On a nostalgic whim I bought some Pop Tarts recently. The amount of filling and icing has dropped dramatically and they tasted awful as a result.
If you look at how they apply the icing you can clearly see how they started putting less and less on each pop tart. I don’t buy these things because I want to eat the crust!
Then, on a more recent whim, I bought some store branded toaster pastries from my local grocery store, and they were exactly the Pop Tarts I remembered.
I'm finding the same with other products too. There are a bunch of Aldi generic foods (like Mac & Cheese, tortillas, salsa, corn chips) that I like the taste of better than the more expensive name brand. Does this mean that the brand name has been reducing quality over time where the generics have been sticking more to their original recipe?
Genenerics often have better overheads because the company takes profit on more points of the production and supply chain.
They're also producing products in almost every aisle of the supermarket and gain an economy of scale on things like only needing a single one of eg house style for every product.
I think brands just fluctuate in quality as time goes on, they get used to being top dog and coast on brand recognition alone. Mac N Cheese in particular it pays to take the 5 extra minutes to mix your own cheese, but if you don't want to do that Cracker Barrel branded Mac N Cheese (the kind that you finish by toasting in the oven!) is pretty good stuff. And don't forget to add pepper, cayenne, and other spices to store bought stuff, it works wonders!
They used to really burn your mouth sometimes. Well that problem is solved because they are probably technically crackers now, there is so little filling.
If you look at how they apply the icing you can clearly see how they started putting less and less on each pop tart. I don’t buy these things because I want to eat the crust!