Food Products That Grocery Stores Lose Money On

There are certain foods sold at such low prices in grocery stores that the store actually loses money on them. They often sell these products at with no profit. These are called “loss leaders.” Loss leaders are a marketing strategy that are used in many retail businesses but that are especially prevalent in grocery stores. For these items, the price is lower than the actual cost the retailer paid for them. Two typically identified loss leaders at the grocery store are milk and eggs, but many items are used as loss leaders all the time, while certain items go on sale at various times. The store hopes that these low-priced items will entice customers to the store, where they will also buy plenty of regular-priced items.

Many people will tell you that the reason the milk and eggs are at the very back corner of the store is because you have to walk through the rest of the store to get to them, and along the way, you might pick up other items on which the store makes a greater profit.

This makes sense, as milk and eggs are considered two essential items by most Americans. Milk is so important to us that we use the term ‘milk run’ not only to mean running to the store to purchase milk but also to refer to any easy but essential errand. Often, loss leaders are featured in end-of-aisle displays.

A lesser-known known loss-leader is rotisserie chicken. It is claimed that Costco loses $30-40 million per year selling their rotisserie chicken for $4.99. This price hasn’t changed since 2009 despite inflation. The same is true of their hotdog and soda company, which sells for $1.50 and is believed to be well below cost.

Purpose of Loss Leaders

The basic purpose of loss leaders is to attract traffic to the store. Therefore, different items might be used as loss leaders at different times of the year. During the Thanksgiving holiday season, for example, grocery stores typically offer turkeys at drastically discounted prices.

The turkey prices are meant to draw customers into the store where they will hopefully buy all the other ingredients they need for their Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner. Typical loss leaders you might find at any time of year are meat, poultry, bread, soft drinks, cereal, and chips.

turkey from grocery store — Turkeys, even high-quality ones like this fresh young turkey, are often used as grocery store loss-leaders during the Holiday season to generate customer traffic. Although money might be lost on the turkeys, the store hopes that its customers will buy all the other ingredients needed for their holiday meal, thus generating higher sales volumes and profits overall.
Image by U.S. Department of Agriculture via Flickr

The grocery store sales circulars typically feature a number of loss leaders. Items that are perishable, so they are not as easy to stock up on are often preferred, and will only be on sale for a short period of time, to create a sense of urgency.

However, in 1971, the Federal Trade Commission ruled that retailers could not advertise sale items unless they were able to stock enough of the item to meet the increased demand. Although ‘rain checks’ can be given to customers if sales items run out, the retailer is required to make every effort to have enough in stock.

Couponers and other people looking to save money often take advantage of their knowledge of loss leaders by following the sales advertisements and only buying those items, and no other items, from a particular store.

The idea is not to be ‘fooled’ into buying regular-priced items, unless they too can be purchased at a discount, such as by using coupons or doubling them.

Why Does My Grocery Store Rearrange Everything Randomly?

This requires very careful planning and traveling to several stores to buy basic foodstuffs. These customers may believe that all the other items in the store, besides the loss leaders, are marked up extremely high. Ironically, some retailers think that the reduced-priced items create the perception that all the store’s prices are low.

The loss leader strategy may seem extremely simple but it is anything but. There is no guarantee that the store will make more money by losing money on certain items. Procedures for tracking purchases must be used and it is possible for low prices to backfire.

Customers are often wary of prices that seem too low and they may think this signals inferior quality, out-of-date, or damaged items. Since, in many cases, they are correct in this assumption, loss leader strategies are always a gamble.

As well, some manufacturers may not allow the store to price its goods too low, for various reasons, such as not having one retailer undercut another strong retailer, and to control the perception of a brand across stores. Although it is illegal for a manufacturer and a retailer to make an agreement on minimum pricing, it is legal for a manufacturer to demand that retailers follow its list pricing.

Some states have laws that prohibit pricing items too low so that loss leaders cannot be used. In these cases, a modified version is used called leader pricing, where an item is sold only slightly above cost. Many major grocery store chains and large retailers like Walmart and Kmart use this strategy.

store coupons — Many shoppers use coupons to shop only for loss leaders.

The use of loss leaders is a very old retail practice and the ethics of this strategy have long been debated. It is often considered predatory pricing, harmful to consumers and to retailers. For consumers, it is often considered a ‘cheap trick’ and for retailers, it is considered price undercutting.

However, most regulatory bodies do not consider loss leaders predatory, as the practice is limited to only a few items that frequently change. As well, the general opinion is that they are beneficial to the consumer.

Typical Loss Leaders in the Grocery Industry

Not all loss-leaders below are constant. Certain are seasonal and others are subject to change based on market conditions.

milk
eggs
bread (bakery departments often operate at a loss)
rice
bananas
rotisserie chicken
frozen turkey (Holiday season)
beer

Is Other Merchandise Marked Up Higher?

Those who purchase only loss leaders often believe that the other merchandise in the store is marked up ridiculously high. The loss leaders are there to lure you in, and you are then tricked into purchasing other items at inflated prices.

In reality, the main tactic of loss-leaders is generating higher customer traffic and volume purchasing. Although the store may lose money on the loss leaders, they hope to make this up and generate sizeable profits from the volume of sales of other items.

Different types of merchandise have different markups, related to customer expectations. Some high-margin items, such as toiletries and cosmetics, can help offset the loss and lead to overall profit. Service areas like bakeries, deli counters, seafood counters, etc. are also high-profit areas.

Using Loss Leaders to Save Money

Some shoppers use a cherry-picking strategy to save money. They purposely find and buy only on-sale loss leaders and nothing else. They will shop at several stores in order to find the items they need. Together with couponing, it is possible to save a great deal of money this way, but it is a lot of work!

There are many websites dedicated to money-saving strategies and couponing. One website that can help you ‘cherry pick’ is My Grocery Deals. You can find deals in stores near you, set your preferred stores, and generate lists of on-sale items for each store, complete with a total price.

You can search for individual items on sale or simply watch for sales at a particular store. Although you still may have to shop at more than one store, the site saves a lot of time. Manufacturer coupons will also appear as your browse sale items.