I went to grab a sandwich at the Loeb grocery store down the street from work at lunch today, and they had a sign up on the door which got me thinking about economics and the practical matters of selling produce. The sign said, roughly:
Due to unforeseen circumstances, we must limit corn purchases to 8 corns on the cob per family.
Things that have gone through my mind since then include:
- “Corns on the cob”?
- Presumably the circumstances are a smaller-than-expected supply of corn.
- 8 is a large number. Do so many people usually buy more than 8 cobs at once that they had to limit it at 8?
- Even if they’re short on corn, why limit people? Just sell out of corn and be happy you had no corn left.
- Or, if people are buying so much corn, raise the price of corn already.
- Maybe they advertised corn at a really low price, and don’t want people to come in from across town to get cheap corn, only for there to be no corn at all.
- In fact, maybe corn is their loss leader, and they were losing too much, but they still want to do a bit of loss leading to get people to do the rest of their grocery shopping there.
- Maybe they priced the corn so low as a loss leader that restaurants or even other grocery stores decided it was better to buy corn at retail than from their regular suppliers, and were buying dozens of cobs — which would mean that the circumstances aren’t a smaller-than-expected supply, but an unexpected (source of) demand.
- April corn is a pretty crappy loss leader. Tough, tiny, insufficiently sweet kernels.
And yes, indeed: 8 ears for $2.
“Corns on the cob”?
8 responses to “Corn rationing”
hahha Due to my Dad being a penny pincher, he often runs into this when buying kleenex that’s on sale. Usually it’s 4 per customer, which means he buys 4, and I buy 4… And he gets 8 in the end. And then he goes back again. Ya, he’s right nuts for paper products. I would guess that it does have to do with drawing more people in and still having it in stock. No point in letting one person take 20 when 4 more customers could be coming in to look around when it’s limited like that.
Tell them you just want the cob and the husk
Wow, I never anticipated needing 20 corns on the cob until now.
(I just like saying “corns on the cob”. What does that mean, individual kernels?)
this might be my favourite entry you’ve ever written :P
Ha! I agree with Pam. I’m enjoying the Buddhism stuff, and I also enjoyed the most expensive list thingy from a while back, but this corn entry is special somehow. I also had the same thought as to corns on the cob?
HEH! I saw that at a Loeb up there (probably the same one). I don’t think I analyzed it quite as thoroughly though. :P
Pam: Yay! And you can go and check the corns ration status of our old local Loeb (and thus your current local Loeb) too! THE BLOGOSPHERE AWAITS UPDATES.
happinesstogo: It’s funny, the Buddhism stuff was becoming a bit of a drag to me, too — but I wanted to get all that basic stuff out there so I can start talking about my own practice without having hundreds of footnotes. It’ll get more interesting when it gets more personal, I hope. Meanwhile: Corns on the cob!
This reminds me of a sign I saw at the grocery store about a month ago. I don’t know the full story, but I saw signs taped up by the milk saying that the store regrets any trouble, but they cannot sell milk for the advertised price of 4 gallons for $5. Apparently there was a typo in the weekly ad (or maybe it was intentional, to get people in), but there’s a STATE LAW that doesn’t allow a price that low.