Amarantha wrote:

(Steve Pope) wrote in

Of course, if you're truly commited to metric, you must measure
all time intervals in seconds and forget about using minutes and
hours. Thus, you smoke your ribs for 14,440 seconds instead of four
hours.

You call that simpler?

This is not a valid comparison as we do not have a metric
time system. If we did there would be metric hours/minutes
and we would not be counting things in seconds.

Indeed something like this was proposed at one point at the
international standards level -- a proposed metric day would have ten
hours, each with 100 metric minutes, each of those with 100
metric seconds. No country would support the proposal other
than France. Too radical of a changeover.

The result is that the only valid metric unit of time is the second,
and its metric compounds (milliseconds, decaseconds, kiloseconds and
so on, but in practice only milli, micro, nano, and pico are much used).
These comprise time under the metric system.

In 14, maybe 15 kiloseconds we can enjoy those ribs.

Steve

In article ,
"Jean B." wrote:

Emma Thackery wrote:
I posted about the smaller jar recently. The other terrible thing is
that they changed the formulations on the Hellman's low/less fat mayos
too. It does not taste nearly as good IMO. I don't know about the
regular mayo, however, as I've not tried it yet. Damn! I am giving
serious thought to making my own. And btw, Cook's Illustrated no longer
rates Hellman's as the best of the common brands either.

What is higher rated?

IIRC, it was Kraft Mayo (not Miracle Whip).

Emma Thackery wrote in
:

In article ,
"Jean B." wrote:

Emma Thackery wrote:
I posted about the smaller jar recently. The other terrible thing
is that they changed the formulations on the Hellman's low/less fat
mayos too. It does not taste nearly as good IMO. I don't know
about the regular mayo, however, as I've not tried it yet. Damn!
I am giving serious thought to making my own. And btw, Cook's
Illustrated no longer rates Hellman's as the best of the common
brands either.

What is higher rated?

IIRC, it was Kraft Mayo (not Miracle Whip).



Not S&W????!!!!

I'd rather go without than buy Kraft Mayo!!


--
Peter Lucas
Brisbane
Australia


Come to the edge, Life said.
They said: We are afraid.
Come to the edge, Life said.
They came.
Life pushed them...and they flew."
-Guillaume Apollinaire-

"Dave Smith" wrote in message
...
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:


I missed your question. I work in a niche within the grocery wholesale
biz.

Let's start over. Do you believe that via research, manufacturers have a
very good idea of what price range will turn off customers completely and
make them seek a different product?



There are several reasons why I refuse to answer marketing surveys. Aside
from them wasting my time and bothering me with questions, I don't want to
tell the marketing people information they will use to try to squeeze more
money out of me. I don't want them to get me to identify with any
particular brand.


By the way, manufacturers don't need to ask you questions in order to find
out what prices are acceptable.

wrote in message
...
On Tue, 22 May 2007 18:07:13 GMT, "JoeSpareBedroom"
wrote:

wrote in message
. ..
On Tue, 22 May 2007 17:33:47 GMT, "JoeSpareBedroom"
wrote:

wrote in message
m...
On Tue, 22 May 2007 15:36:25 GMT, "JoeSpareBedroom"
wrote:

y wrote in message
news:u33653l4kdp029ptvslgkm1r39cfbmu1n6@4ax. com...
On Tue, 22 May 2007 13:35:51 GMT, "JoeSpareBedroom"
wrote:

y wrote in message
news:blq553lntfjq4bbgchn5ijp63qqpj9s7mv@4a x.com...
On Mon, 21 May 2007 22:14:58 GMT, "JoeSpareBedroom"
wrote:

"Pete C." wrote in message
...
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:

"wff_ng_7" wrote in message
news:Gxl4i.4948$qp5.2303@trnddc03...
"Dimitri" wrote:
Subtle price change.

snip

I'd have to know a lot more than you have told me to take a guess at
that; it would vary from business to business depending on various
overhead factors. And, again, it's irrelevant. I said a fair price; I
meant just that. By all means, charge what you must to make the profit
you need. Just don't lie to me to do it. Is that so hard to
understand? Are you seriously trying to argue that it's ok to try and
deceive consumers in order to remain profitable? If so, I'd like to
know exactly where =you= work; clearly, it's a business we should all
know about so we can avoid it.

Regards,
Tracy R.

I don't see it as deception. Apparently, you are easily deceived.

Some here are also implying that "notification" is relevant, but nobody
has
suggested a way of "notifying" customers of size changes. Perhaps they'd
like individual letters sent to every home in America. Or, billboards.

Ok, we're going to have to agree to disagree here. You apparently have
a very different set of beliefs than I do about right and wrong. I
don't see how you can defend this practice as not being deceptive, but
whatever. I think it's obvious to the rest of us that it is, or at
least that it attempts to be. shrug And I notice you failed to
answer the question about where you work. eg

Regards,
Tracy R.

I missed your question. I work in a niche within the grocery wholesale
biz.

Let's start over. Do you believe that via research, manufacturers have a
very good idea of what price range will turn off customers completely and
make them seek a different product?

I'm sure they do, but that doesn't change anything. I have a college
education and an IQ in the high 140s. You can stop being patronizing.
I understand your premise. Allow me to paraphrase:

Our marketing department's research indicates that most consumers will
not purchase our product if the price goes above $x per package;
however, due to cost of production increases, we cannot afford to
produce the 32 oz. package we have made in the past and sell it for $x
or less. Therefore, we have decided to package 30 oz. in a 32 oz.
container, sell it for slightly less than $x and hope that most of our
customers are too oblivious to notice that they're getting less for
their money than they did last week, or too dumb to do the math and
realize that they are now, in fact, paying a price they find
unacceptable for our product. Thus we stay in business a little while
longer.

Does this strategy work? Undoubtedly, at least for a while. I suspect
it's unsustainable in the long run because sooner or later, your
customers are going to realize that they aren't getting the value they
expect for their money and they will buy someone else's product. The
bottom line is that, regardless of production costs, a product is only
worth what people are willing to pay for it, and smarmy marketing
tricks can only cover your ass for so long. In the meantime, is it
insulting to your customer's intelligence? Yes. Is it ethical?
Absolutely not, because it is an attempt to trick your customers into
purchasing something you know they would stop buying if they realized
that the price had crossed what they feel is an "acceptable"
threshhold. And you =do= know that, right? Sure you do, because you've
done the marketing research; that's how you know it's time to try and
pull a fast one.

Regards,
Tracy R.


I guess the word "trick" is where our opinions differ. I don't make such
judgements without having what I consider to be enough information. However,
I'll say this: Two highly accurate recent surveys prove that about 54% of
the population isn't especially bright. I think a significant portion of
those individuals would have a tough time understand why a $2.99 container
of food gradually crept up to $4.50, instead of being converted to a smaller
container.

"Dave Smith" wrote in message
...
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:

"

I didn't bother writing the manufacturer. I told the people in the
grocery
store.

Oh. I thought you were actually concerned and bothered by the package
change. Never mind.


Screw them. If their sales drop as a result of their deceptive marketing
practices I will let them try to figure out why. The people in grocery
store can pass on my comments if they so choose. They have some clout
there. Let them tell the company that their customers refuse to buy the
new
format.


The grocery store staff is highly unlikely to pass your comments to anyone.
Buyers at the main office have some clout, though.

JoeSpareBedroom wrote:


There are several reasons why I refuse to answer marketing surveys. Aside
from them wasting my time and bothering me with questions, I don't want to
tell the marketing people information they will use to try to squeeze more
money out of me. I don't want them to get me to identify with any
particular brand.

By the way, manufacturers don't need to ask you questions in order to find
out what prices are acceptable.

I realize that. They can look at their sales figures and get a more
accurate picture than they get from surveys and people who lie or give
evasive answers.

Emma Thackery wrote:
In article ,
"Jean B." wrote:

Emma Thackery wrote:
I posted about the smaller jar recently. The other terrible thing is
that they changed the formulations on the Hellman's low/less fat mayos
too. It does not taste nearly as good IMO. I don't know about the
regular mayo, however, as I've not tried it yet. Damn! I am giving
serious thought to making my own. And btw, Cook's Illustrated no longer
rates Hellman's as the best of the common brands either.
What is higher rated?

IIRC, it was Kraft Mayo (not Miracle Whip).

Really! Any particular formulation, assuming there are
several now? I'll have to get the smallest possible jar and
try it--after I scrutinize the contents.

--
Jean B.

In article ,
David wrote:

I remember a commercial(?), where an employee had a great idea to
save the company money. They put one less olive in each jar that they
sold. Now, that does not sound like much, except when you realize how
many jars of olives they must sell per year. The savings to them
could easily be in the millions, and the customer will never notice
one olive less in the jar.

In 1987, American Airlines saved about US$40000 by omitting the
olive from each salad they served on board. Just the olive. When
you're talking huge volume (airplane meals, jarred olives, etc.),
amounts add up quickly.

sd

In article Eht4i.4028$TU1.2283@trnddc07,
"wff_ng_7" wrote:

So here we are 30 years later, and the USA is one of only 3
countries in the world still not using metric. The other two are
Liberia and Burma. That's great company to keep.

It's an American thing. Look at the "Coalition of the Willing"....

sd

In article ,
sd wrote:

In article Eht4i.4028$TU1.2283@trnddc07,
"wff_ng_7" wrote:

So here we are 30 years later, and the USA is one of only 3
countries in the world still not using metric. The other two are
Liberia and Burma. That's great company to keep.

It's an American thing. Look at the "Coalition of the Willing"....

I am quite familiar with the metric system, but I still have to do the
math in my head for kilometers per hour to miles per hour and liter to
gallon conversions to think the result. Seeing a tsp in grams isn't easy
either. In other words, I still think in the old and familiar terms.
When I was the most familiar with the metric system in 1970, I still
thought of liters as liters and quarts as quarts. I drank part of a
quart of milk and made a liter of 1N potassium permanganate solution. I
never truly connected the two. My bad.
If the U.S. converted to metric in one fell swoop which should have been
done fifty years ago if at all, we'd probably cope after an enormous
amount of bitching for two years. Boy, would the traffic in this group
go up!

leo

--
http://web0.greatbasin.net/~leo/

In article ,
sd wrote:

It's an American thing. Look at the "Coalition of the Willing"....

To follow up to my previous post since I forgot this part, what the hell
am I going to do with all my tools? Criminy!

leo

--
http://web0.greatbasin.net/~leo/

On May 22, 5:27 pm, Dave Smith wrote:

It doesn't really matter how often people use the measurements, they are
part of the nonsensical system of measurement that so many people claim to
be easier. Even the everyday measurement is nonsense.... 12 inches in a
foot, 3 feet in a yard, 1760 yards in a mile etc. In metric, everything is
based on 10s, so you don't have to convert metres to centimetres or
kilometres. You just move a decimal point.


I agree that the U.S. should already have converted.
However, you are ignoring the historical context of
measurement in the Imperial system.

If a carpenter has a string that he's using as a measuring
device, and if the string is, e.g., 1 foot long, he need only
fold it in quarters, halves, thirds, sixths, or twelfths to get
a wide variety of even-inch measurements.

There *is* a reason for having a measuring system based
on factors of 3 and 4: it's extremely simple and flexible
for a nonliterate user with limited technology.

Still, I wish we'd just convert. So many things would be
much easier, and people would eventually adapt. Ah, well,
someday the U.S. won't be the largest economy in the
world, and we'll basically be forced to adopt the metric
system.

Cindy Hamilton