Anchorage Daily News

You can see it in the bread aisle at Carrs, where shoppers nowadays stare long and hard at a small $4.50 loaf of all-grain Oroweat Best Winterwheat bread before placing it in the cart.

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TUNA up 34% 2007 $1.76 2008 $2.36

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RICE up 85% 2007 $0.46 2008 $0.85

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WHITE FLOUR up 21% 2007 $.34 2008 $.41

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EGGS up 23% 2007 $1.80 2008 $2.22

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COFFEE up 14% 2007 $2.40 2008 $2.74

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CHEDDAR CHEESE up 61% 2007 $2.75 2008 $4.42

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WHOLE GRAIN BREAD up 22% 2007 $1.48 2008 $1.81

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WHITE BREAD up 33% 2007 $.92 2008 $1.22

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GROUND BEEF up 18% 2007 $2.41 2008 $2.85

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APPLES up 24% 2007 $.98 2008 $1.22

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Or at the Costco on DeBarr Road, where fears over rice availability and price increases to come created a small stampede near the entrance Monday morning as customers raced for the food aisles -- clearing out four whole pallets of rice in less than 15 minutes.

Or in the wall-to-wall faces of morning diners at Bean's Cafe, which increasingly caters to Anchorage's "working poor" -- low-income residents who tell the staff they can't afford to buy their own food the last half of the month.

Food prices in Anchorage are rising.

After remaining stable for several years, the cost of a typical weekly shopping cart of food for an Anchorage family of four shot up 10 percent during the first three months of this year -- from $121.31 to $132.88, according to preliminary statistics reported Monday by the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service.

Some individual items have climbed even higher. From March 2007 to March 2008, ground beef rose 18 percent. Eggs, 22 percent. White bread, 33 percent. Cheddar cheese, 61 percent. Rice, 85 percent.

Experts blame a variety of factors, from global-warming-related droughts to higher shipping costs (driven by steadily rising fuel prices) to allocation decisions traceable to farmers who choose to grow government-subsidized biofuel crops rather than food crops.

But it all comes down to a bigger hit on the pocketbook, according to Anchorage resident Janet Galbraith, who says she's changed the way she eats because of the increase in prices.

"Everything has gone up," Galbraith said Monday afternoon, standing with her cart at the Midtown Fred Meyer. She's buying more generic groceries now and tailors her cooking to what's on sale.

"I'm just more careful than I was before," she said.

RUSH ON RICE

The most dramatic example of costlier food, both locally and worldwide, might be the suddenly soaring price of rice, partly due to droughts and shortages in producing countries in Southeast Asia.

On the global commodities market, the price of rice has jumped 68 percent this year. And rice eaters in the U.S. -- including a significant population of Asian-Americans living in Alaska -- are stockpiling rice after hearing horror stories about shortages and soaring prices from relatives back home.

That trend accelerated last week when news spread that Sam's Club and Costco, which typically sell some of the lowest-priced groceries in town, had set new restrictions on how much rice its members can purchase.

Costco members can now buy no more than five bags of rice per day, which still allows someone to purchase as much as 250 pounds per trip -- if it's available.

By 10:15 a.m. Monday, all the rice at the DeBarr Costco, which had been restocked overnight from the Sunday shipment, was gone.

Manager Bob Ripley said some of the rice-buying spree should be a short-lived story, at least at Costco, since supplies from U.S. growers appear to be ample. He expects more rice to arrive with each new ship. The restrictions, he said, were aimed mostly at the owners of local restaurants that serve a lot of rice cuisine.

"I have some pretty big accounts that buy a lot of rice from us, and it wouldn't be fair for us to sell everything we own to them -- and then have that price not be a good value to all our members," Ripley said.

WHEAT AND FLOUR

But rising prices don't stop with rice.

"You talk to any retailer or wholesaler in town and they're going to tell you the same thing," Ripley said. "Prices are going up across the board -- with gas and everything else."

Wheat commodities are also on the rise worldwide.

Great Harvest Bread Co. owner Dirk Sisson, who buys flour by the ton, says his Benson Boulevard business has seen the price of white flour he purchases from a seller in Montana double in the past three months -- from $18 for a 50-pound bag in January to $36 today.

"The franchise has never seen anything like this," Sisson said. "The problem is just basic economics of supply and demand. ... There's a shortage of wheat right now."

As a result, he's raised the price of his breads about a quarter a loaf, Sisson said.

Part of that covers the higher shipping costs for the 6,000 pounds of flour he buys each week, he said.

"Whereas a year ago I was paying about 10 cents a pound for freight, now I'm paying 15 cents."

BUSH GROCERIES

The steep increase in shipping costs is, of course, expected to hit rural residents the hardest. It's already being felt in Bethel, according to grocery story owner Christy Inman.

"Every time I look at my billing, it seems like things keep going higher and higher," Inman said Monday. "This is just the tip of the iceberg. It's going to get way worse by the end of the summer."

She said she doesn't know how people from surrounding villages are going to be able to pay for the boat fuel to come to Bethel for groceries.

"But, fortunately, they can subsistence fish and hunt. They can go out and get birds and eggs, pick berries," Inman said. "They are at least going to be better off than the people in the cities who can only go to the store."

Cathy Squartsoff in Port Lions, on Kodiak Island, said she and her husband are taking the ferry up to Anchorage to load up on groceries for their lodge. The cost of putting three vehicles on a ferry and shopping at Sam's Club and Costco is cheaper than buying groceries in Kodiak, she said. "It is just more expensive," she said of the island prices.

Nome resident Sterling Buffas said the cost of milk has gone up from about $6 a gallon to $7 recently. "We've got two babies, a 2-year-old and a 3-year-old -- we still have to buy it," he said.

THE HUNGRY POOR

At Bean's Cafe near downtown Anchorage, executive director James Crockett has seen food costs for his nonprofit agency rise steadily since the start of the year.

"We've seen a 15 percent increase in roast beef, a 19 percent increase in tuna, a 23 percent increase in apples," Crockett said.

At the same time, he's watched low-income residents in the community -- people he calls the working poor -- increasingly take advantage of free meals at Bean's, especially during the second half of the month.

"These are people who basically pay their rent and put money in the gas tank, then they look in the refrigerator and it's empty," Crockett said. "They used to come (to Bean's) around the 21st of the month. Now we're seeing them toward the 10th and 12th."

Find George Bryson online at adn.com/contact/gbryson or call 257-4318. Reporter Megan Holland contributed to this article.

Trip to the store

Weekly shopping cart for a family of four in Anchorage:

2005 (Dec) $118.33

2006 (Dec) $119.32

2007 (Dec) $121.31

2008 (Mar) $132.88

UAF Cooperative Extension Service

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