WARC (May 3)
“Political leaders in France and the US have been publicly critical of companies for making products smaller while maintaining the existing price, but South Korea’s government is one of the first to legislate against it.” The Korea Fair Trade Commission “will now require producers that downsize products to put notices on packages, websites, or at stores for the three months following the change.”
Tags: Companies, Critical, Downsize, France, FTC, Legislate, Notices, Packages, Political leaders, Price, Products, Smaller, South Korea, Stores, U.S., Websites
Equities (September 13)
In the U.S., many dismiss inflation because it’s “only about 3%,” a big mistake. In real life, it’s actually “closer to 10%” as revealed by the Chapwood Index, a real-time inflation monitor. “Most cities are seeing inflation at or above 10% per year!” This “stealth inflation” is overlooked “because nobody really sees it unless they are paying attention… Packages of pretzels and chips and snacks contain less than they used to, yet their prices are rising…. Those 16-oz packages may be only 13-oz. now.”
Tags: Chapwood Index, Inflation, Packages, Prices, Real time, Stealth inflation, U.S.
Wall Street Journal (April 29)
The cable industry is “panicked over the looming breakup of its business model” as fewer traditional linear customers want big bundles and younger viewers increasingly opt for video on demand subscriptions. Cable operators benefitted from local monopolies that allowed them to “dictate packages and pricing, markets be damned.” Though “cable bills have grown at almost triple the rate of inflation over the past two decades,” the gravy train may be coming to an end.
Tags: Cable, Customers, Inflation, Markets, Monopolies, Packages, Pricing, Video on demand, Viewers
New York Times (December 24, 2013)
With postal services around the world struggling to survive, Canada is taking a step that few nations have dared. “With the digital handwriting ever clearer on the wall, the Canadian postal service has announced that it will end its remaining door-to-door letter deliveries over the next five years and focus on its one clear growth area: package deliveries to a public that is increasingly doing its shopping online.”
Tags: Canada, Deliveries, Letters, Online, Packages, Postal Service, Shopping, Survival
