SmartShopIt Blog

(Shijun Liu is a Product Manager/Advisor for SmartShopIt.com.  He is also an Investment Analyst with John W. Parker Investment Management Group.   In light of the recently released and very depressing job numbers, we thought it good to provide his unique perspective of the state of the economy and how it relates to smarter shopping.  He also discusses our soon to be released comparison feature which will allow Members to compare products on a variety of areas, such as price, calories, sodium, etc. ) 

At heart, I am skeptical of the wise pessimists who come out of hibernation just as fear levels on Wall Street and Main Street are hitting extremes.  While we continue to hear bad news on the economy, housing, and unemployment, I try my best not being sucked into a gloom-and-doom mood.  If anything, staying positive in times like these gives all of us the strength to hold together until more prosperous times arrive.  A good attitude also injects renewed faith into the economic engines of this powerful and unique nation that we call home.  This too shall pass and it helps to repeat the mantra.

With that said, we do need to put food on the table and feed ourselves, our families, and our children.  For those of us who are less financially sound than in the recent past, we may need to dig deeper into our creative minds to come up with new solutions to the on-going problem.  Reflecting on the economic times of the past decade, few Americans would actually know what a depression would look like.  As Drake Bennett points out in his recent article “… a depression circa 2009 might be a less visible and more isolating experience. With the diminishing price of televisions and the proliferation of channels, it’s getting easier and easier to kill time alone, and free time is one thing a 21st-century depression would create in abundance.” 

In addition to more free time spent alone, people’s eating habits will likely be altered, “And while very few would starve, a depression would change how we eat. Food costs remain far below what they were for a family in the 1920s and 1930s, but they have been rising in recent years, and many people already on the edge of poverty would be unable to feed themselves on their own in a harsh economic climate – soup kitchens are already seeing an uptick in attendance.”

 Bennet further points out that even at the high end, things would change drastically,  “…specialty organic foods – which drove the success of chains like Whole Foods – would seem pointlessly expensive; the booming organic food movement could suffer as people start to see specially grown produce as more of a luxury than a moral choice. New England’s surviving farmers would be particularly hard-hit, as demand for their seasonal, relatively high-cost products dried up.” 

With fear currently widespread in the financial markets and the media, we at SmartShopIt.com do not feel morally justified to exacerbate the panic.  Nevertheless, when confronted with statistics of rising unemployment and mortgage defaults, we feel compelled to act, right now, and do what we can to ease the burden on the pocketbooks of anxious consumers all across America. 

Taking a closer look at the services that SmartShopIt.com currently provides to our users, we discovered the service that we call our “Comparison” tool can add immediate value to the dinner table in creative ways.  In fact, its application extends beyond simply helping lazy shoppers brainstorm ideas for a quick meal.  Just like the name implies, the tool helps shoppers figure out the best grocery product mix to put on a shopping cart that will turn into healthy and delicious meals at home.

At its core, the tool’s powerful comparison matrix allows for both apples-to-apples comparison as well as apples-to-oranges comparison, literally.   With more folks inclined to dine at home instead of eating out at restaurants, we want to help shoppers both pay less on the items they already buy on a regular basis as well discover new products they’ve never thought about buying but that could change their eating habits in a positive way.  For example, instead of a gourmet dinner at the local Olive Garden down the street, a family of 5 can piece together a similar 3-course meal using inexpensive ingredients and a recipe that would taste better than an otherwise default Mac N Cheese dinner or a packaged TV dinner or worse, a bag of fast food takeouts.  For those who enjoy eating healthy and organic but suddenly found it economically impractical to pay a premium for high-end produce and meats, our “what to buy” tool gives shoppers a chance to perform quick, at-a-glance, product comparisons that will help make more informed purchase decisions and offer attractive alternatives that are not yet known.  

Find Lower Calorie Options with our New Comparison Feature

For those strapped for cash, organic meals and big grocery bills may seem like a luxury reminiscent of the once-cherished boom times of the past when everybody on the block drove new cars and had well-paying jobs.  But it doesn’t mean we can’t help with the budget that you are currently living on.  Trust us that there are plenty others in your shoes.  During tough economic times, the resourceful and the unfortunate alike can turn small investments of time in front of computer screens and smart phone screens into valuable savings on food and everyday expenses.

Basically, it’s up to us to leverage off of the power of information made easily accessible by the internet.  More importantly, we have each other to communicate with and help.  During the much forgotten days of the Great Depression, families pooled resources together in the form of hand-picked vegetables from kitchen gardens in order to make a neighborhood soup.  In a similar manner, we empower Smart Shoppers to network and share product tips on how to save money, eat better, and enrich the dinner table.

As our vision goes, we created our “what to buy” tool as a handy grocery store helper that gives on-demand advice on practical problems such as “how can I manage to feed my family this week with meals that are well balanced, varied, tasty, easy-to-prepare and at the lowest cost?”  We know from experience that moms from across the country are challenged by this problem every week at the grocery store, and help is long overdue.

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