One of These Turkeys Is Either Too Cheap or Too Expensive

Can one turkey be 3.3 times better than another?

Recently, I saw a TV supermarket ad for frozen turkey. It featured two separate items, in quick succession. First up was a Stop & Shop frozen turkey:

Stop and Shop Frozen Turkey for 39 cents a pount

As you can see, this costs 39¢ a pound. I’ve literally never in my life shopped for meat, so I don’t have a very good frame of reference on this price. Still, that seems awfully inexpensive to me.

Next up was a Butterball frozen turkey:

Butterball frozen turkey for $1.29 a pound

This costs $1.29 a pound, which means it’s well over three times as much. Is that expensive? I still have no idea! But I’m fascinated by the framing of these two products together. The imagery in the ad even implies that they’ll cook up exactly the same, though it seems clear we’re actually being show the exact same turkey in both shots.

Eventually, my curiosity needed to be satisfied. A little web searching quickly led me to this price comparison for turkey around the country. Now I know that 39¢ a pound is indeed some very, very cheap turkey.