"Sell By" dates

Don't you think, sometimes, that they take this concept just a little too far??

I bought some salt recently, and it has a sell-by date on it. I mean, WTF????

It's a fucking MINERAL, and just about the most stable mineral known to mankind! It doesn't "go off". It's actually used as a preservative!!! And it'll be exactly the same in a million years' time as it is now .....

 

it will lose its pourability over time and turn into a big rock

 

I think that they may have a law or something about that.

 

So you hit it with something big and heavy and it breaks back down into a million pieces.

I mean ... for goodness sake ... how hard can it be??

 

if i wanted a chunk of salt ..id buy a chunk of salt ..for a lot cheaper

the sell by date ensures the buyer is getting what theyre paying for...usable table salt

 

They do add anti-caking agents I believe too.

But I think those dates are tpo cover companies asses b/c the world is going sue happy

 

Its has more to do with the production, than the life of the item..

For instance: A bag of chips, sell by date: is not really an expiration date. Its made to clear shelves of old stock for new stock. The chip maker can not stop making chips. Their production would have to cease, and the workers in the plant are more than the workers in the stores.. The chips production cost is 5cent, the sale of chips 1dollars.

Milk: because cows cant stop making milk, they make milk to expire. Not all milk expires. But the order of things, it has to..

ect..

 

Ridiculous sell-by dates bug me almost as much as the content warnings on some products....... Do we really need a label on a jar of peanut butter that says "WARNING: Contains PEANUTS"...... It's F&@%#ing peanut butter, it had better contain peanuts! Seriously! If they want to warn me about something useful, tell me about all the crap inside that's NOT peanuts..... [/rant]

 

Beachball I'm with you....really Old Salt? gimme a break...the reason thay do that is so some dope will throw out a half used carton of salt cause the dates expired and buy more. The company make more money, thats all. The damn stuff is millions of years old to start with. I've been to salt mines/evaporating ponds and picked up chunks of salt off the ground...makes things taste salty when you use it...always will.

 

LOL I'm with you on this one....... "Caution Coffee may be hot"

But we can thank those people who are stupid get hurt because they are stupid then cry foul sue get money saying they should have warned me the coffee was hot!

 

That lady would have sued if the coffee would have been cold too......

 

Keep in mind the sell by date isn't the same thing as the use by date... markets are required to change over their inventory on a somewhat regular basis... I would argue that those requirements probably are around for economic reasons to keep money flowing and I don't know how good a thing that is.

As for warning labels, the woman who burned herself on the coffee that was way too hot to drink really got hurt badly, she was 79 years old and burned 16% of her body including her genitals and was disabled for 2 years. McDonald's was selling the coffee at a much higher temperature than a home machine would make for somewhat questionable reasons. the woman got a $200,000 jury award which was reduced to $180,000, the woman had only sought $20,000 to pay her medical bills.

 

With bread, I guess the tag colors tell you what day it was packaged, so you'll know if its fresh or not...

Monday, the tag color is BLUE

Tuesday, the tag color is GREEN

Thursday, the tag color is RED

Friday, the tag color is WHITE

Saturday, the tag color is YELLOW

I am a stickler about stale bread...I can't stand bread that is even a little bit dry

 

Yeah. I've always wondered why sour cream has an expiration date.

 

no ones makes bread on wednesday?

 

I guess bread makers need a day off during the middle of the week

 

sell by dates have to do with legal liability. they are the last date on which the place it came from is liable if their product kills you. they don't mean it suddenly becomes poisonous on that day, or anything of the sort. food things do go bad though, eventually. and if kept under exactly the wrong conditions, sooner then later.

this is all basic stuff, that "common sense", if there was such a thing, ought to tell anyone.

 

We distribute Flour/maize/legumes and pasta and trust me those sell by dates are there for a reason, ever see "mouldy green pasta " it has a "nice minty smell " or smelled " 10 month old flour " and we get this stuff send back to us that has been sitting on stores shelves until they sell it or its expires..it aint pleasent + last week i opened up a canned of curried veg that found at the back of cupboard , it was 7 years old , i nearly hurled uke:

 

lacking this forum in common sense is

'says Yoda

 

I quote agree that there is a reason for a sell by date on all those products ... what I have difficulty with is the idea that that reason extends to salt :daisy:


(And Bbad - it was cooking salt, not table salt; and was the cheapest brand there is, because all salt is the same stuff... )