{"id":2723,"date":"2026-03-16T11:10:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T15:10:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/?p=2723"},"modified":"2026-03-16T11:19:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T15:19:07","slug":"word-of-the-week-shrinkflation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/2026\/03\/16\/word-of-the-week-shrinkflation\/","title":{"rendered":"Word of the Week! Shrinkflation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/files\/2026\/03\/shrinkflation.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-2725 size-medium\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/files\/2026\/03\/shrinkflation-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"Nutella Jars, before and after Shrinkflation\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/files\/2026\/03\/shrinkflation-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/files\/2026\/03\/shrinkflation.jpg 700w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>We are in the process of switching brands for the dry kibble we feed our three livestock dogs. The dogs are huge, each over 100 pounds, and they eat a LOT of food. Our current brand, which I won&#8217;t name, began selling 38-pound bags for the same price as an older 50-pound bag.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a good example of shrinkflation, a common problem visible to anyone who pays attention in the grocery-store aisles. You can read all about the economics of this portmanteau word at <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Shrinkflation\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Wikipedia<\/a>, but I&#8217;m curious about the term&#8217;s origin. The Online Etymology Dictionary was of no help, but a <a href=\"https:\/\/english.stackexchange.com\/questions\/587922\/when-did-shrinkflation-first-appear-in-writing\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Stack Exchange discussion<\/a> led to a possible first use in 2014. There&#8217;s a precedent, too, in the term &#8220;stagflation,&#8221; a bogeyman of 1970s economics.<\/p>\n<p>Is this post shorter than last week? Since it costs you nothing but time to consume a post, it&#8217;s not shrinkflation. I simply found myself taciturn and grumpy this week about that dog food!<\/p>\n<p>Send metaphors and words to cover by e-mailing me (jessid -at- richmond -dot- edu) or leaving a comment below. Want to write a guest entry? Let me know!<\/p>\n<p>See all of our Metaphors of the Month\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/tag\/metaphor-of-the-month\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here<\/a>\u00a0and Words of the Week\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/tag\/word-of-the-week\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em>Creative-Commons Image: Ink.com. I&#8217;m not a Nutella fan, either.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We are in the process of switching brands for the dry kibble we feed our three livestock dogs. The dogs are huge, each over 100 pounds, and they eat a LOT of food. Our current brand, which I won&#8217;t name, began selling 38-pound bags for the same price as an older 50-pound bag. It&#8217;s a &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/2026\/03\/16\/word-of-the-week-shrinkflation\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Word of the Week! Shrinkflation<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":589,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[214,87405,87415,40197],"tags":[2522],"class_list":["post-2723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business","category-etymology","category-portmanteau-words","category-vocabulary","tag-word-of-the-week"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcsCNV-HV","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/589"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2723"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2723\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2727,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2723\/revisions\/2727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}