While the price of groceries has gone up significantly over the past three-and-a-half years, Aldi and Walmart have announced a campaign to return to Trump-era prices for Thanksgiving. (Brandon Bell / Getty Images ; Evan Vucci-Pool / Getty Images)
By Bryan Chai October 22, 2024 at 3:39pm
In one sense, five years ago really wasn’t that long ago.
In another sense, it feels like a literal lifetime.
Mega retailers Walmart and Aldi are reminding consumers that five years ago actually felt like eons ago — and it’s all thanks to some special holiday promotional pricing.
On Oct. 16 and 17, Aldi and Walmart, respectively, announced that they would be turning back the clocks when it comes to their Thanksgiving spread pricing.
“Now through Dec. 24 Walmart’s inflation-free Thanksgiving meal is available to shop, with options for customers to ‘give or gift’ a meal,” the mega-retailer boasted, taking an unintentionally hilarious shot at all things Bidenomics/Kamalanomics.
Walmart may not have specifically called back to former President Donald Trump’s economy, but the company did boast about its 88 cents per pound turkey deal — a figure that actually tracks remarkably close to Trump-era prices.
Aldi was a bit more explicit when waxing nostalgic for the halcyon days of an economy pre-President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris — the Democratic nominee for president, no less.
“This holiday season, ALDI is offering its lowest-priced Thanksgiving basket in five years — a full meal for 10 people at less than $47,” Aldi said. “With reports showing grocery prices are up 50 percent across the industry on hundreds of items compared to 2019, shoppers will get welcome relief at ALDI on their favorite Thanksgiving fixings.”
“Compared to 2019”? Gee, who was overseeing the economy then?
Has inflation during the Biden-Harris administration caused difficulties for you?
Oh, right.
The guy with mean tweets and insults — but apparently a banging economy that customers and companies alike are publicly yearning for.
Aldi made sure to brag about its “inflation-busting holiday meal,” while Walmart mentioned how its “customers can take advantage of this inflation-free Thanksgiving meal both in-store and online.”
That’s to say nothing of the public discourse that’s often slamming the absentee president and vacuous vice president when it comes to the squeeze that everyday Americans are currently feeling.
(Seriously … why isn’t Harris implementing any of her communist grand promises while she actually wields some political power as the current VP?)
But these promotions also hide a rather uncomfortable question for the incumbent administration: Why are these prices — from a scant five years ago — so much better than what’s currently being proffered in this economy?
This administration would assuredly dodge that question, but it’s one worth asking nonetheless.
Pricing from five years ago shouldn’t feel this gratuitously different, and yet it does because of the bungled leadership that has overseen the country’s last three-and-a-half disastrous years.
Hopefully that’s a message that voters take to the booths come Nov. 5.
Otherwise, depending on who wins (hint, hint, nudge, nudge), customers in 2028 may be yearning for these bloated 2024 prices.
And that’s not good for anyone involved.
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