Going into Labor... Day weekend.

 Welcome to Soda Wars Episode: XXXV Aug. 31st - September 6th

Soda Wars: Revenge of the Thirst is a weekly blog presented by the Peanut Butter List. Every week (usually Wednesday) we illustrate which grocery store has the best prices on your favorite brands of soda. We price compare Coke, Pepsi and 7up in a variety of packages in ALL Colorado King Soopers, Safeway and Albertsons locations. With this blog and the Peanut Butter List, you'll 'know before you go' which store has the best deal on your favorite soda each week before you leave your house.

Well here it is, the last official holiday weekend of the summer. As far as soda goes these are some of the best prices we've seen since starting Soda Wars 10 weeks ago. If you have a change jar or a little extra cash floating around somewhere, you can save a large chunk of money by stocking up on these sales. 

Please share this blog and this information with your friends and family. This is the week to save money on soda. The more you can stock up the more you will save in the long run. Just click the Facebook, Twitter, or any of the share buttons at the bottom of the blog and let everyone know about these great sales.

I do have some bad news if you're a Coke drinker. Coke decided not to participate in the pricing game during this holiday so hopefully you bought your Coke last week at Albertsons when it was 4/$9.88. The best price for Coke this week is still .39¢ higher than the competition. 


So who does have the lowest price? Pretty much everyone else and at just about every store. 


Let's look at the 12pack soda sales...

OMG! Look at all of those green tacks and scores of 100! 
Five sales listed at their absolute lowest price. These prices actually lowered the historical low price with a $2.40 price point. Now there are a few rules in getting these prices, so instead of declaring a winner this week I'll break down the sales so everyone is getting the most out of the sales and can be sure to maximize the savings. 


King Soopers:
Pepsi and 7up... 
Buy 4 and get a 5th one free bringing the price down to $2.40 each WYB5. If you don't grab the 5th one you will pay a higher price than $2.40, so make sure you pick up five 12packs when you're there.
Coke... 
Sits on a 4/$12.00 deal and a $3.00 tag for each 12pack.


Safeway:
Pepsi and 7up... 
Buy 2 and get 3 free. So you pay the full shelf price of $5.99 on 2 packs and get 3 more 12packs free bringing the price down to $2.40 each WYB5. If you buy less than 5 you will pay $5.99 for each 12pack and this is not a deal where if you buy more than 5 you get the same deal. So if you buy 7 packs, you'll get 5 for $2.40 and 2 for $5.99 each. 
Coke...
This is the best price for Coke out of all 3 stores. $2.79 each WYB4+. The '+' means that you can buy '4 or more' and as long as you have at least 4 you'll get the sale price on every 12pack purchased. Anything less than the 4 and you pay a higher price. 


Albertsons:
Pepsi...
$2.40 WYB4. They claim a one reward per transaction and some cashiers and stores will enforce that and others wont. 
Coke...
This is the highest price on Coke 12packs out there this week, do not buy these. 
7up...
These 12packs are the highest priced of all stores and all brands this week at $3.67. That's $1.27 more in cost than the very same 7up products just down the street at either King Soopers and Safeway. If you buy 5, you'll pay $6.35 more at Albertsons... That's just about 2 gallons of gas just spent by not driving to one of the other stores. 


12packs are the package of choice this week but let's go ahead and look at other package prices as well.


20/24 packs

The only notable 20pack on sale this week is the Albertsons deal of $4.99 per 20pack of Coke when you buy 2. With the purchase of 2 you save $2.00 at checkout bringing it down to the $4.99 price, otherwise you'll pay $5.99 each. This price is about the same as paying $3.00 per 12pack. 


2 liters

King Soopers and Pepsi offer the best deal at .86¢ each WYB6 (buy 4 get 2 free.) You can grab Coke or 7up for $1.00 each at Albertsons and Safeway has a one day sale on Friday the 2nd on Pepsi and 7up 2 liter at just .89¢. If you buy 2 liters at Safeway on any other day you're going to pay a huge price of $1.67 each. 


I hope everyone has a great Labor Day weekend and enjoys the extra time with friends and family. Be sure to look through each stores ads this week, there are some other great deals out there on a bunch of different products that you wont want to miss out on.


See you here next week with the new ads, and with any luck better pr... actually, the prices wont be better next week. They will in fact be higher, much much higher... so buy your soda this week and next week we will come back here to see just how much the prices do go up. 


See you in 7.

Soda Wars Episode: XXXIV Aug. 24th - 30th

Welcome to Soda Wars Episode XXXIV.

Soda Wars: Revenge of the Thirst is a weekly blog presented by the Peanut Butter List. Every week (usually Wednesday) we illustrate which grocery store has the best prices on your favorite brands of soda. We price compare Coke, Pepsi and 7up in a variety of packages in ALL Colorado King Soopers, Safeway and Albertsons locations. With this blog and the Peanut Butter List, you'll 'know before you go' which store has the best deal on your favorite soda each week before you leave your house.

Today is August 25th and we're just two weeks away from Labor Day weekend. Labor Day is a holiday to celebrate the economic and social achievements of workers. If you were to talk with your friends and family from the 1800's about what work was like for them in their day, they would recollect the common 10 to 16 hour days and 6 day work weeks they lived with. They would be baffled by the 'new rules' of breaks and lunch periods before the 7th hour of work. They might be amazed that anything could get done in a mere 8 hour day and without the cheap use of children laboring away. They might even continue on to say that they had to walk to work uphill both ways in 3 feet of snow and hunt for their lunch using only a butter knife and a rock... but the walking and hunting is not what brought us to Labor Day, so just listen to them and be kind to them and remember that they are from the 1800's and very old.

Today the 8 hour work day is very common and we also have regular break and lunch periods with pretty strict child labor laws in place. Yes, here in the 2011's working is quite nice and very regulated. Plus if we do walk to work it's usually only uphill one way and thanks to Global Warming, the snow is only 3 inches high. In these times Labor Day weekend means much more than fair working conditions. It means a 3 day weekend! Camping trips, fishing, hiking, excessive amounts of TV and binge eating, BBQ's, swimming and all around good fun.

Then there are some of us who are lucky enough to have to work the weekend. This is where I fit in on this holiday. We are the select and lucky few who are annually invited to reenact all of the stories our friends from the 1800's have spoke about.

Whatever your reason is to celebrate Labor day, I just want to say, "Good job working people, and now it's break time! Now let's see if we can save you some of that hard earned money."

So, being this close to the actual holiday weekend we are starting to see some great deals on soda out there and this would be a perfect week to stock up on some of the packages.

Here's what the 12packs look like this week...

12 pack Winner: Coke at Albertsons ($2.47 wyb4)

This Albertsons deal of 4/$9.88 on Coke has actually set a new low price of $2.47 for a 12pack. Barely higher are 7up 12packs at 4/$10.00 at Safeway. Next week's prices should remain about the same but at more of the stores and we'll probably see Pepsi come into the game as well.
If the prices do drop lower it wont be by much so feel free to stock up on you favorite flavors of Coke or 7up this week and know that your are getting a great deal.

For Pepsi drinkers, it's going to cost you an extra $1.52 per 12pack over Coke this week to quench your thirst. In my own opinion, paying $3.99 for a 12pack of any soda is just a really bad life decision and making such a purchase could cause your family to declare you legally incompetent and needing medical attention STAT. That's only an opinion, and I'm sure your family would never do that to you. Mine would, so I'm buying Coke this week.

20packs are carbonated with Helium and going up...

 20/24pack Winner: 12packs!! This week and next (probably)

12packs are generally the holiday item on soda sales so steer away from these packages for the next 2 weeks and save yourself some cash. The 12 packs are lighter anyways so let's conserve both money and energy this week.

2 liters are also priced like crap this week...

2 liter Winner: Pepsi or 7up at Safeway (0.99¢ wyb4+)

When the best deal for a 2 liter is right at about a buck, it's time to reconsider your selection. Usually you can get the best 'per fluid ounce' deal in this package, but with this weeks 12pack sales most of the 2 liters fall short on that as well.

Coke drinkers rejoice, this is your weekend! Next week look for all brands and stores to get in on the pricing action as I think we will see just about every brand and flavor nearer the $2.50 mark.

See you here next week with the new ads, and with any luck better prices.
See you in 7.

Soda Wars Episode XXXIII: Aug. 17th - 23rd

Welcome to Soda Wars Episode XXXIII. 

Soda Wars: Revenge of the Thirst is a weekly blog presented by the Peanut Butter List. Every Wednesday we illustrate which store has the best prices on your favorite brands of soda. We price compare Pepsi, Coke and 7up in the 2 liter, 12 pack and 20/24 packs at ALL Colorado  King Soopers, Safeway and Albertsons locations. With this blog you'll 'know before you go' who has the best deal on your favorite brands of soda each week before you head off to the stores. 

Good afternoon everyone, I hope you're doing well on this August 17th. For some of us, this marks the week our kids go back to school after a long summer of 'un'learning everything they learned just last year. For others, the kids have been back in school for a week or so by now and are just getting back into the grind of homework and after school activities. 

For us, we are in the first group. The kids start school tomorrow, Thursday, and our youngest of 3 kids ventures into the first grade. I know this has nothing to do with grocery or soda prices but, I bring this up because I'm curious as to why they picked Thursday to ring in the new school year. It really makes no sense to me. The kids go back to school for 2 days, then off for 2 days, and then they start a normal week on Monday. Why not just start the school year on a Monday? I find it just a bit strange, it's kind of like going to work just before your supposed to get off. Maybe it's just me and maybe it's just our District, either way starting school on Thursday is near lunacy in my book. 

Such as life, continuing on...

I think the grocery stores are counting on it being very hot this month to sell soda. This is just a horrible week to purchase soft drinks. Don't get me wrong, there are a few deals here and there, but overall the cost of your beverages this week will run up the grocery bill fast. This is especially true if you're a Coke drinker, but in their defense, they did say they were going to raise prices. If the other companies don't follow suit they might be priced out of a few fans in the long run. 

Let me show you what I'm talking about...

12pack Winner: 7up at Albertsons (4/$11 wyb4)

7up dropped $1.25 off their price at Albertsons to take the win this week at $2.75 per 12pack when you buy 4. Pretty good deal for 7up fans. 

For Coke drinkers, look to pay $3.67 as the lowest price this week on a 12pack but be sure to buy 3, otherwise you'll be paying $4.33 per 12pack. You save $2.00 when you buy 3. 

Pepsi fans can grab their favorites for $3.00 at Safeway with a buy 2 get 2 deal for the week. If you prefer bottles over cans, this price also includes the 6pack 24oz varieties as well. Had you stocked up last week you could have saved yourself .25¢ per 12pack buying at Albertsons 4/$11.00 deal. 

For me personally, I'm waiting just a bit longer until we are getting holiday soda sales for Labor Day. Then I'm going to buy a crap ton of my favorite drinks and store them in the garage. $2.75 is a good price, but I prefer to make my purchases when it hits nearer $2.50 each. 

For 20 & 24 packs...

20pack Winner: Pepsi at Albertsons ($4.99 wyb3)

Pepsi wins this week with offering a savings when you buy 3 20packs bringing the price down to $4.99 each. This is also a mix and match event and includes the Frappuccino 4pk and the Lipton 1/2 liter 12packs. The deal itself is not too bad and buying the 3 20packs is equal to buying 12 packs at $2.99 each. 

Again, best thing to do at this point, is wait until the holidays gets a little closer, then fill the garage. 

2 liters pricing...

2 liter Winner: 7up at Albertsons ($1.00)

2 liters are a funny item to me. I have seen person after person walk up to the 2 liter shelf, notice the price ($1.50) and say, "that's way too much!" Then they go to the checkout and buy a 20oz for $1.59. So instead of paying $1.50 for 67.6oz, they pay $1.59 for a 20oz. 

If you want a cold drink on the spot, buy a 2 liter for a buck, then head over to the deli and ask for a cup of ice. They will usually oblige and now you have much more to drink for far less money. This is a great idea if you are with a friend and can split the 2 liter between you. If you're traveling alone that day, you can still grab two cups and see if you can make a friend on the way out. 

Hypothetically, let's say you run into a mean deli person who offers you no free cup. I can personally say that if you have your own container and fill it with ice and/or water, even the meanest of deli people are not going to say anything to you.

Unless you're buying a 7up brand 2 liter from Albertsons this week, stay away from this package as they are all priced well over $1.00. 

If you absolutely must buy a 2 liter of Pepsi or Coke because you have some Mentos on hand, head over to Safeway and snag the high price of $1.29 each when you buy 4 or more. 

Enjoy the weekend and be ready for all of the new school years drama... See you here next Wednesday with the new ads, and with any luck, better prices. 

See you in 7.

Soda Wars Episode XXXII: Aug. 10th - 16th

Welcome to Soda Wars Episode XXXII. 

Soda Wars: Revenge of the Thirst is a weekly blog presented by the Peanut Butter List. Every Wednesday we illustrate which store has the best prices on your favorite brands of soda. We price compare Pepsi, Coke and 7up in the 2 liter, 12 pack and 20/24 packs at ALL Colorado  King Soopers, Safeway and Albertsons locations. With this blog you'll 'know before you go' who has the best deal on your favorite brands of soda each week before you head off to the stores. 

Today is August 10th, which is also National S'mores Day, so I'm going to make this quick and get back to the fire! Actually, I'm really tired and have had about 3 hours sleep so I'm going to spare you the banter for today and simply post the prices so you can know where the deals are at. I will revisit this tomorrow or Friday to insert jokes and random thoughts about the sales for the week. I know, I know, you're horribly sad about all of this, but if I kept going with it tonight I wouldn't even be able to guarantee writing in the English language by the end of it.  

Here are your soda prices for the week... click the images for more a larger size. I will add in the winners of the week when I revisit this blog later. 

12 packs

12 pack winner: Pepsi at Safeway ($2.75 wyb4)

20 packs

20 pack winner: Pepsi at King Soopers ($4.99 wyb2)

2 liters

2 liter winner: Pepsi and 7up at King Soopers ($1.00)

Good night everyone... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Hello and welcome to Friday the 12th, I'm back to post a few comments to the soda sales this week. 

First up, let's look at 12 packs...

At Safeway you can get both Coke and 7up for $3.00 with their buy 2 get 2 sale for the week. With their shelf price of $5.99 that put you back $11.98 for four 12 packs. This is a fair between holiday sale that Safeway has going, but if your a Pepsi drinker you best deal is at Albertsons. You'll save 0.98¢ over the Coke and 7up deal at Safeway and $4.96 over the price of Pepsi at Safeway. 

Compared to the horrible King Soopers deal, you'll spend $6.32 more on your Pepsi this week if you don't head over to Albertsons. 

In the Albertsons ad it mentions that you have to include a diet brand in the mix to get the sale price. If you drink diets then no problem, but if you don't drink diets then... no problem either. The price will remain the same whether you have diets in the mix or not. The register will not calculate the variables to make adjustments based on flavor, so no worries just grab your favorite flavors and grab your 11 bucks.

This is nothing more than selective marketing to try to increase diet sales by Pepsi. If you do happen to have an anal cashier who insists on including a diet, just tell him that you're allergic to everything inside of a can of diet... and you are afraid to drink it because it has the word 'die' in diet. If they still persist, just ask for the manager. When the manager comes up tell him that the cashier was hitting on you and then picked his nose before grabbing your food. They will then ring you up as quickly and possibly even give you a slight discount. 

If you must buy your Pepsi at King Soopers, grab the 20 packs at $4.99 when you buy 2. You save $2.00 at the checkout when you have 2 of the $5.99 20 packs in your cart. You'll still pay .02¢ per can more (.24¢ per 12 cans), but that's way better than the Kings 12 pack price. 

20 packs...

As already mentioned, the save $2.00 on two 20 packs of Pepsi at Kings is the best deal. Everyone else is set at the standard $5.99 for a 20 pack and $7.99 for the 24 packs. 

Most Kings have a fair selection of 20 packs to get a variety on this sale. There should be Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Pepsi Max, Diet Mountain Dew, Sierra Mist and Orange Crush available at most King Soopers. 

2 liters...

Nothing overwhelmingly special this week on 2 liters with the lowest price sitting at $1.00. This deal is okay and is at the price I would never pay more than for a 2 liter. 

Here's a funny observation though... Pepsi has their 1.5 liters on sale for .99¢ and Coke just introduced a 1.25 liter, which is also on sale for .99¢. So, for a penny more you can get a half liter to .75 liters more soda in buying the 2 liters over these new packages. Really?!? Come on soda companies, quit changing the package sizes and giving us less for more money. Stick with the packages that people want and stop experimenting with how to squeeze more money out of us. 

This is the same thing with the 6 packs of Pepsi that have now switched to the 8 packs. The 6 pack cans were 8oz and the new cans in the 8 pack are only 7.5oz but it looks like a better deal because of the 2 extra cans when in fact you are paying .25¢ to .50¢ for each extra 7.5oz can. I'm not trying to pick on Pepsi, all of the companies are doing this same exact thing. This stems throughout the entire grocery store as well... Have you bought a Chips A'Hoy Chocolate Chip Cookie bag lately? Those things have gotten very small over the years. I remember when I was younger we could use those things as umbrellas, and now, if I put one of those cookies in my pocket I would lose it with my change. They're small!

Hope all of you have a great weekend, see you here next Wednesday with new sales and, with any luck, better prices.

Have a good week, see you in 7... err 5.

Have you noticed any package changes in the grocery stores?

Soda Wars Episode XXXI: Aug. 3rd - 9th

Welcome to Soda Wars Episode XXXI. 

Soda Wars: Revenge of the Thirst is a weekly blog presented by the Peanut Butter List. Every Wednesday we illustrate which store has the best prices on your favorite brands of soda. We price compare Pepsi, Coke and 7up in the 2 liter, 12 pack and 20/24 packs at ALL Colorado  King Soopers, Safeway and Albertsons locations. With this blog you'll 'know before you go' who has the best deal on your favorite brands of soda each week before you head off to the stores. 

Wednesday the 3rd of August. Starting a new month and marking just one month to go before the last summer sale on Labor Day week. Before I get into the soda sales for this week, I want to answer a question that came up this past week. The question was this, "so, is the Peanut Butter List only about soda?" The short answer to this is, no, soda is a very small part of the list we price compare at all 3 stores every week. 

This blog and these soda prices are 9 items on our list of over 1200 that we price side by side every week to find out the lowest possible prices on a wide variety of grocery items. This is a snippet of the information we offer and a small taste of the amount of money you can save on your groceries simply by knowing where to go and when to buy. 

Imagine this concept of side by side comparison along with our easy glimpse scoring system to create your weekly shopping list on everything you buy at the grocery store... that's what the Peanut Butter List is. The easiest way to save the most money on your groceries.

So why is this blog focused on soda?

2 reasons. 

Reason one. 

I have been inside of the soda industry for 14 years and know it very well. I'm not going to say which company because I don't want anyone to think I am bias toward any company over the other. This is my first blog, so I'm writing about what I know to get started. 

It was the work I do that helped bring about the idea behind PBL. I saw person after person buying product at one store at a higher price than they could buy it just a few blocks away. I thought to myself, 'if they knew what the other stores sale was, would they have come to this store to make a purchase?' 

Then I expanded on that idea and wondered how people would shop if they could know where to get all of their groceries at the lowest available prices for the week before they left their house. This led to the thought of, how would people change their buying habits if they could easily see the historical prices for each item on their list. Would someone buy a product knowing that it has been, and will be again, at a much lower price? 

For example, soda 12 packs, if you knew that the lowest price for the best routine sale was $2.49 and the average good sale price was right around $3.00 each... would you still pay $4.49 per 12 pack    to get your soda fix? Or would you go to the store with the $3.00 sale and save yourself $1.49 per 12 pack ($4.47 for the average purchase of three 12 packs per grocery trip.) 

Do that on everything you buy at the grocery store, then add in some online coupons and a little bit of stockpiling, and you'll begin to understand what the Peanut Butter List is all about. 

Reason two.

Soda has one of the most volatile prices at the grocery stores and changes just about every single week. These prices can jump or drop by a few bucks every day, sometimes even more than that if there's a weekend or one day sale. Soda is one of many items that have this ever changing price where buying at the right time could mean the difference in hundreds of dollars saved or spent throughout the year on this one routine purchase. 

Our goal at the Peanut Butter List is to allow every person the availability to purchase ALL of their groceries at their lowest possible prices every time they walk into the stores. Soda just seemed like a good place to start.

If you would like to see any other products in this or other blog series like this, please let me know in the comments sections which products you would like to see me compare here every week. 

Since I have rambled away on this blog about other topics, I will make the actual Soda Wars nice and quick. 

Best priced 12 packs for Colorado this week?

12 pack Winner: 7up at Safeway ($2.49 WYB10 (M&M))

The 7up is a PBL Item and is at it's lowest historical price this week with a $2.49 price point. 7up drinkers rejoice... and stock up! Everyone else is well above $3.00 per pack, which I find hard to swallow, even if it is liquid.

Best priced 20/24 packs for Colorado this week?

20/24 Pack Winner: Coke at Safeway ($4.99 WYB10 (M&M))

With a score of 90, Coke takes this one by far as the best deal this week. Just make sure you look at the per can and per fluid ounce breakdowns before you make a purchase. 

Best priced 2 liters for Colorado this week?

2 Liter Winner: 7up at Safeway (WYB10 (M&M))

Another 90 score in this category. 7up dominates the prices this week with the highest scores in 2 packages. Hope this is your brand, because this is a great time to fill the garage with your favorite 7up flavors. 

Safeway dominates the other stores this week and offers the lowest  prices in all 3 packages across the board. Of course, with an ad event called "Big Beverage Event, Mix and Match," I would hope that they have the lowest prices on soda. If not, they might have to change the name to, "Big Profit Margin Event, Raise and Pay Extravaganza." 

See you here next week late Wednesday with new sales, and with any luck, better prices. Have a good week friends, see you in 7.

What other items would like to see battle it out for best deal in the PBL blog? Let me know in the comments below. Thanks.