Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 18, 1992 TAG: 9203180032
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Covey said he didn't mean he had to have tomatoes. But at $1.19 a pound, he still was willing to buy them.
"If it's something I can do without, I won't buy," Covey said. That includes certain cuts of meat, such as steak.
"It looks like prices change about every week," said the 80-year-old, who was shopping Tuesday at Super Save Fresh Foods on Roanoke's Riverland Road Southeast.
Food prices are so volatile it seems that if Juan Valdez drops a coffee bean in Colombia, the price of regular grind shoots up in America.
It rained too much during the recent tomato growing season in Mexico and the price of tomatoes blipped because there are not as many Mexican tomatoes available.
Rain in Mexico, a storm in Florida or a workers' strike in Costa Rica can influence the prices Americans pay for food.
Food prices along with other goods, such as clothes and heating oil, are part of the government's main inflation indicator, the Consumer Price Index.
On Tuesday, the Labor Department said food prices rose 0.3 percent in February, energy costs fell 0.9 percent and apparel prices went up. The result was that the index rose 0.3 for the month.
But, because each category of the index is calculated from the prices of a variety of items, tomato prices could soar 43.1 percent and the overall rise in food prices be a puny 0.3 percent.
For instance, meat prices, which had declined in January and in most of 1991, rose moderately. Beef was up 0.5 percent, pork 0.7. Cereal and bakery products rose 0.3 percent, while dairy products declined 0.1 percent.
And green peppers and cucumbers shot up, said Ernie Hosey, produce manager at Super Save. These two vegetables are about double what they cost a year ago.
Hosey and store owner Joe Herron agreed that - as Covey said - price does affect shoppers' grocery-buying habits.
Because of this, when some items rise sharply - such as peppers at two for 99 cents - grocers sometimes sell at cost, said Herron.
"If you don't, nobody will pick them up when they get so high . . ."
Produce wholesaler Fred Najjum said grapes and strawberries are today's best buys for quality and cost.
The grapes are coming from Chile and the berries from Florida and California, said Najjum, whose family owns Roanoke Fruit & Produce Co.
by CNB