Ice Cream: Sneaky, Sneaky!

Posted at 6:50 PM, Aug. 17, 2007

Ice Cream: Sneaky, Sneaky!

As kids we all use to 'chant'....'I scream, you scream, we all scream for Ice Cream'....we use to be able to go to the corner drug store and buy an ice cream cone (1 scoop) for a nickle and a double scoop for 10cents! 

Then there was the 'Good Humor' truck....are those even still around?  For those too young to remember these were trucks LOADED with ice cream in all different assortments and sizes.  What fun to listen for the music and stop whatever we were doing to get to the curb before the truck went past.  The man would jump out of his truck and meet us at the back and open the door to a HUGE assortment of goodies to choose from!  It was always mid-to-late afternoon when the truck would arrive and mom would stand at the door and tell us 'now only one so you don't ruin your supper!' 

Have you noticed how much ice cream has gone down lately?  No, not in price but in size?  Well, price is affected.  I bought the Dreyers 'half gallon' in the grocery store the other day for $5.69.  Only to get home and discover it's no longer a half gallon....it's 1.75 quarts!  I'm game for paying $5 a half-gallon...I know that today $5 is worth the same amount as a 5cents was in the 'old days'.  I feel though that the 'downsizing' of packaging is just a way of trying to pull the wool over the consumer's eyes.  This was done with coffee several years ago when it went from a full pound (16 oz.) to 12 oz. with barely a peep, I had not noticed it since...until I noticed this on the ice cream packaging.  (The Anderson ice cream is one I had in the freezer and says 2 gallons, I'm curious to see if they 'downsized' also.)