I am disappointed that there has never been any focus on the steep price rise of Mushrooms. Not long after this almost every tv Chef began campaigning for this simple fungus. From there we have seen prices jump from $3 - $4 per kg to $12 - $15 per kg.
This is for a product that is never affected by weather or disastor events.
This price hike has been in multiple countries and seems to be against our fair trading laws yet no-one has responded.
I contacted ACCC years ago with this request but was fobbed off.
This is a similar Investor ploy as happened to razor blades.
Monopolise the market, increase demand through advertising blitz and crank up the price.
By my calculations mushies should be between $5 - $6 certainly no higher than $7.
What is your view?
All this is new to me. Is there anywhere we can read about these misdeeds, why the prices are contrary to fair trading laws or why a fair price might be $6 not $12?
Same. Mushies here - button or field (as I call them) always come in minimum 11$/kg, up to 14. Unsure of the more fancy types, always wanted to experiment but never have.
We pay around $8 per kg for buttons (should be unopened or just opened caps, fairly mild taste), around the same for field (opened and flatish caps with a much more mushroom taste). Swedish around $11 per kilo, more exotic types eg oyster prices can be much higher.
Sterile growing media is expensive to produce for commercial operations, it is important that the media has no other spores of other fungi, temperature, moisture and light also need to be well controlled . It is normally labour intensive to pick the crop as generally hand picked. Prices per kg seem somewhat in line with other prices for other intensive labour and infrastructure requiring crops.
As an aside:
To increase Vit D content of Mushrooms leave them in sunlight for around a half hour or a little more and they naturally develop Vit D, in fact enough in a handful for a person to receive more than their daily allowance. A reference in regards to this simple “trick” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6213178/
Hi @Madchef welcome to the Forum.
You raised an interesting issue, as I hadn’t notiiced an inordinate price increase in the mushrooms.
I acknowledge your point about mushrooms not being affected by weather, unlike other vegetables, but in my opinion all the vegetable prices have been rising quite steeply. Consequently, I haven’t picked up on the the mushroom price increases as a seperate issue.
Just had a look at prices out of curiosity…
The current price of mushroom cups loose at Woolworths is $8/kg.
The current price of mushroom cups loose at Coles is $11/kg
So Woolworths price isn’t that high.
I haven’t seen them that cheap at our local woolies, ever I think … its made me feel rather esurient all of a sudden !!
We get them at times for around $5 a kilo and at a store we visit they sometimes have boxes of them for free (not often but when they do we get a few boxes and dehydrate them).
I eat lots of mushrooms, they are one of my most favoured meals.
Make sure you get them in a plain paper bag so no-one else sees what you have purchased!
Thanks for the link. Very interesting (if technical) reading… I have been spoiled by graphs, pie charts etc in the Covid/coronavirus articles I have devoured/am devouring - the graphics make statistics much easier for me to comprehend!
Is that a referrence to self checkout mushatoes?
$5kg…wow. Where are you? I have quoted woolies prices in Tasmania. Is it just us? Tho I asked someone via twitter who told me comparitive price in NY is the same. At farmers markets here can be $13 - $18kg
Where are you situated that you pay so much less than me?
The real burner is Tasmania has so many types of mushroons growing naturally. I take your point regarding the cost of the growing medium but this too has a value added component as a gardening product.
Why the jump in price since 2014 that seems outside the norm?
Thanks.
What piqued my interest was the following events…
The TV Chefs began a huge media push about the nutritional value of mushrooms.
The old " superfood " label was trotted out.
And mushrooms began to increase in price.
As a Professional Chef of 37yrs my Tech Colledge training was early 70s and the fungi family ( I learned) had small nutritional value but major flavour boost.
Depending on the growing medium there is some transferrence in nutritional value but Superfood?
Also I wanted to know how you know what a reasonable price might be but you didn’t address that.
And on how this is contrary to fair trading laws, you said there was price fixing but didn’t give any data to support that idea.
I don’t doubt your qualifications as a chef and I agree that the superfood concept is rubbish but from what you have said I don’t see any reason to think that mushroom producers are any different to any other in applying whatever puffery they can find to push their product. By all means show that I have it wrong.
My comments regarding price fixing is based on local shopping. Any variation to price is duplicated from store to store. The range of price, is surprisingly narrow and seems ( at face value ) to be almost coriagraphed.
I find it interesting that you seem to believe " alls fair in marketing"
You must agree however that to make false claims about a product is illegal.
There were certainly claims made by the Chef/Influencers that I yelled BS at.
I cannot remember the wording, but do remember my digust.
As a Chef my entire working life was to know what every component of a dish cost.
I assure you, mushrooms have increased over many other foods.
They are not the only deviant product.
Bread is there too.
But that’s another day’s argument. 
I live in the Greater Brisbane area of Qld. My normal Green Grocers (I have two preferred GGs) have them almost always at $7.99 a kg, they also at times on special drop the price to around $4.99 a kg. The free boxes are from another general goods shop.
If I bother going to the Rocklea Markets I find Mushrooms from suppliers are generally around $5 - $6 per kg (you have to buy a box though so quite a few mushrooms) sometimes a small bit less sometimes a bit more. Considering that a GG has to make a profit and risk the loss of any old product they didn’t sell a mark up of around 100% would seem normal. Same goes for other fruit and veg, price at the markets is about 1/2 or less than of what is sold at retailers.
Have you tried local produce markets in Tassie. We have recently moved here and we are yet to go to one (have been closed due to COVID)…but the locals say that they are far better, cheaper and fresher than supermarkets or fruit and vege stores.
Wow! I live in regional SA: the duopoly sells around $11/kg, Aldi about $10, & my local IGA $13, most of the year. Occasional specials drop the price, plus seasonal (??) variation: currently a bit less/kg. I understand mushrooms are a good source of meat replacement (not for protein) in vegetable based diets - maybe these prices are “what the market will bear”???
Seems like a general mark up at retailers of about 100% from wholesale market prices, so within reason they would see it as. Florists for their flowers can have markups of around 300%…that’s too big I feel but I understand the 100% in easily perishable foods.
I can’t say that I noticed any “sharp rise” in mushrooms. I have been buying the occasional flat cap and cups for decades, and grew my own in kits for a while.
In rural & remote areas they have always been about $15 - $20/kg - which I suppose means they have not risen with inflation. Being on a very limited budget a few years back I always chose the oldest, dehydrated flat cap to get more mushy per buck.
Our Foodworks has mushroom cups on special.
