How Much for a Watermelon?

Over the weekend my local grocery store, Delisio’s had a wonderful sale. They were having a BBQ fund-raiser on Saturday and they put out some special prices for the Weekend. It went over so well that they actually unexpectedly sold out of sale items. Unusual for this store as they always try to have more then needed. Sunday they quickly ran out of watermelons, $3.00 was a great price and it had been a very hot weekend.

When Monday rolled around so did the delivery truck, with lots of watermelons and a new price, $7.99. That is more then double the sale price and about $2.00 more then the cost the Thursday before. So now they have this huge bin of watermelons that no one is buying. If the price stays like that we are not having any more watermelon this summer. As it is we are already cutting back on anything that is not a necessity. I don’t know what more we can cut back on.

I don’t want to even think about what the price of a watermelon is going to be by the end of the summer. People are just not going to buy them. It is going to be a huge waste all those watermelons going bad because no one can afford them. The store is loosing out, customers are loosing out and soon farmers will feel it as stores reduce their orders because people are unable to buy things. It is going to be difficult explaining to my kids why they cannot have one of their favorite summer treats. They are not old enough to understand how much something costs. They still think a penny will buy just about anything, and if one penny is not enough two should be. I work hard to be able to put food on the table and now increases in gas prices is taking away my ability to feed my family.

I want to be able to give my kids fresh fruit and vegetables, but not at the prices we have now. I know other families are having the same problem. The food banks are getting hit hard and are expecting it to be even worse soon. They are worried about having enough food for the demand. As this is just the beginning I figure it is going to be a difficult summer for everyone. Gas prices are going to keep rising, so will shipping costs, meaning more expensive food. On top of that thousands of people are being laid off. We are definitely in an economic downturn that is only going to get worse. An $8.00 watermelon is just the start, the first sign of the hard times to come and things I cannot put into my shopping cart.