Did Q-tips cotton swabs, warehouse-club multipack shrink?
Size FactsDid it shrink? Yes
Before1875 swabs
After1750 swabs
−6.7%smaller
Price per swab · if the price stayed the same+7.1%Hypothetical: the size cut alone. The source recorded no shelf prices.
How big a cut? The 26th-largest of 27 documented personal care cuts; a bigger cut than 14% of all 1,366 cases in the library. See the biggest cuts →
- When
- 2024 · reported 23 Dec 2024
- Country
- United States
- Brand
- Q-tips
- Category
- Personal Care
- Source
- mouseprint.org
Source and evidence
Against official inflation: BLS CPI-U (US) “personal care products” changed +0.5% (12 months to Dec 2024). The size cut alone raises the price per unit by +7.1% if the shelf price stayed the same (the source recorded no prices). Every case is compared the same way in the ShrinkRadar Index.
What the source says
“…Thanks to Nora F. for this submission. Q-Tips Warehouse club packs of Q-Tips have been shrinking. The old packs combined contained 1875 Q-Tips, but the new ones have 125 fewer Q-Tips — just 1750. Either way, this seems like a lifetime supply for many people.”
More from the US: the US Shrinkflation Tracker has all 296 documented cases, sortable and filterable.
Topic guide: toothpaste, deodorant and personal care shrinkflation, every documented case in one place, brand by brand.
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