Posted on 08/08/2008 6:30:16 AM PDT by shrinkermd
Companies throughout the food chain are changing the way they do business in response to soaring grain costs, and consumers are likely to bear the brunt in the form of rising food prices.
Farmers are making the broadest cuts to their livestock herds in decades, meaning meat at the supermarket will likely cost more in coming years. Middlemen are trying to shorten the duration of supply contracts to 90 days from one year so they can pass on higher costs more quickly. And food brands are shrinking the contents of their packages, from ice-cream cartons to beverage containers.
...In another measure, the cost of the groceries that the federal government suggests middle-class families buy to have healthy diets rose 8.6% in June compared with the same month a year earlier.
Michael Swanson, an economist at Wells Fargo & Co., thinks the food inflation rate could rise as high as 6% next year. Paul Prentice, president of Farm Sector Economics, Colorado Springs, Colo., said he expects retail food prices to rise about 7.5% in 2009.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture sees food prices climbing 4.5% to 5.5% this year and 4% to 5% in 2009. Even under this more conservative forecast, the average family of four would see its annual food costs hit $9,800 in 2009, up about $1,200 since 2006.
Meat is a big reason economists think food inflation has legs.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Right now our husbands are in Iraq. Tomorrow one of the younger wives is moving in with me for the next 5 months so I can teach her how to can, cook and shop smart. She also wants to know about credit, compound interest and saving. (Her husband’s an E-2 and they are BROKE.)
She wants to learn, so what the heck. I don’t have anything better to do and I could use the extra set of hands.
My husband’s uncle’s dairy cows are beautiful animals. He keeps them very clean and happy. Their hooves are regularly trimmed and they are kept very healthy.
Heck, there are hormones and traces of medications in the water supply. Should we stop drinking that?
For what it's worth.
That is AWESOME, Marie! I mentor my niece as much as possible. I’m currently teaching her to crochet, and she loves to bake and is an avid reader so I send her wholesome, moral books disguised as “entertainment.” ;)
My three boys all know how to hunt and fish and can put together a meal if they have a pot and a can opener, LOL! They’d rather cook anything on the grill or over a bonfire than be in the kitchen, though. The youngest one can sew on a button; the other two need wives, but none currently on the horizon. (They’re still in their early 20’s, so no rush. College and starter careers, first!)
I remember those days as a Navy Wife and the long separations. It’s not easy. My then-husband would go on West-Pacific tours for 6 months at a crack. Luckily, I could move back home during those deployments to be near his family and mine.
There’s hope for the next generation, thanks to people like you! :)
When I was a small boy my family visited an uncle who was a small dairy farmer. I was fascinated by the cows. My uncle was also very fond of his cows. He had a small herd and knew them all by name. They seemed to respond to his kindness. But also they were regular as clockwork. He had to be there on a set schedule for regular feeding and milking.
Right now, at our auction house, 600-800 pound steer are going for about $100-120 each. We should get 250-300 lbs of meat (we like the fat) depending on the size of the animal. So that’s still 50 cents a pound and that’s with steaks and roasts.
The largest thing I’ve ever slaughtered and butchered at home was a 600lb ram. It took three women and one man 8 hours to get it in the freezer and to serve up a nice stew. The next two days were spent canning a good part of it.
I have three capable teenagers (two are male), me and another woman. I don’t want to tackle anything larger than that for a first time. Setting us up for success, you know. ;-)
Right now I honestly think we’re on the edge of despiration. I’m trying to get a jump on things before they get bad.
My husband earns good money and we’ll be alright, but I remember being the wife of an E-3 with a baby and how hard that was.
Last week there was an article in the Army Times that the last 7 years of pay raises have just been eaten up with the rise of the cost of living. So the young wives in our company are feeling the crunch like I was in the “way way back”.
But most of these young wives are missing the *equipment* to deal with being broke. They still eat out at McDonalds and go out to nice dinners every month because the “deserve” it. They’re still using expensive cleaning products because they don’t know that baking soda cuts grease and that vinegar is antibacterial and can give anything a good shine.
Sadly, most of them don’t *want* to learn. They think that they have it all under control. I’m just gald that there’s one who’s seeing the big picture and taking the initiative to learn.
My daughter has a 16 year-old friend who’s begging to come over to join in on the fun. Last time she was here she pointedly told me that she would be an adult soon and needed this knowledge to be ready.
*That* is our hope for the future! :-)
Well, D'OH!
I wish I could post that Captain Obvious graphics.
Yes, Dorothy, there are still morons who think that, somehow, they are exempt from sharing the bottom of the consumer food chain with the rest of us...
LOL!
I love it.
Aren't really stupid, posturing megalomaniacs their own worst enemy?
Ridicule, although mostly invisible, really works.
They must have a deal on cuts of meat too. No shrink wrapped stuff either. Butchers wrap your selection in wax paper and weigh it and price it. The selection of meat is excellent and 1/2 the price. T-bone steaks an inch thick and big enough to make you drool on your footwear.
Not much diesel used used to get the stuff to the markets.
There is a giant produce terminal in downtown L.A. where farmers sell their whole crops. And trucks are needed to move it to the big supermarkets. That means driving up the I-5, the 405, etc. where there is always some kind of accident causing 8-10 lane freeways to slow to 5 mph.
Once a truckfull of live chickens overturned and chickens were running around. So traffic stopped so people could grab them and put them in their trunk. Another time a truckful of frozen pigs overturned on the 14 fwy-S. Every pickup truck had a pig in the back. Same with the beer truck and the Brinks truck full of quarters.
Marie — cutting your grocery bill from $700 to $500 in three months is awesome! How many are in your family?
I have managed to cut my grocery bill down to $100 a week, including cleaning supplies and toiletries, but not pet food and supplies. I make my own laundry detergent out of Fels Naphtha soap, Arm and Hammer Washing Soda, and 20 Mule Team Borax. It costs 1 to 2 cents a load, depending on whether you have a front loader or a top loader. It works better than Tide. (There are many websites where you can get the exact recipe, so I won’t post the details here.) As far as the Dawn, do you have a CVS in your area? Check out the website www.moneysavingmom.com (sorry I don’t know how to do the linky thing) and learn how to use the CVS discount system to your advantage. I have 18 bottles of Dawn under my kitchen sink that I got either free or for pennies at CVS. Also, if you have an Aldi in your area, check it out! I paid $1.99 a gallon for milk this week!
“....Are liberals a viable source of Soylent Green?....”
Eww! Yuck, give it to Mikey. He’ll eat anything.
“....Aren’t really stupid, posturing megalomaniacs their own worst enemy?....”
You’d think so. There is so much support for Obama I am losing respect and confidence in the American voter.
A 600 pound steer will yield about 450lbs hanging weight and should cost about $700. Do you mean per hundred weight? 600 lb road kill is worth more than $100-120.
*APPLAUSE* :)
The I-5 sounds like my kind of place to “shop,” LOL!
Best Christmas Ever? Grandpa hit a big, fat pheasant. It went into the trunk. A day later, a Christmas Tree fell off the back of a tree truck, so we had a REAL Christmas Tree that year, and pheasant for Christmas Dinner.
God Bless Us, Every One! :)
If you have a Walgreen’s in the area, they have great in-store specials with their coupons (on lots of BASIC needs) and at http://www.walgreens.com you can get additional coupons. They also have a Super Saver magazine each month and lots of times you can get stuff for free after rebates, and you can combine a lot of national-brand coupons with their in-store coupons so sometimes they pay YOU to cart stuff out the door.
Also, request the FREE samples of this and that every few weeks from http://www.walmart.com (Click on “In Stores Now” and the drop-down menu will show you “Free Samples.”) I do that all year long and use them as Christmas Stocking Stuffers for Husband and our (20-something) sons. Walgreen’s is good for that too; lots of Buy One Get One Free deals on stocking-stuffer items; gum, chocolate bars, snacks, toothbrushes, floss, nail clippers, garden seeds, shampoo, etc. (Our kids get a stocking and then something useful like a gift card for food or gasoline. It works for us.)
My Mom gives me Walgreen’s gift cards at various times throughout the year (Christmas, Birthday, etc.) because she loves my stories about how I used the card, stocked up on TP or laundry soap and they gave me money back, LOL!
When we were at our poorest, I fed Husband, three teen boys and a (worthless, at best) brother in law for under $200 a month. And no one ever left the table hungry. It can be done with a little planning and common sense. We hunted, fished, had a huge garden and never turned down an offer of “free anything.” :)
“Marie — cutting your grocery bill from $700 to $500 in three months is awesome! How many are in your family?
I have managed to cut my grocery bill down to $100 a week, including cleaning supplies and toiletries, but not pet food and supplies. I make my own laundry detergent out of Fels Naphtha soap, Arm and Hammer Washing Soda, and 20 Mule Team Borax. It costs 1 to 2 cents a load, depending on whether you have a front loader or a top loader. It works better than Tide. (There are many websites where you can get the exact recipe, so I won’t post the details here.) As far as the Dawn, do you have a CVS in your area? Check out the website www.moneysavingmom.com (sorry I don’t know how to do the linky thing) and learn how to use the CVS discount system to your advantage. I have 18 bottles of Dawn under my kitchen sink that I got either free or for pennies at CVS. Also, if you have an Aldi in your area, check it out! I paid $1.99 a gallon for milk this week!”
There are four of us and one of them is a teenage boy! ;-)
I don’t know if there’s a CVS, but I haven’t looked.
I *love* the link! I’ll be playing with that all weekend. Have you heard of the Tightwad Gazette? Those three books are like bibles to me. TONS of inspiration.
What has me mad is that I was really being good and had it down to $350 a year ago and that included everything.
I know. Part of the problem is that it’s summer and the kids are home all the time. I forgot how much of an effect that has. I’ll see how low I can get it next month.
And would you mind posting the recipe for the laundry soap here? A link like the one you sent before would be fine.
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