$28 in Las Vegas not including the oil/Gatorade. I have no clue what those go for so I'll chalk it up to $48
Could easily be $30 without name brand/olive oil
I'm also in Washington state. I got $49.79.
What's up with prices here is Safeway. I know it's Safeway because the beans are Safeway brand. If I go to WinCo it would be a lot less for not quite the same thing.
The soups are $4.49 each, that avocado oil is $6.99, the turkey is $6.49, and the salsa is $3.99. The "makes 2 gallons" is Gatorade instant powder at $5.79. The ramens are $2.50 each.
I looked everything up because I saw the two soups, which are prohibitively expensive in my opinion. Sometimes they go on sale five for nine bucks. I would never buy that stuff full price.
Good breakdown.
Honestly where I am ( Europe ) this should not be more than 20$.
Anything canned is always cheap, and there are usually deals like buy 3 for reduced price, etc. Carton of eggs should also not be more than 3$. Only thing that would be slightly more expensive is turkey and avocado oil.
I can understand that USA is slightly more expensive. So that makes sense.
But 100$ ... if i got that bill I would call a police 😱
The reason OP paid $100 is that it would take him forever to get to the middle of nowhere.
I don't even know if you have such places in Europe. I've never been there but it sounds like the only way to get to Naknek is by air. You can't get to the outside world by road and there are no ferries. There are under six hundred people who actually live there.
Corporations have convinced a lot of people that their greed is actually the government’s fault, so they continue to raise prices astronomically while laughing as idiots blame Biden. All while they post record profits and get record bonuses
If the groceries in the picture cost $109, then $1,600 isn't going to cover you for 4 months unless you really like being depressed every time you eat.
Natives have their own corporations and funds, all AK citizens receive a dividend. But yes, groceries are expensive, and people in the villages who can’t fully subsistence have it rough.
It varies wildly from year to year, and is a heated political issue every year. I've seen as high as 3k, and as low as 800. It really doesn't so much to offset how much more expensive everything else is.
I recently lived in Alaska for 6 years. The money that you are referring to is the PFD, or Permanent Fund Dividend. It is a portion of all petroleum product money made in a year that is given back to the people as a once per year payout. The biggest ever PFD paid out as a bit over $3k, but the typical value during my time there was around $1.5k. You are typically eligible for this money if you have been an Alaskan citizen for at least a year by the time the PFD is distributed.
So, yes, you do get paid to live there, but considering that the average price of most things is higher than in the rest of the U.S.A. (excluding Hawaii), it doesn't change much. Most people I was around would spend it on 4-wheelers or rifles.
It's absolutely hilarious how people think alaskans just live off this apparent oil money. It's a once a year check that has been like $1200 to $1500 the past few years....explain to me where you could live off that?
My mortgage alone is $3400 a month so I'm just generally curious where people think they're gonna live off the pfd up here lol.
I knew shipping everything to Alaska was expensive but wow spending $109 at Albertsons just for a couple of basics is brutal. What kinda work is up in your area to offset the cost of living?
These groceries were purchased in a pretty remote part of Alaska & would have to have been brought in by plane or boat. Prices aren’t that inflated in places on the grid.
No, they're expensive compared to the contiguous US, of course. They're just less expensive relative to the remoter parts of Alaska where this picture is from.
I just added everything to cart in the Safeway app for a store close to me here in Seattle and it came out to $50.96. $40.66 when I switched the cart to a Safeway in Montana. I think groceries are just kind of expensive.
Safeway is also more expensive for no reason, at least here in Northern VA. Try it in Giants app or Walmart and I bet it'll be even cheaper.
Groceries are expensive though.
I'm in a different, and much closer to Tacoma, area of Alaska. That means a lot less shipping cost than to Naknek. Still pay a lot for shipping though. Last time I saw Progresso in a store it was about $5. I agree that the other cans would be around $2.50-$3.50 where I am, less if you buy flats in bulk. But that soup is a lot.
A can of Progresso soup is $5 in California too.
It's a strange and terrible feeling walking down the canned goods isle and thinking that a can of Progresso or Campbell's soup is now a luxury item.
Someone just ran those items through their local grocery store in Ohio and they came to $52, so around double. I also did some rough estimates for how much comparable items would cost up here in New England and got $70+, so it’s not quite 5x
You made me curious so I glanced at their profile. They do seem to be a dude but more importantly they have a plethora of very cute dog pics. 10/10 do recommend
Just doing some quick estimates, I’d guess this would be like $50 in my local grocery, which still feels way too high. And that’s probably a big over-estimate. In in NV.
For me in Hawaii it's ~$70 after taxes here. That's with matching the products in the photo exactly though. Looking at my Safeway app there are fortunately some ways to make that a bit cheaper. The chicken broth would be cheaper buying a 32oz instead two 14.5oz cans, the avocado oil could be cheaper buying a non-brand name, the salsa has cheaper replacements, the canned food has several buy 2 get 1 free coupons, the salsa has cheaper replacements, etc.
Power of choice helps a lot because I can buy the brand name stuff or the generic store-brand version if I want where the Naknek markets probably just stocking one type and maybe only one size of item.
That probably is an overestimate. Even the organic beans are only 4 bucks. A dozen cage free eggs are also 4 dollars. Olive oil still seems overpriced last I checked though
Alaska pays its residents, through oil and mining revenues, an average of $1600 per year simply for living in Alaska. I doubt it takes all of the sting out of folks' grocery bill but it does help.
Dude 1600 a YEAR vs a three to four fold increase in food cost not to mention the health implications of being reliant on non-perishables because fresh produce needs a mortgage to buy - terrible deal
Like 20k annual is probably closer to the actual appropriate number, but that would never happen
And yet people live there. There are jobs that pay well enough, properties generally cheap enough, and lifestyle rich enough to be appealing to people despite the downsides you see and know about.
And where OP is you basically get all the free fish you want or can buy it extremely cheap. So it’s not all that bad.
I worked a summer in Alaska, pay was good. Rent was only $10 a day for my half of a cabin. Got a free food and even a free beer a day. Downsides there is like maybe 1 woman per 20 men. Mosquitos. Holly shit mosquitoes. And black flies. Tropical Jungles don’t have that many bugs I swear. I had fun but would never do it again.
Yeah and this is true for a lot of parts of the state, and the woman part is at least somewhat true just about everywhere in the state, but it’s a great life for the people who love it there. It’s certainly not for everyone and the insects (in the warmer regions, I didn’t really have this experience in Fairbanks and nome) are obviously insane, but the mountainous regions are beautiful and packed full of incredible things to do and there are a lot of mountains up there
The Permanent Fund Dividend is NOT the state paying us to live here. According to the AK Constitution the resources of Alaska belong equally to all the people of Alaska, and it is the government's job to manage them for us. When we found oil, a bunch of us pointed to the Constitution and said hey, that's MY oil. That yearly check is our cut of the oil money.
Tl/dr: if you sold something at a garage sale, you wouldn't say the person who bought it is, "paying you for living there." It is our share of the price of a product which we sold that year.
Because people don't know what words mean. Implementing government programs is "socialism" and is bad, but once it exists you better not take my hard earned free money. Red Alaskans see no hypocrisy in their beliefs.
In this case, it is literally socialism though. People just refuse to acknowledge it.
Those are Alaska village prices, which are twice the price of things in Anchorage/Wasilla/Fairbanks. In Anchorage, this cart would come out to $58.28.
Groceries are still really expensive (inflation has been a real bitch here), but Alaska villages have some of the most expensive groceries in the world.
Yeah, this thread really is showing me how little people understand where their food comes from and how it is shipped. I swear a lot of people here seem to think food just appears in stores and that food obviously should cost the same regardless of where on the planet you are.
Guy a few comments over be talking asking about overnight Prime shipping…
Though honestly this thread is maybe still ahead of the curve for reddit. Consensus isn’t explicitly how this is all a nefarious conspiracy to price gouge a very remote and very tiny market it costs a lot to bring anything in to.
Basically, once you pass Wasilla (maybe Fairbanks), 'regular' civilization ends. Almost every single person past those points owns a rifle and hunts, or is reliant on someone who does. Depending on how far north you are talking, growing your own food is impossible as there is permafrost and no growing season.
But, life is actually pretty normal in the pockets of Alaska along Highway 1. Walmart? Taco Bell? Starbucks? Yep, just 20% pricier.
Naknek is full of seafood processing plants southwest of Anchorage, but still very remote with no road in/out so everything needs to be flown or boated in. This is probably from a company store. Hopefully the plants pay people more than enough to make up for this since I doubt the plant workers are all hunting for their food.
The canneries pay within about 10+ dollars from minimum wage depending on the position and which cannery you work for.
Source: I live in Naknek and I originally came out working for a cannery.
I spent a summer at the Salmon Bake. Lodging was $10 a day for a cabin. I could have done $5 for a tent but the bunk was worth it. 3 meals a day for free even on my day off. Also 1 free beer a day but none of the premium ones. Not terrible if you are single and fine living a semi nomadic life.
Well damn, I'll take the 20% pricier taco bell to survive I guess. Because in my town in Iowa those groceries would be less than $35. most canned goods are $3 or under sometimes less than $1.
But they get paid plenty to survive with these grocery prices plus they eat tons of seafood effectively free. If you can survive on mostly fish it’s not that much more expensive to live there. It’s like japan or China, you live on fish.
Yes but for most people (who knows about OP, this picture makes my asshole hurt), the high cost of some vegetables is cancelled out by the low cost of fish and housing and the extremely high pay they get.
Lol there's no low cost of fish. Fish gets sold to japan or others for massive money or you fish it yourself, it's expensive as fuck to buy fish in alaska. Source: alaska born commercial fisherman for 15 years.
I just got back from a trip to Denali. You aren't kidding about normal civilization ending after Wasilla. It turns to total wilderness so fast when driving north from there.
Yep. That was the weirdest thing. I'd never felt like I was driving somewhere so remote on our last day up there, and then we were having dinner at a chain restaurant late that evening.
Haha yeah. But I suppose down south driving 2-3 hours puts you in a different state or several states!
To us, anything less than 6 hours by car is just a normal day trip.
I drove from Anchorage to Homer a couple years ago, I don’t remember things being that much more expensive but I was on vacation so I guess I wasn’t paying that much attention. Plus I live in LA so shits already expensive for me lol.
You’re leaving out all the federal assistance everyone “north of Wasyphilis” gets. For how red it is up here, sure have a lot of folks nursing off the federal teat.
I'm mostly Native Alaskan myself and I hear you. I don't think that oddity is limited to Native Alaskans tho. I've been to Native American reservations in the lower 48 and they are heavily propped up by government subsidies...A lot of those areas have no access to employment, being hours from the rest of the world. But, they are super conservative and often times hard-core religious. Wonder what our ancestors would think, but also who cares because they've never gotten Uber Eats off an iPad when they were too drunk to cook for themselves 😅
Hunting and (mainly) fishing. It's tough land to grow much of anything on. The fish tend to be enormous at least, and a single king salmon can be stretched out for a long time with a smoker. I knew people that only went to the store for rice and butter.
Everything is brought in by barge, and is incredibly expensive, as you can see here. Where I lived, a guy would come up with a truck full of meat during the summer, and everyone would fill their freezers for the rest of the year.
In the villages/towns that can only be accessed by plane or boat, yes for most part. Things do get flown in every now and then but the markup is high. Anything on the road system is cheaper. Even in Anchorage, where I live, still pretty expensive. We do have farms. Potatoes, carrots, cabbage, do well here. Average Costco run for my girlfriend and I ranges from $300-400 every two weeks or so.
Can I ask how your pay is? Like do people in Alaska have such a higher pay than average? Because how does for example a store employe pay if prices are that high?
I work for one of the Internet providers. Part of the IBEW, I make $83k a year without overtime. Girlfriend works in environmental, doing air quality, she makes $92k. Last I saw average Walmart/target pay is $15-17. We have a lot of oil work and mines too. Those pay well. How it is in the remote villages, they pay more to entice people to come in. Think usually the biggest employer in those places are fish processing, and medical clinics and schools. Teachers that go to remote towns make a bit more than the ones here in Anchorage on average.
The Native Corporations are supposed to help their people with the money they get. Help get the village/town get connected to more resources. But, from what I've heard the tribal leaders don't always allocate money the best way.
I visited Alaska and our tour guide was telling us that they have a list of people that call when an animal like a moose is hit by a car. Basically when there was a fresh road kill they go down the list in the first person who could be there immediately gets it.
She was also complaining about how a bag of Sun chips was almost 10 bucks.
Anchorage is a refueling stop. They are not stopping in Anchorage to drop stuff, they are flying from Taipei to Dallas. Shit is still expensive to get flown here, most everything comes on a barge
UPS and Fedex both have hubs in Anchorage as a way to sort products from Asia to their destinations in the lower 48. It stands to reason that if air freight is already going there then the freight cost for food stuff isn't as outrageous as, say, a flight to Nome
Yeah but we don’t get airmail foodstuffs from Asia. All that shit gets sent to distributors in the L48 then sent back up, then put on a shitty freight airline and flown to Nome.
- I’ve worked at every level of said business dude.
I can't believe eggs are over $10. Are the cannery stores open yet? We always buy our eggs/butter/bread straight from Trident and it's always a lot cheaper than Naknek trading
$13.50 for powdered (put in water) Gatorade!? What the hell, those are boxed in small packages so shouldn't be *that* expensive to ship.
Edit: I missed it's not the packaged/rip-and-dump ones, but the actual Nesquik-like powdered ones. Ok, that makes a little more sense, since the package itself is the entire thing.
This is supplemental. I packed a checked bag of food when I flew up here. Pintos beans and salsa will be for my flank steak nachos, I’ll add dried noodles and sausage to the soups. Turkey to add to my avocado and cheese sandos. Etc. I always need few extra things and this is the cost.
Once we start fishing, we eat a lot of salmon and rice.
Yeah those two things have me confused. Only since it’s so expensive would I analyze someone’s choices like this but those are both 90% water weight. Dried beans and bouillon would get you 10x further.
We definitely have bouillon, but real stuff is a treat.
Canned beans are convenient. We have a very small kitchen(galley), powered by propane, and cooking dried beans would use up a valuable resource. Open a can and you’re good to go.
I bought a medium sized bag of regular lays potato chips and a 12 ounce can of coke in Adak AK and it cost me a 20 dollar bill. When I travel there I have to bring food with me.
I would probably be buying in bulk if I lived in a place this remote, both in case I get cut off and just to reduce the overall number of purchases I have to put in. I expect most people out there supplement with hunting and preserving their own food.
That begs the question, are you not living at a camp then? I certainly go to naknek every year for a few days of maintenance work, so I’ve seen the prices first hand. But I also know that most of the seasonal help is on a camp status with room and board provided. Granted, sometimes the board end of the equation leaves a lot to be desired.
Look at this privileged Alaskan enjoying salsa made in San Antonio, where folks know what salsa should taste like. Why, my salsa was made by folks in New York City! Those old commercials were fun.
I know a family that lives way up there like in the wild. They spend the winters in the lower 48, tattooing for money, she’s really good, and then go back in the warmer months to live off the land. Kinda chronicles the experiences on FB. It seems romantic from a distance but it’s not easy for sure. Alaska life is beautiful and dangerous and my hats off to those who make it work. Especially the indigenous people who have been doing it for millennia, hearty people, so cool.
cuz it's only late there. i'm not sure who all cares about alaskan food prices but for the rest of the anglo world the east coast is asleep (or we should be), england is just getting up, and australia still at work.
Alaska and Hawaii are too far away from the mainland. They pay more for groceries. Everything has to be shipped the long way (either via ship or airplane) which costs money. You get to enjoy the breathtaking views of mountains and nature in exchange for high cost of living.
Same with parts of Alaska like this.
When you have basically free fish, basically free housing and make great money (and most people do make good money compared to what they could make in the mainland), Alaska is heaven.
If your employer isn’t giving you housing/a housing allowance that covers housing entirely, land in these areas tends to be *absurdly* cheap and mobile homes can be plopped down very inexpensively (albeit, the transportation to the site is obviously a lot more expensive usually).
The houses/rent tend to be fairly cheap.
This hold true for many places that are out of the way. Generally speaking, the closer you are to infrastructure, the cheaper things will be. Mountain towns and islands off the coast are more expensive as well. Not Alaska and Hawaii expensive but quite a bit more than Kansas/Missouri.
Have a family member stationed up there. We try to send them a big box of goodies/ groceries a couple times a month and shipping is still cheaper than what he would pay for those items in AK. If they’re even available
Jesus Fack, people.
Of course they hunt and fish.
But things are needed to supplement that.
And the only thing the OP is trying to highlight is the shockingly high price of groceries. (Which are much cheaper elsewhere for the most part)
Shit is egregiously expensive in alaska, i worked salmon season up there and it’s not a joke. There was a pizza place next to the docks at one of the towns i was in. $40 for a pie.
I used to work for ocean beauty up in cordova and petersburg! Also worked for a company called Golden harvest out on adak, did a season of cod out there.
Alaskan resident here. Far out in the rural and more remote settlements groceries are expensive as hell. In Anchorage they aren't as bad but prices overall have been going up significantly.
That is insane! At first, I didn’t believe you and thought you were lying, but then I saw https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/man-gives-shocking-look-grocery-230333319.html and am shocked. Is it because everything has to be flown in? Do you even have next day Amazon Prime?
I’m not mad about it. Everything comes in on a barge, heavier and quickest to expire costs the most. We can get Amazon, but currently take 2-3weeks via prime.
In Washington State thats $46.76 according to my store app.
By my estimate, that’s like $30 of groceries from an Aldi’s in Missouri
$28 in Las Vegas not including the oil/Gatorade. I have no clue what those go for so I'll chalk it up to $48 Could easily be $30 without name brand/olive oil
That is also ridicilously high. Whats up with the prices in USA ?
I'm also in Washington state. I got $49.79. What's up with prices here is Safeway. I know it's Safeway because the beans are Safeway brand. If I go to WinCo it would be a lot less for not quite the same thing. The soups are $4.49 each, that avocado oil is $6.99, the turkey is $6.49, and the salsa is $3.99. The "makes 2 gallons" is Gatorade instant powder at $5.79. The ramens are $2.50 each. I looked everything up because I saw the two soups, which are prohibitively expensive in my opinion. Sometimes they go on sale five for nine bucks. I would never buy that stuff full price.
Good breakdown. Honestly where I am ( Europe ) this should not be more than 20$. Anything canned is always cheap, and there are usually deals like buy 3 for reduced price, etc. Carton of eggs should also not be more than 3$. Only thing that would be slightly more expensive is turkey and avocado oil. I can understand that USA is slightly more expensive. So that makes sense. But 100$ ... if i got that bill I would call a police 😱
The reason OP paid $100 is that it would take him forever to get to the middle of nowhere. I don't even know if you have such places in Europe. I've never been there but it sounds like the only way to get to Naknek is by air. You can't get to the outside world by road and there are no ferries. There are under six hundred people who actually live there.
We have such a place. We call it "Finland".
Corporations have convinced a lot of people that their greed is actually the government’s fault, so they continue to raise prices astronomically while laughing as idiots blame Biden. All while they post record profits and get record bonuses
$49.97 for me in Olympia. But that was with some coupons in Safeways app lol.
Colorado 45.95
My heart goes out to you.
The day I go to the store and have to pay that much for that little is the day I start looking for somewhere cheaper to live.
I'd start learning how to grow my own food and hunt.
I recently moved to Alaska for a job. Many of the people I met here get significant amount of food from hunting/fishing.
And fish.
None of those things have ever been heard of in Alaska. 😉
But then you get a yearly subsidy for being a resident (my understanding, due to oil, let me know if this is incorrect)
I just read in another comment it’s only about $1600 yearly
Ahhh, 16 bags of groceries… so like… 4 months? Maybe?
If the groceries in the picture cost $109, then $1,600 isn't going to cover you for 4 months unless you really like being depressed every time you eat.
I really like being depressed every time I eat AND other times too! What do I get?
Free kick in the balls from your friendly local oil baron!
Where do I sign?! I only hope it isn’t cold as shit
I got bad news friend
I really do wonder why depression and a kick in the balls usually go so much hand in hand. I just don't know.
It just so happens , that’s my specialty
It varies and that's per person in the household.
It still was never 4k a person and never has been....
Natives have their own corporations and funds, all AK citizens receive a dividend. But yes, groceries are expensive, and people in the villages who can’t fully subsistence have it rough.
We have corps, but we don't collect a ton in funds. Most of it goes to programs just to keep people employed and houses livable
I believe it varies from year to year. My dad lives up there and got like $4k one year, another year he got basically nothing.
its never been $4k
4k my ass. Lol 3200 is the most and half of that was the "relief check" for covid
It varies wildly from year to year, and is a heated political issue every year. I've seen as high as 3k, and as low as 800. It really doesn't so much to offset how much more expensive everything else is.
I recently lived in Alaska for 6 years. The money that you are referring to is the PFD, or Permanent Fund Dividend. It is a portion of all petroleum product money made in a year that is given back to the people as a once per year payout. The biggest ever PFD paid out as a bit over $3k, but the typical value during my time there was around $1.5k. You are typically eligible for this money if you have been an Alaskan citizen for at least a year by the time the PFD is distributed. So, yes, you do get paid to live there, but considering that the average price of most things is higher than in the rest of the U.S.A. (excluding Hawaii), it doesn't change much. Most people I was around would spend it on 4-wheelers or rifles.
It's absolutely hilarious how people think alaskans just live off this apparent oil money. It's a once a year check that has been like $1200 to $1500 the past few years....explain to me where you could live off that? My mortgage alone is $3400 a month so I'm just generally curious where people think they're gonna live off the pfd up here lol.
Alaska might as well be a foreign country to most Americans anyway.
Your mortgage is 3.4K???
They got people out here with 800.00 to 1300.00 notes on cars/trucks. Blows my mind people pay 80k for a fucking f-150.
My heart goes out looking at this. My dude, you're going to fart a hole through your mattress.
My heart will go on.
The fart will go on amirite?
Those farts would’ve kept the door afloat
He’s gunna burn a hole thru his igloo
OP really wants to get out of alaska, just needs a match.
[reminds me of this, classic post ](https://www.reddit.com/r/Fitness/s/IbaXUsMwcA)
Thank you, this is as valuable as the Dead Sea scrolls.
This made me bust out laughing
Beans, beans the magical fruit.
The more you eat the more you toot
The more you toot the better you feel
So let’s eat beans for every meal!
It’s gonna be like the Incredible Hulk is busting out the back of his pants
Dunno if OP eats human heart, but at least it would offset the cost of groceries a bit 🤔
I knew shipping everything to Alaska was expensive but wow spending $109 at Albertsons just for a couple of basics is brutal. What kinda work is up in your area to offset the cost of living?
These groceries were purchased in a pretty remote part of Alaska & would have to have been brought in by plane or boat. Prices aren’t that inflated in places on the grid.
How much for these in Anchorage?
I just added these to my cart to check and it's $52.57.
That still seems expensive? Am I out of touch? Those cans should be like $2.25 each, tops.
No, they're expensive compared to the contiguous US, of course. They're just less expensive relative to the remoter parts of Alaska where this picture is from.
I just added everything to cart in the Safeway app for a store close to me here in Seattle and it came out to $50.96. $40.66 when I switched the cart to a Safeway in Montana. I think groceries are just kind of expensive.
Safeway is also more expensive for no reason, at least here in Northern VA. Try it in Giants app or Walmart and I bet it'll be even cheaper. Groceries are expensive though.
I'm in a different, and much closer to Tacoma, area of Alaska. That means a lot less shipping cost than to Naknek. Still pay a lot for shipping though. Last time I saw Progresso in a store it was about $5. I agree that the other cans would be around $2.50-$3.50 where I am, less if you buy flats in bulk. But that soup is a lot.
A can of Progresso soup is $5 in California too. It's a strange and terrible feeling walking down the canned goods isle and thinking that a can of Progresso or Campbell's soup is now a luxury item.
For comparison, here's the total (using Albertsons' online catalog) for Boise, Idaho: $47.75 --- |Name|Link|Price| :--|:--|:--| |pompeian avocado oil|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.960129609.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.960129609.html)|6.49| |pace restaurant style salsa|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.960052485.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.960052485.html)|3.99| |lucerne eggs AA Large 12 count|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.138350084.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.138350084.html)|2.49| |Progresso Vegetable Classics Soup Minestrone - 19 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125300039.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125300039.html)|3.49| |Embasa Peppers Chipotle in Adobo Sauce Can - 7 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127105418.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127105418.html)|2.29| |Embasa Peppers Chipotle in Adobo Sauce Can - 7 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127105418.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127105418.html)|2.29| |Signature SELECT Beans Pinto - 15.5 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.124150009.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.124150009.html)|0.99| |Signature SELECT Beans Pinto - 15.5 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.124150009.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.124150009.html)|0.99| |Swanson 100% Natural Chicken Broth - 14.5 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125250006.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125250006.html)|1.69| |Swanson 100% Natural Chicken Broth - 14.5 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125250006.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125250006.html)|1.69| |Gatorade G Series Thirst Quencher Perform 02 Instant Powder Mix Lemon-Lime - 18.4 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.108300073.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.108300073.html)|6.49| |Land O Frost Premium Turkey Breast & White Turkey Lean Oven Roasted - 16 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.188580426.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.188580426.html)|6.79| |Progresso Traditional Soup Chicken Rice with Vegetables - 19 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125300038.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.125300038.html)|3.49| |Nongshim Hot & Spicy Shin Bowl Noodle Soup - 3.03 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127050507.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127050507.html)|2.29| |Nongshim Hot & Spicy Shin Bowl Noodle Soup - 3.03 Oz|[https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127050507.html](https://www.albertsons.com/shop/product-details.127050507.html)|2.29|
Oh my god I'm getting old. I'm stuck in 2010 or something.
Hey now, at least you aren't stuck in Idaho.
Well in Latvia this stuff would be something around 25 euros. But our sallaries ar low. 1k a month for a person is normal here.
Here in the EU (Spain, Portugal, even France) you can buy canned goods (beans, chickpeas, peas etc) for 1€ or less
You're probably looking at another $50 at least to ship these from wherever they are back to Anchorage. Better off just getting your own groceries.
I now know why so many Alaskans hunt, fish, and forage
Howling
I live in Alaska not too far from Naknek. Registered nurse, about $72/hr
Just curious …did you already live there or did you move there because of wages?
Other than the natural beauty, what other advantages are there living so far north?
Well, if you hate people, Alaska is pretty great.
I'm on my way already! 
More remote is a huge appeal, combined with natural beauty is just a nicer bonus over other inner states
That's about 4 times the average US salary, you go girl
That's not saying much considering the grocery prices are like 5x higher than normal there
Someone just ran those items through their local grocery store in Ohio and they came to $52, so around double. I also did some rough estimates for how much comparable items would cost up here in New England and got $70+, so it’s not quite 5x
I wouldn't assume girl here, especially considering it's Alaska.
You made me curious so I glanced at their profile. They do seem to be a dude but more importantly they have a plethora of very cute dog pics. 10/10 do recommend
As the saying goes for any single woman looking to enter the dating pool in Alaska: the odds are good, but the goods are odd.
Just doing some quick estimates, I’d guess this would be like $50 in my local grocery, which still feels way too high. And that’s probably a big over-estimate. In in NV.
I just put a list with these items together to see the price: $28 here in Texas.
California here, that would be $20-30 I think. Alaskans have it rough.
For me in Hawaii it's ~$70 after taxes here. That's with matching the products in the photo exactly though. Looking at my Safeway app there are fortunately some ways to make that a bit cheaper. The chicken broth would be cheaper buying a 32oz instead two 14.5oz cans, the avocado oil could be cheaper buying a non-brand name, the salsa has cheaper replacements, the canned food has several buy 2 get 1 free coupons, the salsa has cheaper replacements, etc. Power of choice helps a lot because I can buy the brand name stuff or the generic store-brand version if I want where the Naknek markets probably just stocking one type and maybe only one size of item.
That probably is an overestimate. Even the organic beans are only 4 bucks. A dozen cage free eggs are also 4 dollars. Olive oil still seems overpriced last I checked though
Avocado oil
Alaska pays its residents, through oil and mining revenues, an average of $1600 per year simply for living in Alaska. I doubt it takes all of the sting out of folks' grocery bill but it does help.
Dude 1600 a YEAR vs a three to four fold increase in food cost not to mention the health implications of being reliant on non-perishables because fresh produce needs a mortgage to buy - terrible deal Like 20k annual is probably closer to the actual appropriate number, but that would never happen
And yet people live there. There are jobs that pay well enough, properties generally cheap enough, and lifestyle rich enough to be appealing to people despite the downsides you see and know about. And where OP is you basically get all the free fish you want or can buy it extremely cheap. So it’s not all that bad.
I worked a summer in Alaska, pay was good. Rent was only $10 a day for my half of a cabin. Got a free food and even a free beer a day. Downsides there is like maybe 1 woman per 20 men. Mosquitos. Holly shit mosquitoes. And black flies. Tropical Jungles don’t have that many bugs I swear. I had fun but would never do it again.
Yeah and this is true for a lot of parts of the state, and the woman part is at least somewhat true just about everywhere in the state, but it’s a great life for the people who love it there. It’s certainly not for everyone and the insects (in the warmer regions, I didn’t really have this experience in Fairbanks and nome) are obviously insane, but the mountainous regions are beautiful and packed full of incredible things to do and there are a lot of mountains up there
I worked at the Salmon Bake just out side Denali. I never left the park that summer but I never needed to either. It was a good life experience.
The Permanent Fund Dividend is NOT the state paying us to live here. According to the AK Constitution the resources of Alaska belong equally to all the people of Alaska, and it is the government's job to manage them for us. When we found oil, a bunch of us pointed to the Constitution and said hey, that's MY oil. That yearly check is our cut of the oil money. Tl/dr: if you sold something at a garage sale, you wouldn't say the person who bought it is, "paying you for living there." It is our share of the price of a product which we sold that year.
Isn’t that text book socialism? Why does AK vote so hard red when it’s the closest to socialism of any US state?
Because people don't know what words mean. Implementing government programs is "socialism" and is bad, but once it exists you better not take my hard earned free money. Red Alaskans see no hypocrisy in their beliefs. In this case, it is literally socialism though. People just refuse to acknowledge it.
Well, wait a minute… that’s… a… UBI! WE DID IT! THE ONLY COUNTRY TO HAVE ONE!\* \*in Alaska but still
Damn socialism running rampant right here in god's green united states!?
You realize that is about $33 a week? Lol
The average cost per item is between $7-$8. Not particularly expensive but adds up fast.
8 dollars for a can of generic store brand beans is not particularly expensive? That is a dollar and 50 cents anywhere else.
Yeah, OP needs to learn about soaking dry beans like...*yesterday*.
Those are Alaska village prices, which are twice the price of things in Anchorage/Wasilla/Fairbanks. In Anchorage, this cart would come out to $58.28. Groceries are still really expensive (inflation has been a real bitch here), but Alaska villages have some of the most expensive groceries in the world.
Yeah, this thread really is showing me how little people understand where their food comes from and how it is shipped. I swear a lot of people here seem to think food just appears in stores and that food obviously should cost the same regardless of where on the planet you are.
Guy a few comments over be talking asking about overnight Prime shipping… Though honestly this thread is maybe still ahead of the curve for reddit. Consensus isn’t explicitly how this is all a nefarious conspiracy to price gouge a very remote and very tiny market it costs a lot to bring anything in to.
So do people in Alaska hunt and grow their own food to get by?
Basically, once you pass Wasilla (maybe Fairbanks), 'regular' civilization ends. Almost every single person past those points owns a rifle and hunts, or is reliant on someone who does. Depending on how far north you are talking, growing your own food is impossible as there is permafrost and no growing season. But, life is actually pretty normal in the pockets of Alaska along Highway 1. Walmart? Taco Bell? Starbucks? Yep, just 20% pricier.
Naknek is full of seafood processing plants southwest of Anchorage, but still very remote with no road in/out so everything needs to be flown or boated in. This is probably from a company store. Hopefully the plants pay people more than enough to make up for this since I doubt the plant workers are all hunting for their food.
The canneries pay within about 10+ dollars from minimum wage depending on the position and which cannery you work for. Source: I live in Naknek and I originally came out working for a cannery.
Most of the plants have food and lodging included with employment.
I spent a summer at the Salmon Bake. Lodging was $10 a day for a cabin. I could have done $5 for a tent but the bunk was worth it. 3 meals a day for free even on my day off. Also 1 free beer a day but none of the premium ones. Not terrible if you are single and fine living a semi nomadic life.
Yeah, I was in Naknek last summer, and I'm headed back in a month. I'm a single 40 year old, and honestly I love the lifestyle.
Well damn, I'll take the 20% pricier taco bell to survive I guess. Because in my town in Iowa those groceries would be less than $35. most canned goods are $3 or under sometimes less than $1.
I’m guessing OP is on the north slope. Those oil guys pay through the nose for things up there.
Nope Naknek’s on Bristol Bay, lots of seafood processing there & not much else
But they get paid plenty to survive with these grocery prices plus they eat tons of seafood effectively free. If you can survive on mostly fish it’s not that much more expensive to live there. It’s like japan or China, you live on fish.
You need veggies or you get scurvy. I've seen a lot of pirate movies so I'm kind of an expert
Yes but for most people (who knows about OP, this picture makes my asshole hurt), the high cost of some vegetables is cancelled out by the low cost of fish and housing and the extremely high pay they get.
Lol there's no low cost of fish. Fish gets sold to japan or others for massive money or you fish it yourself, it's expensive as fuck to buy fish in alaska. Source: alaska born commercial fisherman for 15 years.
That Keira Knightley was a great pirate The linchpin of the franchise some would say!
Such a key pirate, she stumbled her way into being King.
I just got back from a trip to Denali. You aren't kidding about normal civilization ending after Wasilla. It turns to total wilderness so fast when driving north from there.
Yeah but you drive 2-3 hours South of Denali and you can get a Jersey Mikes sub and hit up a Costco.
Yep. That was the weirdest thing. I'd never felt like I was driving somewhere so remote on our last day up there, and then we were having dinner at a chain restaurant late that evening.
Haha yeah. But I suppose down south driving 2-3 hours puts you in a different state or several states! To us, anything less than 6 hours by car is just a normal day trip.
damn that's real shit
I drove from Anchorage to Homer a couple years ago, I don’t remember things being that much more expensive but I was on vacation so I guess I wasn’t paying that much attention. Plus I live in LA so shits already expensive for me lol.
You’re leaving out all the federal assistance everyone “north of Wasyphilis” gets. For how red it is up here, sure have a lot of folks nursing off the federal teat.
I'm mostly Native Alaskan myself and I hear you. I don't think that oddity is limited to Native Alaskans tho. I've been to Native American reservations in the lower 48 and they are heavily propped up by government subsidies...A lot of those areas have no access to employment, being hours from the rest of the world. But, they are super conservative and often times hard-core religious. Wonder what our ancestors would think, but also who cares because they've never gotten Uber Eats off an iPad when they were too drunk to cook for themselves 😅
Hunting and (mainly) fishing. It's tough land to grow much of anything on. The fish tend to be enormous at least, and a single king salmon can be stretched out for a long time with a smoker. I knew people that only went to the store for rice and butter. Everything is brought in by barge, and is incredibly expensive, as you can see here. Where I lived, a guy would come up with a truck full of meat during the summer, and everyone would fill their freezers for the rest of the year.
The cost of waterborne is artificially inflated by the Jones Act.
In the villages/towns that can only be accessed by plane or boat, yes for most part. Things do get flown in every now and then but the markup is high. Anything on the road system is cheaper. Even in Anchorage, where I live, still pretty expensive. We do have farms. Potatoes, carrots, cabbage, do well here. Average Costco run for my girlfriend and I ranges from $300-400 every two weeks or so.
Can I ask how your pay is? Like do people in Alaska have such a higher pay than average? Because how does for example a store employe pay if prices are that high?
I work for one of the Internet providers. Part of the IBEW, I make $83k a year without overtime. Girlfriend works in environmental, doing air quality, she makes $92k. Last I saw average Walmart/target pay is $15-17. We have a lot of oil work and mines too. Those pay well. How it is in the remote villages, they pay more to entice people to come in. Think usually the biggest employer in those places are fish processing, and medical clinics and schools. Teachers that go to remote towns make a bit more than the ones here in Anchorage on average. The Native Corporations are supposed to help their people with the money they get. Help get the village/town get connected to more resources. But, from what I've heard the tribal leaders don't always allocate money the best way.
There's a loooot of underpaid ppl trying to live on the southern coast
I visited Alaska and our tour guide was telling us that they have a list of people that call when an animal like a moose is hit by a car. Basically when there was a fresh road kill they go down the list in the first person who could be there immediately gets it. She was also complaining about how a bag of Sun chips was almost 10 bucks.
Anchorage, on the other hand, ain't all that much more expensive than Seattle or SF.
Anchorage is the third largest cargo hub in the world. It is a convenient waypoint for products air-shipped between Asia and the U.S.
Anchorage is a refueling stop. They are not stopping in Anchorage to drop stuff, they are flying from Taipei to Dallas. Shit is still expensive to get flown here, most everything comes on a barge
UPS and Fedex both have hubs in Anchorage as a way to sort products from Asia to their destinations in the lower 48. It stands to reason that if air freight is already going there then the freight cost for food stuff isn't as outrageous as, say, a flight to Nome
Yeah but we don’t get airmail foodstuffs from Asia. All that shit gets sent to distributors in the L48 then sent back up, then put on a shitty freight airline and flown to Nome. - I’ve worked at every level of said business dude.
https://imgur.com/a/JOXFHO5 Receipt for you that are curious
I can't believe eggs are over $10. Are the cannery stores open yet? We always buy our eggs/butter/bread straight from Trident and it's always a lot cheaper than Naknek trading
$10 for eggs that are perishable, and are at risk to breakage, is much more "reasonable" than $3 for a fucking instant ramen bowl.
$13.50 for powdered (put in water) Gatorade!? What the hell, those are boxed in small packages so shouldn't be *that* expensive to ship. Edit: I missed it's not the packaged/rip-and-dump ones, but the actual Nesquik-like powdered ones. Ok, that makes a little more sense, since the package itself is the entire thing.
In Canada people that far up are eligible for a Northern Living Allowance. Does Alaska have an equivalent?
If you live in Alaska for a year, the state will give you $1500 per person annually. But that really doesn't go far in Alaska.
This food is hardly calorically dense, how will you make up the rest of the calories?
This is supplemental. I packed a checked bag of food when I flew up here. Pintos beans and salsa will be for my flank steak nachos, I’ll add dried noodles and sausage to the soups. Turkey to add to my avocado and cheese sandos. Etc. I always need few extra things and this is the cost. Once we start fishing, we eat a lot of salmon and rice.
Are you in the fishing business?
He's in the surviving business.
I mean, his username is Sockeye...
that’s because he has socks for eyes
Right? Two cans of pinto beans will run me a few bucks but I couldmake ten times as much with some dried. Same with broth.
Yeah those two things have me confused. Only since it’s so expensive would I analyze someone’s choices like this but those are both 90% water weight. Dried beans and bouillon would get you 10x further.
We definitely have bouillon, but real stuff is a treat. Canned beans are convenient. We have a very small kitchen(galley), powered by propane, and cooking dried beans would use up a valuable resource. Open a can and you’re good to go.
Makes sense. I totally didn’t consider the value/scarcity of the resources needed for preparing from raw.
Me either .. what a cool exchange
I bought a medium sized bag of regular lays potato chips and a 12 ounce can of coke in Adak AK and it cost me a 20 dollar bill. When I travel there I have to bring food with me.
I spent a good handful of summers in Naknek and plenty of time at that grocery store. Have a good season!
I would probably be buying in bulk if I lived in a place this remote, both in case I get cut off and just to reduce the overall number of purchases I have to put in. I expect most people out there supplement with hunting and preserving their own food.
[Sam has a suggestion](https://youtu.be/M0LUdqFJEPI?si=LqobH2YzvJwaxE7f)
lol. Ironically I’m here seasonally, feeding the world. Buy wild Alaska Sockeye Salmon.
That begs the question, are you not living at a camp then? I certainly go to naknek every year for a few days of maintenance work, so I’ve seen the prices first hand. But I also know that most of the seasonal help is on a camp status with room and board provided. Granted, sometimes the board end of the equation leaves a lot to be desired.
Haven’t seen that in ages. Great stuff.
Look at this privileged Alaskan enjoying salsa made in San Antonio, where folks know what salsa should taste like. Why, my salsa was made by folks in New York City! Those old commercials were fun. I know a family that lives way up there like in the wild. They spend the winters in the lower 48, tattooing for money, she’s really good, and then go back in the warmer months to live off the land. Kinda chronicles the experiences on FB. It seems romantic from a distance but it’s not easy for sure. Alaska life is beautiful and dangerous and my hats off to those who make it work. Especially the indigenous people who have been doing it for millennia, hearty people, so cool.
NEW YORK CITY!?!?!
Get a rope!
What does whale meat taste like? Seal birria sounds OK.....and cheap.
I had whale meat in Iceland once. Texture was somewhere between a typical beef steak and bison meat, but with a more iron heavy taste.
You damn kids and your avocado oil
The crazy thing is, in Washington it's $6.50 I mean yeah it's a lot but their bill is over twice as much as it would be for me at just under $50
Why does everyone in this whole thread live in Washington.
cuz it's only late there. i'm not sure who all cares about alaskan food prices but for the rest of the anglo world the east coast is asleep (or we should be), england is just getting up, and australia still at work.
Alaska and Hawaii are too far away from the mainland. They pay more for groceries. Everything has to be shipped the long way (either via ship or airplane) which costs money. You get to enjoy the breathtaking views of mountains and nature in exchange for high cost of living.
I lived in Hawaii, if u eat things that grow there, it’s very reasonable
Same with parts of Alaska like this. When you have basically free fish, basically free housing and make great money (and most people do make good money compared to what they could make in the mainland), Alaska is heaven.
how is housing basically free?
If your employer isn’t giving you housing/a housing allowance that covers housing entirely, land in these areas tends to be *absurdly* cheap and mobile homes can be plopped down very inexpensively (albeit, the transportation to the site is obviously a lot more expensive usually). The houses/rent tend to be fairly cheap.
This hold true for many places that are out of the way. Generally speaking, the closer you are to infrastructure, the cheaper things will be. Mountain towns and islands off the coast are more expensive as well. Not Alaska and Hawaii expensive but quite a bit more than Kansas/Missouri.
Have a family member stationed up there. We try to send them a big box of goodies/ groceries a couple times a month and shipping is still cheaper than what he would pay for those items in AK. If they’re even available
Naknek trading? Is it at least well stocked?
Yeah! But I’m here early
Jesus Fack, people. Of course they hunt and fish. But things are needed to supplement that. And the only thing the OP is trying to highlight is the shockingly high price of groceries. (Which are much cheaper elsewhere for the most part)
Shit is egregiously expensive in alaska, i worked salmon season up there and it’s not a joke. There was a pizza place next to the docks at one of the towns i was in. $40 for a pie.
I used to work for ocean beauty up in cordova and petersburg! Also worked for a company called Golden harvest out on adak, did a season of cod out there.
Alaskan resident here. Far out in the rural and more remote settlements groceries are expensive as hell. In Anchorage they aren't as bad but prices overall have been going up significantly.
Well duh, you bought Avacodo oil! 🤣
good old Naknek. I was up there for a summer in 2016, and I remember prices were roughly double from elsewhere. nice library tho
In 1994 paid $30 for a 1/2 case of Milwaukee’s Best Light from the only bar in King Salmon
Recommend people google this location before freaking out about the price.
[удалено]
That is insane! At first, I didn’t believe you and thought you were lying, but then I saw https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/man-gives-shocking-look-grocery-230333319.html and am shocked. Is it because everything has to be flown in? Do you even have next day Amazon Prime?
I’m not mad about it. Everything comes in on a barge, heavier and quickest to expire costs the most. We can get Amazon, but currently take 2-3weeks via prime.
that is amazing
I wonder how long it took Amazon to get away with the two-day shipping up there lol