What The Chip?

Every time I sit down to eat lunch I usually purchase a personal sized package of chips to go along with a sandwich and often find myself asking the same question. I always

A half-full bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. Photo by Andrina Alvarez.

wonder why they never fill the chip bag all the way to the top. It used to make me think I was getting ripped off in serving size, but I soon got used to that factor and began wondering why they left all that empty space in the bag.

In the midst of environmental protection, it is not smart to produce all of this excess packaging. In a world that strives to conserve and recycle like the world we live in today, excess waste is not really ideal. It’s wasteful in two ways, financially and physically. Imagine all of the extra bags that could be produced and the money that could be saved if chip companies were to reduce the bag size but keep the serving size. Some branches like Sun Chips use recycled material to package their chips, which helps, but they still practice excessive packaging, which defeats the purpose of recycling in a sense.

A half-full bag of Sun Chips. Photo by Andrina Alvarez.

Remember when canned soda went mini, and cut the size of their cans in half? The same thing should happen to personal sized chip bags, but the serving size would remain constant. It’s killing two birds with one stone.

Excess bag size could be a marketing technique on the chip company’s behalf.. People eat with there eyes, meaning they eat what appears to be more tasty or satisfied. People can’t see through a chip bag and wouldn’t be able to visualize the amount of chips inside. But, if the package is severely larger than its content, people would never know. We don’t see a bag filled halfway with chips and the other half air pockets, we see the illusion.

The consumer may be turned off by the size of the bag because it doesn’t look as satisfying, but discovering that the smaller bag is filled to the top like it should be may very well reverse these concerns. People would go nuts if they opened a bag of chips and the chips actually flood out of the bag.

Please let the material cuts begin and let the crunchy goodness live on forever.

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