It also costs 10p more for me to get a single train ticket to Leeds than it does to get a return ticket.
You're right - It is just plain weird.

Arizona Tea is pretty foul. I think in the gallon size they actually pay people to take it home.

Maybe they made too many 42 oz size and needed to get rid of them in a timely fashion.

I think: once you've got the bottles being made, it doesn't matter if one is bigger than the other: glass is cheap and the manufacturing of a 42 oz bottle is virtually the same as a 20 oz bottle.

Same goes for the tea itself: it's incredibly cheap to make, so 42 oz isn't really that much more expensive than 20 oz.

mr_crash_davis: I bow to your superior sense for humor. Well done, sir.

The most expensive part of drinks like that is the packaging materials. Second is usually marketing. Glass containers are for the most part priced by weight. Specklet is correct in that once you purchase a certain number of containers any more you purchase is really just raw materials. Having said that, all things being equal you'd think that the larger size would be at least marginally more expensive. Could also be some kind of promotion, but it really does seem odd.

My favorite brand of iced tea is Honest Tea.

It could be as simple as there being more demand for the smaller size than there is the larger size.

We don't know how the wholesale prices differ, so we don't know if this is the retailer making the difference or if the producer is. (If it's the retailer, then the next paragraph applies, but not the one that follows.) But let's assume the difference is in the wholesale cost set by the producer.

There are benefits of linking together the prices of the two sizes, but if the two differ greatly in how they sell then you've sacrificed the ability to price either of them "just right".

But this is also the case with a single product. For example, things sell differently in different regions. If you price the product the same nationally, then you have to accept a compromise that makes your product, for example, too expensive in Mississippi and too cheap in New York. But it's probably going to cost you something to go to the trouble to price regionally.

And this is true about time-of-day, even.

Most people have what I think is the weird idea that something "should" be priced at the cost of the raw materials plus labor plus some set amount in profit. And that sounds like it makes sense. But how do the producers of the raw materials price their product? And further back up the chain. At some point you have to price either arbitrarily or according to supply and demand.

People get mad about Priceline's airline tickets because they think it's not fair that one person should pay one amount and another pay a different, perhaps much lower, amount for the same thing. But that's the same sort of thinking as above. Actually, for some obvious reasons if you think about it, a seat on a plane will be worth different amounts through to the time the plane takes off.

1 gallon bottles of Poland Spring is usually $1.75, same price (or less) that a liter bottle. It's cause who the hell wants to walk around sipping on a gallon bottle?

I'm still wondering why Moe's sells bottle of Arizona Tea for $1.19 when it has "99 cents!" printed on the bottle. Well, actually I know why, I just wonder why I ever bought one.

At my (shitty, shitty job I'm probably about to get fired from), Coke and Pepsi cost $1.00, and water costs $1.25 in the vending machines.

At a gas station I was at last week, the 20oz bottles of water were $1.25, and the one litres were 2 for a dollar, or $1.89 each. It's apparently the regular price there. I don't understand it... Maybe some sort of FDA subsidy to get more people drinking water.

Maybe some sort of FDA subsidy to get more people drinking water.

You might want to stop and think about this. It's about as likely as, um, I dunno, something very, very, very unlikely.

mischief, ready-to-drink beverage sales are tightly controlled by the manufacturer. They may "buy" SKUs (shelf-keeping units) to have more of their product for sale in a given store, or promote a new size or one which hasn't been selling well with a special price.

And in a very real sense, the actual amount of beverage sold per container is almost irrelevant. They need to sell specific numbers of containers to make money, but it hardly costs them more to have them larger, and the cost per container is probably very nearly identical regardless of size. The only significant variable might be transport and storage costs.

Also, there's a strong element of predatory pricing. The more of their product you buy, the less of their competitor's product you buy. Your bladder is only so big.

Q: Why do revolutionaries drink herbal tea?
A: Because proper tea is theft.

Was it this, by any chance?

At any rate, what I noticed that was interesting is that the suggested retail on that is $1.99; elsewhere I saw a 20 oz. bottle selling for 1.69 - exactly a 30 cent difference.

What if they just mixed up their prices? Funny... but possible.

That's it! So, it is a promotion. Thanks, taz!

To answer your other question, the 20 oz was selling here for $1.69, the standard price. The 42 oz was $1.39.

Yay! I can now add "beverage detective" to my long list of credits.

oops... maybe not. I just noticed the date on that press release: August 31, 2001.

Okay, then... How about this: The shelf life for that particular bottle is nine months (yes, I looked it up - I'm stangely fascinated by this question, and obviously have no life). Maybe the bottles your store is selling are eight months old?

I fall into the "looming shelf-life expiry" camp, but 'tis true that unit pricing is pretty arcane and often defies logic from a consumer's point of view.

Arizona Tea? gah *shiver* :)