’s college. Thanks. Thanks a lot Eco-Fairy. I appreciate that. What has really changed in that detergent? Nothing really. They claim it is more “concentrated” now. Essentially they removed the extra water they used to dilute it with, put the same amount of product into a small Barbie sized bottle, slapped an “eco-friendly” label on it and raised the price so high that even Mr. Clean can’t afford to do his laundry these days.
What other products have I noted the same change in? Cleaners of course! Yep. Smaller bottles, bigger price tags. I did vomit a little when I walked by the soup isle and I saw a Campbell’s Soup can with an “eco friendly” label! So, how does a soup become more environmentally friendly? Simple. They change nothing at all, slap a green label on a can and then charge the poor sucker-consumer (a.k.a ME) the cost to be in on the trend. Oh, we can find eco-friendly popcorn, eco-friendly shampoo, conditioner, flour, sugar, mac and cheese, and just about any other product under the sun that could possibly be given a green label and a price hike. The company does not need to change the product. They only need to put on a fancy green label (I will let my husband a.k.a. “Polymer-Man” tell you why the green dyes used to make those labels are not good for the environment).
What will be held hostage next by the Eco-Fairy? I think that the recent hype around plastics in the media is a good hint. Now we have stores who are already jumping on the bandwagon so that they can claim to be a “BPA Free” store. Guess what? They were already, more than likely, a “mostly-BPA-free” store. Now, they will get to claim to be more “child and family friendly” than their competitor, and since the media has done such a good job scaring the crap out of people, the store can raise its prices since they have had to do, oh so much, to accommodate consumer fears. Baby bottles will now have new labels declaring them as “BPA FREE!” Even though they were already BPA Free before the hype. Of course the exact same bottle will wind up costing you three-times more now.
If you really want to get this domestic-doll all fired up then whisper sweet nothings in my ear about mercury laden light bulbs. I can see the ads now:
Save the environment! Kill your children by putting these light bulbs throughout your house! You too can now own the light bulbs that use less energy to burn! Of course mercury is a heavy metal that is a known hazard to humankind, it causes birth defects and permanent brain damage, but the environment will thank you for it! Well, not really because mercury is also bad for the envrionment — but it’s good for the company pushing this light bulb and Al Gore thinks it’s a pretty darn groovy idea too!
Every time I see Al Gore talk about “Carbon Credits” I have flashbacks of having the crap scared out of me as a kid while watching Return of the Living Dead. He may be proof positive that mercury light bulbs are a really bad idea!
By the way, did they ever establish the mortifying connection between cell phones and brain tumors? Lavender and breast development in boys? Power lines and three headed babies? The Achy-breaky heart dance and attention deficit disorder?
Funny isn’t it? These scare-driven fads “come on like a flame and then turn a cold shoulder.” Why is that? Maybe because past the hype there is not much substance or evidence. Or, maybe we get bored with it when we begin to realize the green can of soup only made a difference in how much we paid and not a single thing more. So we anxiously wait for the next wave of hype so we hang ten - or just pay ten-dollars more.
I could have had a V-8! Only with this current hype, put a lot of Vodka in mine. Make that Skyy Vodka, please.
Claire,this is absolutely the funniest and most insightful article. Grocery Aquisition Specialist, Al Gore and The Night of the Living Dead is too much. Have a wonderful day!! Grocery Aquisition Specialist !!!
Funny stuff– keep up the fine writing. Humor is the hardest genre to script.
Johnny Carson said “If they buy the premise, they’ll buy the bit”.
I’ve bought the premise, and your article left me laughing.
Kinda reminds me of my 87 year old Polski motherinlaw who looks at every can on the shelf trying to find the one that is mismarked in price.
As for cleaning products, I use LesToil. It’s still relatively inexpensive and works for greasy clothing and whitewall tires
Oh yes, isn’t the public a bunch of lemmings. The laundry detergent repackaging has really gotten to me. What a joke. How thoughtful of companies in attempting to make the general public ‘feel better’ about being supplied with ’safer products’. Perhaps we are amongst the minority who are not smiling as we get screwed at the checkout.
Be sure to recycle that V-8 can and vodka bottle now! Maybe I shouldn’t share the story told from a person in ‘waste management’, that although citizens go through great effort in preparing and separating recyclables, many times the separated items get thrown into one big pile out of the trucks anyway. Guess I just shared.
March on Mistress of the Market~swat that Eco-Fairy if she buzzes too close!
Vixen of Vending? I’m married to a vixen??
I think I like the sound of this.
This also explains our grocery budget in more concrete terms. Sheeesh.
Oh yes, this was an easy piece for me to write. It was my moment on the proverbial soap box (pun intended of course!). Sarcasm and cynicism is just one of the many services I offer. ;)
Honey, you knew I was just a little vixenish when I caught your eye. You look calm on the surface, but truth be told you like a good challenge and a little adventure. Thus the sheer excitement of throwing grenades, land nav, and shooting big guns.
Yes, and that’s just to change the baby’s diaper!
Imagine what life in the Army must have been like!
I loved ’sole grocery acquisition specialist’! :-)
Really funny post…and spot on. Smaller packages acrcoss the board, fancy labels and more $$ as a result…it’s happening here as well. My wallet is losing weight faster than I am,,,
so, I had another, odd, tangential thought :)
Weren’t the 1970’s the first time that eco-friendly became the catch-phrase du jour? Maxis were in then….and they are now back in fashion…
everything old = new again - including trends in eco-friendly stuff and fashion .
Of course, there’s that saying: the better the economy, the shorter the hemline…
Ah, good catch there Piper! Yes, it is what I call “recycled reality.”
Shorter hemlines? Hummm. Honey did you notice how much “better” the economy will be doign this weekend? Eh?
Pity that, like so many other things, eco-awareness is basically a good idea — but thanks to those great folks who grab any way they can to make a dime off stuff, the message gets lost in the capitalism.
No, not saying I’m down on capitlaism — what I *am* saying is that it inevitably leads to the smaller bottles with the higher prices. Sorry, ma’am, but you cant blame Gore for that one. Blame Proctor-Gamble. Blame Kroger. Theyre the ones who are insisting they’re so “eco-aware”, when you and I both know that aint the case.
And a little recycling aint gonna kill ya. After all, if you dont, then that just means *someone else* has to deal with the trash you left behind. Just remember that.
Well, Gore is making it all so fashionable — which is why he gets my vote for being partially responsible; that and the fact that consumers are way too easily pulled into this stuff.
Actually you may be surprised to know that I am avid recycler. Our family only owns ONE vehicle and we carpool everywhere we go. I turn my lights out when they are not in use, we do not buy cable TV or sit in front of a TV for hours on end, we live a pretty conservative lifestyle when it comes to consumption ( I also Freecycle, and try to always reuse items as well). I guess I get outraged when I hear people like Gore pointing his finger at me — the one small used car family and telling me to watch my carbon usage while he is flying around in jets and living in how many huge energy ineffecient homes? Practice what you preach Gore!