The Great Toilet Paper Ripoff

Why does toilet paper need a commercial? Who isn’t buying this?

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Saturday I was out grocery shopping with my mother and she wanted to buy toilet paper. I buy my toilet paper at Costco (the home brand) but this isn’t good enough for Shirley who is a toilet paper connoisseur. It has to be Cashmere, Royale or Charmin – 2 ply of course (as is the Costco toilet paper that's not good enough to grace her bathroom). There were several different types of packages on sale – double rolls or triple rolls - and I was shocked to discover that not all toilet paper rolls are created equal.

Product packaging works like a charm to deceive because Shirley immediately thought that the triple roll package of Charmin was a better buy than the double roll package of Cashmere. She was going to buy it until I told her to check out the number of sheets per roll. Much to our surprise the double rolls of Cashmere had more sheets per roll than the triple rolls of Charmin. So the Charmin wasn’t a good buy at all. Shirley bought the Cashmere even though I still believe she should buy the Costco brand. After all, it’s all going down the toilet.

It seems that anything can be called a double roll or a triple roll. There are no standards that must be adhered to. This is just another case of deceptive product packaging designed to fool the consumer. Toilet paper manufacturers are all competing in the same marketplace and they’re always looking for a new hook. I guess softness is now passé and they’ve moved onto trying to show value with double and triple rolls. The bottom line is that the consumer has to really be diligent when it comes to product packaging. It’s designed to screw you, so beware!

Life is a lot like toilet paper. You’re either on a roll…or you’re taking shit from some asshole.

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Make someone smile today.

Geri