You’re eight years old accompanying your mom while she gets groceries at the grocery store. You pass by the pop tarts and ask if she can grab a box. She says yes but instead of grabbing the familiar blue pop tart box, she grabs a box of “Frosted Toaster Treats”. You ask “Mom, what’s that?” and she responds with “they’re the pop tarts you wanted. This kind is just cheaper, that’s all.” Now, the whole grocery trip is ruined because you got some off-brand cheap sweets rather than the actual brand you wanted.
Everyone knows that name brand products are way better than the off-brand products… Or are they? According to this article, “While it’s true that some name brand products have rigorous quality control, many generic products are manufactured to meet the same standards. In fact, some generic products are produced in the same facilities as brand name items and are essentially identical except for the labeling.” So, is there no difference? What do our schoolmates think–is the higher price worth buying brand name?
Harrison High School journalism students were asked if they thought they could tell the difference between name brand and off brand. 48% of students said yes, 40% said maybe, and 12% said no. So, people are confident that they can tell the difference, but are they willing to pay more? This question was also asked of high school students, with only 15% saying no. We are confident that we can tell the difference!
Pop tarts are a great grab n go breakfast for mornings where you’re running late, or chill mornings if it’s what you’re craving. But before you grab a box, ask yourself, is it worth it to pay almost double for the Pop Tart brand? Can you really tell? The Paw Print purchased three different brands of jelly toaster pastries: Pop Tart Brand($4.29), Kroger Brand ($2.49), and Aldi Brand ($2.18). Harrison high schoolers were asked to taste nine pop tarts: each of those brands in three different pop tart flavors (strawberry, chocolate, and brown sugar and cinnamon). Here’s what they thought:
Out of the three chosen brands, students enjoyed the Pop Tart brand the most, Kroger Brand the second, and Aldi brand the least. That answers the question, that different brands can be distinguished. What’s ironic is that they were ranked in order of price. Pop Tart being the most expensive, Kroger Brand being in the middle, and Aldi Brand being the cheapest.
Out of the chosen flavors, the strawberry flavor was the favorite among the students with an average rating of 3.13 out of 5. What may have brought the score down is the Aldi brand, which had a score of 2.91 out of 5, which was the least favorite of the strawberry flavor.
In second place of flavor is brown sugar & cinnamon with a score of 3.12 out of 5. First and second place are separated by only 0.01 point! Each pop tart of this flavor had a score over 3, but it still couldn’t top strawberry.
In last place is the chocolate flavor with an incredibly distant rating on 2.87 out of 5. When walking towards the chocolate pop tart table, you could tell the mood getting worse compared to the strawberry table. Students were not excited to eat this flavor of toaster pastry, which the data also showed.
Out of all the pop tarts displayed, the one with the highest rating is the Pop Tart brand of strawberry! This makes sense because it’s the most enjoyable brand, combined with the most enjoyable flavor.
In last place is the Pop Tart brand of chocolate. It makes sense that the last place got the worst flavor, but what’s ironic is that it’s the most enjoyable brand. I guess the most expensive brand sometimes tastes horrible.
