CONSUMERS are suffering "sneaky" price rises on some everyday grocery items as big brands quietly reduce the size of products, a watchdog has warned.
Which? said it continued to find evidence that commonly-bought items such as tea, cheese and washing powder had shrunk - and in some cases actually increased in price.
It found that Sainsbury's increased the cost of Tetley Blend of Both tea from £2.55 to £2.75, despite the pack shrinking from 80 tea bags to 75.
Asda increased its price for Philadelphia Light Soft Cheese from £1.84 to £1.87 after the pack shrank 10% from 200g to 180g.
Surf Essential Oils Powder Tropical Lily & Ylang Ylang remained priced at £5 in Ocado and Tesco despite shrinking from 25 washes (2kg) to 23 washes (1.61kg).
And at Asda, Morrisons and Sainsbury's, the prices of Birds Eye Select Mixed Vegetables and Hovis Best of Both bread remained the same despite shrinking.
The watchdog reported that the majority of manufacturers said it was retailers who ultimately set the prices of products.
But it pointed out that supermarkets were unlikely to drop prices unless the wholesale cost fell.
It said: "Products are losing 50g here and a few centimetres there, which is all adding up to a more expensive shop without you knowing why."
Which? executive director Richard Lloyd said: "Shrinking products can be a sneaky way of putting up costs for consumers because pack sizes shrink but the prices don't.
"It's now time for action on dodgy pricing practices that stops people from easily comparing products to find the cheapest."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article