Op-Ed: The grocery chain wars prove that the modern supermarket model isn’t sustainable
Markets have proven that price wars – both on shelves and in the minds of consumers – are a farce. Not only are consumers no longer willing to pay outrageous prices for items they’ve come to know when they can find them at less, but they’re no longer willing to pay outrageous prices for goods they’ve come to know when they can find them at more.
That is the case for the grocery market. Prices are set and prices for each specific product are determined, by retailers, by consumers and by the market.
The current price wars for groceries are just a symptom of a new and important problem in our grocery market. We’ve become too focused on price. Price is all consumers have to focus on when shopping.
Our grocery markets are in deep, deep trouble. We have become too focused on price and have stopped seeking to find the best value among different products and price points. Rather than focusing on price, and in this case, quality, we’ve become a marketplace where it’s all about the price and the best price – and where consumers feel that they’ll pay more for the same item or product and can get them at a better price.
The modern grocery market in America is not sustainable.
To see what’s going wrong, we first have to examine what’s going right.
To truly know what is going wrong, we need to know what is going right.
The price wars on grocery products are part of a trend we’ve followed for decades.
How we have ended up in this disastrous situation is our own decision. Many people have been willing to pay more for the same product, for the same item because it is more efficient than someone else’s.
We have become the consumer-driven market where cost is the measure of value. This has created inefficiency, more prices, more waste and, ultimately, fewer choices when it comes
