Author Topic: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust  (Read 1072 times)

zands

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What will happen this time around? In the 2008-2012 recession and onward, food prices were stable, with not much inflation. This time around, food prices are getting inflated. 10% yearly, they say.

What I see are processed foods (peanut butter, frozen this and that, bread etc.) prices are rising faster than the basics. Such as meats, chicken, rice, beans, vegetables that you cook at home.

Plantinyum

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #1 on: October 07, 2022, 01:21:44 PM »
I guess that more people may get interested in growing food themselves as the prices get higher. Prices may be the trigger ,but  flavour may be the thing that will keep them growing
once they realize that homegrown fruit/ plant food is generally way better that whats available at the stores.


K-Rimes

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #2 on: October 07, 2022, 02:02:15 PM »
I think the biggest boom was COVID where everyone had tons of time to hang out at home and learn about and install gardens. The sort of collector scene did see a bit of growth, I sold a lot of plants locally off Craigslist, but that has dropped off precipitously. 2008-2012 were the golden years of forum use and it's all on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and so on now - hundreds of posts per day in certain collector groups. Unfortunately not nearly as high quality a group or quality of knowledge on those forums, the dragonfruit FB communities especially drove me insane with the misinformation and I ended up quitting those particular groups.

Due to the precarious nature of people's finances today and how tight belts are going to get, I don't think we'll see a lot of people getting into rare fruit collecting. The return on investment for most gardening is not very good at first.

We should see some conversion of regular gardeners into collectors though so probably a decent boost in of COVID first timers getting deeper but certainly not a kaboom.

pagnr

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #3 on: October 07, 2022, 04:04:55 PM »
Here in Australia, all those small independent seed companies selling heirloom non hybrid vegetable seeds were swamped with orders.
Seeds were sold out. and processing delayed. Some restricted sales to their own state. That all seems have passed by now.

John B

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #4 on: October 07, 2022, 04:19:57 PM »
Yes, 10% is very conservative...more like 15-20%. Don't forget about those magically shrinking packages. Packaged meat, chips, dips decreasing volume/size of product and inflating with air.

JCorte

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #5 on: October 07, 2022, 04:53:53 PM »
I'd like to see this forum continue to grow.  I'm going to work on creating more content and posts to share my experiences starting a new farm, restoring an old orchard, and creating a home food forest. 

Gardening and growing food and the excitement of trying new fruits is what I love to do.  So, I'll work on doing a better job of sharing and hopefully inspiring others.

Janet

JakeFruit

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #6 on: October 07, 2022, 04:58:16 PM »
TTF went online in January of 2012; this economy was busted & back when the Patrick and Co opened the doors.
https://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?action=mlist;sort=registered;start=0

spaugh

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #7 on: October 07, 2022, 05:29:07 PM »
I wish bacon grew on trees.
Brad Spaugh

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #8 on: October 07, 2022, 08:50:11 PM »
I wish bacon grew on trees.

It kinda does, but I think you cut that one down.  ;)

hammer524

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #9 on: October 07, 2022, 08:56:37 PM »
I enjoy the taste of palm oil so I'll be fine /s

Jaboticaba45

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #10 on: October 07, 2022, 11:11:05 PM »
Well I always like seeing newbies on the forum whether they be spammers or actualy people looking for help.
When in doubt, get the moderators out.
Ok yeah nice to see growth.
More people to spread plants to meaning larger audience.
Yay

Vegan Potato Man

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #11 on: October 08, 2022, 12:32:15 AM »
Yes, 10% is very conservative...more like 15-20%. Don't forget about those magically shrinking packages. Packaged meat, chips, dips decreasing volume/size of product and inflating with air.


FWIW, Chips are sold by weight, not volume. The bag is filled with nitrogen to preserve freshness. Animal flesh is also sold by weight, generally.

K-Rimes

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #12 on: October 08, 2022, 12:05:45 PM »
Yes, 10% is very conservative...more like 15-20%. Don't forget about those magically shrinking packages. Packaged meat, chips, dips decreasing volume/size of product and inflating with air.


FWIW, Chips are sold by weight, not volume. The bag is filled with nitrogen to preserve freshness. Animal flesh is also sold by weight, generally.

User name checks out with this knowledge.

Jordan321

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #13 on: October 08, 2022, 04:30:36 PM »
As far as new members go, I'm definitely a part of the newest crop (see what I did there?).  Covid and supply chain type stuff sort of snapped us out of the "someplace, someday" mindset into getting busy right now.  Like someone else said, gardening doesn't usually give a good return on investment early on, so if I don't learnt to do this stuff now, it will be too late to make mistakes when it matters.  So now I do whatever I can to try and pull food out of my little lot in "the other Melbourne," while quietly, but religiously reading virtually every post here daily. ... so even if you feel like it's always the same 15 people writing to each other, I'd bet there is a lot more of us out here learning lots.

cassowary

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #14 on: October 08, 2022, 08:12:45 PM »
Lebanese cucumbers at 12-14kg nowdays so some fresh fruits are going up.
Pumpkins are up by 1$ so some staples are going up.
Mango and avo is same as years ago IMO, probably due to high volumes still. Might go up if more farmers turn into pasture, that have happen with some sugarcane land here.

In our area there where an influx of southern families moving here and now there's a lot less "for sale" signs around.
But some of them will not be able to handle the wet season.

Yeah collecting rare fruit requires some initial investment and it might take a decade for some decent return it seams to me. But if people do it well it can give good return with little labor. As one can have good margins and established good tree's keep on giving for decades. I can't imagine myself trying to compete with commercial mango growers for cents with the big fruit packers.

Rare fruit is expensive cause it requires huge amounts of knowledge from the collector/farmer and also some form of social skill or dedication to collect successfully (dealing with new people, cranky old timers , new cultures and musky tropical hotels somewhere in nowhere). And rare/exotic fruit will be expensive until the commercial people have systematized it. So a Rollina sells for 6$ a kg in my area, same as five years ago and i doubt it will go up cause of supermarket food prices goes up unless things get really bad. 6$ is already good margin.

Peace



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John B

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #15 on: October 09, 2022, 12:35:59 AM »
Yes, 10% is very conservative...more like 15-20%. Don't forget about those magically shrinking packages. Packaged meat, chips, dips decreasing volume/size of product and inflating with air.


FWIW, Chips are sold by weight, not volume. The bag is filled with nitrogen to preserve freshness. Animal flesh is also sold by weight, generally.

User name checks out with this knowledge.

Flipping hilarious! Here, maybe this will explain what I failed to articulate:
https://www.npr.org/2022/06/08/1103766334/shrinkflation-globally-manufacturers-shrink-package-sizes

jamesthomas171

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Re: This forum grew during the 2008-2012 recession / housing bust
« Reply #16 on: October 09, 2022, 02:30:39 PM »
What will take place this time? Food costs were constant during the 2008–2012 recession and subsequent years of low inflation. The cost of food is increasing at the moment.10% each year, they claim.
I observe that costs for processed items (such peanut butter, various frozen meals, bread, etc.) are growing more quickly than those for essentials. such as the meats, poultry, grains, beans, and vegetables you prepare at home.