The Peters Township Source

Gas prices are soaring and the cost of food seems to rise inexorably every week. So shoppers are budgeting like never before. But is that really enough to make you save a few cents by foregoing Heinz Ketchup in favor of the store brand equivalent?

Probably not, if you’re like area shoppers we recently interviewed. It seems that, while sales of private label foods (those made or marketed by the grocery store) have been soaring in the past year, there are some food products that just have no substitutes. Think Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, Coca-Cola soda, and Pittsburgh's favorite ketchup.

“Even if I was scraping together pennies and living on ketchup sandwiches, the ketchup on that sandwich would have to be Heinz,” says Michelle Stonemark, of Bethel Park. “Nothing else compares.”

Apparently, she’s not alone. Out of a dozen random customers queried at a local Shop ’n Save, everyone could name at least a handful of national name brand items he or she simply had to have, whether Home Pride bread, Doritos tortilla chips, or Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. “It has to be Hellman’s Mayonnaise for the flavor,” says Jo Brown, of South Fayette. “I don’t care when it comes to things like window cleaners, or even peanut butter. My five-year-old grandson eats that, and he doesn’t care. But with potato chips, I have to have Cape Cod. I come to this store specifically for those because you can’t get them everywhere.”

There’s an ongoing debate among consumers and marketing experts about whether name brand foods are inherently better-tasting than store brands, or whether people simply perceive a superior quality because of marketing and better art on the front of the box. A few years ago, for example, Consumer Reports ranked Winn-Dixie store-brand ice cream ahead of Breyer’s and declared that Kroger’s-brand potato chips were better than Ruffles or Pringles. The same magazine also declared that the best-tasting take-out coffee in America was from McDonald’s.

But tastes are obviously subjective. One thing that’s indisputable for the most popular name brand foods is that they contain a unique taste that can’t be found elsewhere. Love it or hate it, Dr. Pepper has a distinctly different taste than Wal-Mart’s “Dr. Thunder” knock-off. The same goes for Hellmann’s Mayonnaise or Jif Peanut Butter.

But is it the unique taste that we’re after, or the psychological comfort of having a recognizable name brand on our shelves? After all, when it comes to breakfast cereals, are top-selling brands like Froot Loops really much different than “Fruity O’s,” or is King Vitamin more flavor-rich than “Squire Mineral” or whatever it’s called?

“It’s just a mindset you grow up with,” says Sandy Fricker, of South Fayette, who has been eating Campbell’s soup for as long as she can recall. “If it’s soup, it has to be Campbell’s. You just don’t venture from that.” And she doesn’t, as evidenced by the cans of soup in her cart bearing the iconic red-and-white logo.

For Betsy Schwartz, of Cecil, she has a long list of name brand products she has to buy, not necessarily because she prefers them: “Heinz Ketchup, Hellmann’s Mayonnaise, Dasani water… I have a house with seven people, and this is what they tell me to get [Betsy isn’t even sure what makes Dasani water better]. I have one who still makes ketchup sandwiches. She has to have Heinz. When we go on road trips, we pack a bottle of ketchup for her.”

There is one item that Schwartz herself insists on.

“With toilet tissue, it has to be Scott,” she says. “First, because I have a septic tank, and second, because it lasts longer. With seven people in the house, that’s important.”

Brand “New”
Have you ever noticed how more and more national brands have become partnered with store brands? Thus, you’ll see Kellogg’s Rice Krispies sitting next to a private label box of “Krispie Rice.”

Marketing and retailing store brands has become a highly profitable, $65 billion business in the U.S. This is why grocery stores maximize their efforts to put their private label brands in the most prominent shelf positions. They want to persuade you to choose their own brand.

For price-conscious shoppers, private label purchases can mean savings of hundreds of dollars a year.

Moreover, where store brands started out as cheap, inferior-quality alternatives, the quality of store brands has perceptibly improved over the years. In fact, a few store brands have actually created such strong consumer followings that they have become the new national brand of choice.

Comparing the Non-Essentials

McDonald’s Cheeseburger: 300 cals, 12 grms fat, 750 grms sodium, 6 grms sugar

Subway Beef Sandwich: 290 cals, 5 grms fat, 900 grms sodium, 8 grms sugar

Bob Evans Kid’s Menu: 137 cals, 8 grms fat, 302 grms sodium, 0 grms sugar

Pizza Hut 12in. Pepperoni: 280 cals, 14 grms fat, 640 grms sodium, 2 grms sugar

Dairy Queen Arctic Float: 730 cals, 15 grms fat, 220 grms sodium, 113 grms sugar

Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture