10/01/08 Bargain Buys

Remember that cookbook way back on the shelf in your kitchen, behind the holiday placemats? You know, the one that has a hundred different ways to use cream of mushroom soup? Well, looks like you'll probably need to be bringing it back out to the forefront, at least that's what companies like Campbell Soup are counting on with the launch of their new media campaign touting their canned soups as bargain buys. Several food companies are hoping to cash in on the declining economy by reintroducing consumers to their less expensive, high margin products. Even Kraft Foods is advertising its powdered Kool-Aid drink on national radio again after over a decade of being off the airwaves. Frozen TV dinners which had fallen out of favor with the mainstream consumer in the last decade is also back with a vengeance. But will today's organic consumers sacrifice nutritional value in some cases for quantity? I guess only time and our waistlines will tell.