I was lying around the living room wondering what in the world to blog about today and convalescing nicely when Jim said, “Mission Tortillas has a new marketing genius working for them!”
They have pretty good tortillas, they’ve been selling them in packages of ten for years. They make damned good homemade tortilla chips when deep fat fried. I like the label “como hechas in casa” (like home made), which is cynically combined with “No lard” below. Like we don’t know the ingredients for home made tortillas.
Oh hell. Most Americans don’t. Who am I kidding?
But we had gotten low on tortillas, and so when Jim went to the store to acquire more he noticed they have created a new label for their product. No longer like home made, I notice. No bragging about “no lard” either. No pretense at being marketed to Spanish speaking people, either. The only Spanish on the package is the word “tortilla.” Guess they don’t want to scare away all those bigoted rednecks that are buying so much of their product around here.
Notice: It’s a package of eight tortillas, but: ”Now with 2 extra Tortillas!
Wow. Aren’t you excited yet?
Here’s the real kicker. The medium tortilla in the package has gotten smaller. The package of ten used to weigh 22.5 ounces, now it weighs 17.5 ounces. They used to say they had 180 calories apiece. Now it has gone down to 150.
They have not changed the price.
Bottom line: Less tortilla for the same price with a label that is supposed to make you feel like you are getting something for nothing.
If that isn’t marketing genius, I don’t know what is.
Yeah. Time for a new brand, perhaps…
Actually, I was seriously considering learning to make my own and screw the manufacturers. I believe I have all the necessary ingredients.
Wow. Authentic nonauthentic less for more for less for more of your money.
I can’t top that.
No one can and you appear to have too much integrity to try.
Glad you’re feeling better. No damage to your sharp brain then.
I find myself wondering what it feels like for you to be running low on tortillas. We’ve been extremely low on tortillas all our lives
And yes: manufacturers have cottoned on to the new packaging/let’s screw the customers/lower size and weight wheeze.
Ryevita is a case in point over here.
Now, running low on dark rye Ryvita, that I can understand.
I don’t know. I feel like I lost 10 IQ points this week.
Well, Jo, you said earlier you assemble meals and don’t cook. You can assemble a pretty good meal using tortillas, but I suspect that Ryevita actually tastes better in an assembly than a tortilla would. God knows, it’s got to be better for you! However, we use tortillas to actually cook things like enchiladas and chilaquiles.
Didn’t they do this with Hershey bars and lots of other things a few years ago? Do they just hope that the new consumers who have just come on line won’t notice? Us grayheads remember, though.
They are still doing it, every day. They don’t hope new consumers won’t notice, they have done market research that indicates that 1. people tend not to notice and 2. even if they do notice they still buy the product because damn it, they want breakfast cereal, hershey bars, coffee, butter, bleach, laundry soap, etc.
Here is So Cal we still have the original package…..lots of spanish speaking people buying I guess, but the package has gone from 30 tortillas to 24 for the same price. Mission also sells and makes a brand here called Guerrero with all the spanish on the label…my son swears there is a difference…..????
It would not surprise me if there was a difference. Companies often adjust ingredients and tastes for the different markets they are aiming at. Salsa is a whole different animal when it comes in a package with a Spanish label! We make our own, though, and have even been known to bring it along with us when we go to the Mexican restaurants here in town. They are so heat-shy that even if you tell them you want a hot salsa they can’t find one in their kitchen. Of course, you know we are not normal midwesterners. . .
I think my family eats more than our share of Mission tortillas. They are just too easy. PB&J wraps, burritos, quesadillas…all very quick and relatively healthy food for starving kids.
What I love is the “Mexican” lady on the Santitas corn chip bag. She looks like a Spanish (and by that I mean white, not native Mexican) Ava Gardner.
I’m not familiar with Santitas; not sure it is available here in MO.
Tortillas really are a very convenient thing, probably not surprisingly as the originators of them used them exactly like you (and we) are doing.. You know, they also make excellent containers for tuna fish salad. . .
Here’s the label, if you care to look: http://www.fritolay.com/our-snacks/santitas.html
Might be a Western US brand.
Funny how so many cultures have some sort of food-holding bread thing: burritos, tamales, piroshki, gyoza, bao, calzone….
Whenever they go on sale at Martin’s I buy these, only looking for whatever package promises the most fibre per tortilla.
I guess when I buy them on sale I am actually paying the price I should have been paying in the first place.
Hmm. We may have this here. The chips/soda aisle is one of the parts of the supermarket that I rarely (if ever) traverse.