How Much Would You Pay for an Organic Thanksgiving?
Nothing puts the price differential between organic and non-organic eating into perspective like a Thanksgiving Day meal. Paying $2 more for organic blueberries or $1 more for organic milk may seem like an easy decision, but what about spending almost $80 more for one meal’s worth of Turkey?
As the New York Times reports, smartmoney.com has done some investigative reporting on the real costs of an organic Thanksgiving Day meal. Shopping organic as thriftily as possible at Whole Foods, Associated Supermarket, and the Food Emporium, the financial advice Web site found that an organic traditional Thanksgiving Day meal cost $126.35 more than a non-organic meal. According to Smartmoney, this constitutes a rip-off.
126 bucks is certainly a prohibitively hefty price tag for many families, but let’s keep in mind that there are thriftier ways to buy organic than shopping at Whole Foods in Manhattan. For instance, I shop at a co-op and I would bet that buying an organic meal there might even be cheaper than a non-organic one bought in traditional supermarkets. And if you can afford to pay a little more for farming methods that are easier on the environment, by all means do. Isn’t that what Thanksgiving is all about?
Photo: New York Times
How about this: bundle up the money you would have spent on the “organic” items (lots of those actually aren’t organic at all, you’re being ripped off twice over) and donate that amount to your local food bank to help a struggling family put food on the table.