The "Food Barons" Jacking Up Your Grocery Bill with Austin Frerick - 270

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I used to be Meat Cutter at Sprouts until a couple years ago and this interview is dead on for everything I experienced before leaving. When I started working in the grocery store industry in the mid 10s, a lot of the old folks were retiring to great big retirement plans in nice houses. They used to say that once you got in at your local grocery store, you were set for life. I came to be in the Meat Department because they were the highest paid outside of store management. Over my years at sprouts, I watched them condense their services in what i imagine was an attempt to sell the company and cut labor. We went from cutting a wide selection of various meats and being one of the only local grocery chains that made our own sausage to, at the time of my leaving in 2021, largely receiving pre-cut Meat and not grinding any meat in store. The meat and grocery industry used to be a staple of the middle class. People could come work at a local grocery chain, join the Union, and make great money all the while customers could come in to the store and build a relationship with the people bringing them their food. Now, most of the meat you get is packed in a centralized warehouse by low wage workers in dangerous conditions and the meat cutters are largely just stocking shelves. Oh and btw, the "Sprouts" brand products you see on their shelves are just relabled big name brands. The chicken is now from Foster Farm, the pork from Tyson, and the beef from JBS.

Cargill, Tyson, Smithfield own 95% of U.S meat production (industrial slaughter and distribution). Farmers today are either serfs or multinational corporations.

Adam: "Baby Carrots are whittled carrots." My brain: "Yes, baby carrots are widdle carrots."

Why don’t we see reports like this on corporate media? $3 candy bars! $7 eggs! See: record profits for all consolidated industries.

Its not just that its more expensive, its also worse. Its basically poison.

Anytime I travel outside the US, fist thing I notice is the food quality difference.

I've done software consulting for a lot of companies and the worst industry by far has been the meat packing/producing industry. One of the big companies were horrid to me and my co-workers from name calling, gaslighting, yelling, swearing at us, etc. I had to comfort co-workers who would break down crying almost every day while working with that customer. Sadly, because the project was big money, our upper management didn't want to push back on the customer's behavior and told us to just "bear with it for the sack of the company." I left half way through that project, lol.

"When you cut corners so much, at some point you're cutting bone" Damn, that's a good line

The merchandising part wrecked me. I used to be a merchandiser. Got laid off in 2008. I tried getting back into it, but the pay is awful. I was making $15/hr fresh out of high school doing merchandising. I got bonuses because I was good at it. After 2008, into present most are around 12/hr. Few stores are organized for local demands. The orders are based on algorithms which end up sending crates of lobster to places that live paycheck to paycheck. It's grotesque.

Love this guy even though he is a reporter of impending doom. He needs to investigate every system in America. Will be buying the book!

"We're paying more for garbage."

As a teacher, our school food is a joke. I teach in a district that receives free government provided breakfast for every student...I didn't realize Honey Buns counted as a grain much less part of a healthy breakfast. Learn something new everday.

Ive never been the biggest fan of peaches, so many other fruits I’d choose before a peach. 10 years ago i was visiting pike place and randomly bought some peaches and other fruits from one of the fruit stands there, and that peach blew me away. I have never had a better peach and have spent so long chasing that high… I’ve almost convinced myself i was crazy, but it may have been just one of those perfectly grown, expertly picked local pieces of fruit

Baby carrots were my favorite snack in the early 2000s but the flavor is just gone now, even the texture is kind of grainy

“Gay little sassy lines” 😂 Well, that sold me. Buying the book now 😂

I would love to watch a video of you two going through the grocery store commenting on everything!

The junk food is starting to become unaffordable too. Our processed food is designed to be as addictive as possible. Now that they have people hooked on the food, they can increase the price and not worry about sales decreasing. It took great will power to put back the $6 bag of Doritos at Target yesterday, but I conquered my addiction and bought some nuts instead...probably produced by some nut baron, but what are you going to do?

We were just talking about this last night. Every time we travel we think food is going to be so expensive. We were especially shocked at how cheap it was to eat in Japan. I wonder what they think of our food prices here 😬

It's so interesting that Katie Porter is the only one I've heard address this as a national security issue. Think about it.