Supermarkets pricing

Cost is a significant factor in the consumer s acceptance of substitute dairy foods. Table 20 shows the relative cost of substitute fat and protein in the various substitute foods. A comparison of retail prices of selected dairy products and corresponding substitutes in four supermarkets in the midwestem United States in the Fall of 1992 are shown in Table 21. In all cases the prices for the substitutes are lower than the prices of the respective dairy product. The smallest price margin is in the area where the substitute products are advertised as fat-reduced or cholesterol-free. 

A simple contract for any value need not be in writing, but can be verbal and is known as a parole contract. Many contracts are made which are verbal. When a person goes into a supermarket, takes an item off the shelves, carries it to the checkout and makes an offer to purchase it at the price shown, this constitutes an offer in contract law. The checkout cashier takes the money and is, at the same time, accepting the offer. 

Sales through supermarkets require large and continuing supplies, which in turn tend to reduce average price premiums for organic food. 

Recently, organic farms have been encouraged to make added value products such as cheese and yoghurt. The farmer processes the milk and can fix a price for the farmhouse-produced cheese or yoghurt. It needs to be a unique quality product, or have a superior image, if it is going to sell well at a higher price than a similar product in the local supermarket. 

The Organic Valley dairy co-op, based in Wisconsin (USA), has 633 farmers in 16 states and one Canadian province. They have 20475 cows and 95000 acres. They claim that their success stems from paying farmers a fair, sustainable and stable price. They sell via natural food stores and supermarkets. They have also been active in getting schools to offer organic milk (The New Farm, 2003). 

By selling through the supermarket, rather than to an abattoir, several additional costs are incurred which increase the end price but not the price received by the farmer. These additional costs may be summarised as follows ... 

Consumer products require expensive magazine advertisements and television commercials. This can amount to 30% or 40% of the selling price. If a new laundry product is introduced, a large amount of money must be spent to convince supermarkets and/or mass distribution outlets to grant it shelf space. They must be convinced it will sell before they will put it on their shelves. They are only interested in items that will move. In 1968 Colgate introduced its new pre-soak, Axion . In the first 9 months it spent over 3,000,000 for advertisements alone- 640,000 for newspaper ads, 865,000 for network television, 886,000 for spot local radio commercials, 800,000 for spot local television commercials, and 199,000 for magazine ads.8 Airwick spent over 7,000,000 to introduce a new disinfectant-deodorant spray in 1973.7... 

The basic research in our fields is now done largely in universities. It can have incredibly important practical results, but those results cannot normally be predicted in advance. Who would have thought that the basic study of induced energy emission from excited states of atoms and molecules that led to the laser would wind up giving us a better way to record music, or read supermarket prices Would a music company have funded that research Who would have thought that our increased understanding of the chemistry of life would have led to the creation of biotechnology as an entirely new industry The industry that benefited from the basic research could not have funded it, since it did not yet exist. 

We may end up recommending a formulation for a low-priced drinking water under the house brand of the local supermarket, which is manufactured with simple separation steps from tap water. It will certainly be esthetically more pleasing than tap water, with or without carbon dioxide to give it the fizz, and it will have less objectionable appearance and smell than tap water. It is aimed at a market niche of people who are willing to pay a little more than tap water to ensure health, but not enough for Evian and Perrier. We will discuss the quantitative methods of evaluation and selection in section 11.6, and the presentation of the recommendations as a business plan in section 11.7. 

The vendor estimates the price range of FACT to be 25 to 75/yd. The cost of treating 3000 yd of soil for Boys Supermarket in Los Angeles, California, was 75/yd. According to the vendor, factors affecting cost include initial and target contaminant concentrations, site preparation, and amount of waste (D10006H, pp. 10, 13). 

For the value of fine chemicals used in speciality chemicals outside life sciences, only a best guess is possible. Issues such as at what stage of the supply chain the end price is determined (wholesaler, supermarket, or specialty boutique), what is the exact concentration of the embedded fine... 

Apart from the importance of consumer confidence in the product, which is encouraged through a trustworthy and known certification scheme, a stable supply (e.g. through the involvement of supermarkets) and relatively low prices are important for organic agriculture to expand (Michelsen etal. 1999). 

An everyday example might be the association between price and item in a supermarket. As there are in all likelihood many items that have the same price, we cannot describe this association as a function however, the association of item with price does define a function, as each article has only one price. In this latter case, the domain of the function is simply a list of all items for sale in the supermarket. 

Retail scales in various configurations are used in stores and supermarkets to determine price. They range from simple weigh-only scales to ones having touch screens and enough memory to store and print data on thousands of products, including the data necessary to print nutritional labels. They range in capacities up to 25 kg. 

The major opportunity for our technology was to be in store-printed labels. The most expensive items in supermarkets are found in the meat and fish counters. Generally, meat is cut and packaged in the store, and a label must be printed then and there. The store-printed labels require a somewhat different code than the package-printed labels, as they reflect the price of the item. That, however, is not important here. 

Further process steps such as dye coloration, electrolyte filling and seal-ing/lamination, leading to sealed completed modules, have also been carried out on 10 x 10 cm2 substrates. For these process steps, dedicated equipment has been developed from the laboratory stage, since it is not commercially available. A photo of a fully processed master plate is shown in Fig. 7.7. It contains 4 modules of 5 cells each (total area of 1 module 20 cm2) on one TCO plate of 100 cm2. These modules were intended for LCD powered price tags on supermarket shelves. 

Organic supermarkets have a greater chance of economies of scale than smaller retail outlets and, by offering a wide variety in one shop at lower prices to the consumer than smaller specialist outlets, they are able to compete with the supermarkets on convenience. 

Forty years ago chicken was considered a luxury for Sunday lunch and now it is a commodity always available on the supermarket shelf. Over these years we have witnessed the intensification of poultry rearing, and with this has come criticism of the industry, some of it justified and much that is probably unjustified. Whatever else is levelled at intensification, one cannot deny that poultry meat has provided a high level of nutrition to many families at prices that can be afforded by most. Standards of husbandry and welfare have moved forward and present-day poultry farmers are very aware of their responsibilities in producing a quality product. 

In producing for supermarkets, many of the decisions are not within the control of the farmer, and neither are many of the worries. This type of organic production may not suit the farmer who wishes to take all the risk, as is the case with many other aspects of farming, however, the market is secure and there should be firm knowledge that all the poultry will be purchased at a pre-agreed price. How therefore does this supply structure operate ... 

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