The Sunday Review #19: Expensive Onions Edition

Wow..onion prices are bringing tears to our eyes. We tend to eat a lot of onions through a variety of recipes and probably consume about 14~18 pounds of onions in a month (…yeah we have a strong mouthwash too). During most of our purchases in the last month, the prices have been around $1.99 per pound. Here is how our yesterday’s onion purchase looked like, at that price:

The USB drive is only to give a sense of size - didn’t get that one free with the onions.

So basically, we got just 5 onions (about 5~6 days supply) for $6.53. Now, in absolute terms that’s not too expensive, but I remember buying the same kind of onions at $0.50 cents per pound, in the same grocery store, a few months ago. So the current price is like a 298% increase over the earlier price [a business idea with the potential of a 298% profit? - I wish onions lasted a bit longer ]

According to this recent story on Netscape:

A 50-pound bag of white onions from Mexico cost $55 on March 13, a record-high price that reflects low supplies caused by weather and decreased acreage, plus the end of the storage onion shipping season in the United States.

That “record-high” comes to about $1.10 per pound. Even after considering retail profit margin, the current price of $1.99 probably sounds like a new record.

Ah..so much for supply and demand. Let’s close the matter by blaming the weather (for reducing the supply) and consumers like yours truly (for increasing the demand) and let’s get back to the Sunday review.

• Top Ten Ways Personal Finance Blogging has Helped Me by Lazy @ Lazy Man and Money. Lazy shares the benefits of blogging about personal finance - right from making money to improving networking and negotiating skills.

• Money Question: What Do You Look For In An Online Bank Account? by Henry @ Binary Dollar. As a part of a “Money Question” series, Henry asks his readers about their perspective on online savings account. Look for my answer in this post.

• Two Ways to Grow Your Business Income by Ben @ Money Smart Life. Through this post, Ben proudly declares that he is on his way to increase the amount of money he makes on eBay by 100%. See if you can follow his footsteps.

• 7 Ways To Kill Your Net Worth by Flexo @ Consumerism Commentary. Flexo succinctly summarizes a CNN Money article with this post. Check out the #5 “Always getting what you want“. Think over it for a while. It would probably make more sense to some folks when expressed as “Always getting what you don’t need“.

• Two Years of FiveCentNickel and a Big, Huge Giveaway by Nickel @ Five Cent Nickel. Check out Nickel’s mega-giveaway. It’s open till 11th May and there are a couple of iPods at stake.

• 101 Goals in 1001 Days by Trent @ The Simple Dollar. Trent publishes his extensive list of goals and encourages readers to do the same. Honestly, I don’t even have 101 goals; so it’s going to take some time for me to get into this. Plus, I don’t have goals that extend 1001 days in future - may be because I foresee an almost certain span of uncertainty (ah..the irony of that statement) in about an year’s time. After that span, my goals start becoming a bit complicated - with a lot of *plan B’s* thrown in.

• Getting the Most from Used Furniture: Telltale Signs of a Bad Deal by Sharon @ The Frugal Duchess. Some practical tips from Sharon about frugal furniture shopping. I have one more tip to add - if you walk in a furniture store and see that most salespersons are just sitting around on the sofas doing nothing, that store will be a waste of time. At least that’s how it has been for us till now.

• Poker: Luck or Skill? by LAMoneyGuy @ It’s Just Money. That’s an interesting question. Towards the end of this post, LAMoneyGuy raises another interesting question - “Is investing in stocks a game of luck of skill?”. Investing is probably a game of luck - but you marginally increase your odds with some skills. I guess it’s about the same as poker.