SPAM sales surging as consumers try to stretch food budget

[Bluebear]

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Love it, hate it or laugh at it — at least it's inexpensive.

Sales of Spam — that much maligned meat — are rising as consumers are turning more to lunch meats and other lower-cost foods to extend their already stretched food budgets.

What was once cheeky, silly and the subject of a musical (as Monty Python mocked the meat in a can), is now back on the table as people turn to the once-snubbed meat as costs rise, analysts say.

Food prices are increasing faster than they've risen since 1990, at 4 percent in the U.S. last year, according to the Agriculture Department. Many staples are rising even faster, with white bread up 13 percent last year, bacon up 7 percent and peanut butter up 9 percent.

There's no sign of a slowdown. Food inflation is running at an annualized rate of 6.1 percent as of April, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gtF_r6YW589BUegKGbzv4jQP-g_AD90URO003

[marmar]

1. Wow.....This is what it's come to.

I noticed a run on the boxed macaroni & cheese and Ramen noodles sections of the grocery store yesterday as well.

[meow2u3]

2. Just keep it out of my inbox

:)

[NightWatcher]

3. yum, fried spam and eggs

[spanone]

4. spamity spam

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwy2MPT5RE

[kineneb]

6. ...bloody Vikings! n/t

[NightWatcher]

5. go play the Spamalot game

http://spamalot.spam.com/go/game/

[Catch22Dem]

7. I LOVE Spam!

I don't care how much money I make, I'll continue buying it.

[stray cat]

8. Fried spam and eggs or fried spam sandwiches were always winners at my place

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

9. Just what goes into making SPAM anyway?

Or dare I ask? I ate some about 20 years ago. When I was a kid, my next door neighbor worked in the Oscar Mayer weiner factory. We couldn't get him to eat a hot dog for all the money in the world.

[colinmom71]

12. It's basically parts of pork meat cutlets that otherwise....

Tend to be too tough for conventional cooking methods. It's mostly pork shoulder trimmings and some ham trimmings processed finely so that it can cook evenly.

[ms liberty]

10. But I don't like Spam! n/t

[fed_up_mother]

11. Wow.

A pound of dried beans tastes so much better than that stuff.

And I'm a meat lover!

[Bozita]

13. Watch for a jump in sales of canned pet foods.

Some of the dog foods smell pretty good.

[ColbertWatcher]

14. Spam Haiku

Split the SPAM atom
Enormous pink mushroom cloud
World covered in pork

http://web.mit.edu/jync/www/spam/">Spam Haiku