Inflation has caused a price increase from 2020 to 2023 of up to 100 percent and even over!

A head of iceberg lettuce was 99 cents in 2020 and now, it is $2.39! While this may not seem that significant, it is a scary notion when I am telling you that over the last three years you have been conditioned, and forced to accept a 141 percent price increase on your head of iceberg lettuce.

Do you know why you are paying more?

With shortages, disruptions in the supply chain, and energy prices going up, farmers are growing less to produce quality crops. This means the demand has gone up per product because the customer base is the same, but the availability is less so demand is higher.

In addition, stores have higher operating costs too so they all take their share and add to the cost of your head of lettuce.
This is why you are paying more than double!

A Plan to Shrink the Hole in your Wallet

Today, a bag of 2 cu ft jungle growth potting mix at Lowe’s is $8.98 and Mary’s heirloom Seeds sells seeds at an affordable price and she has an amazing germination rate with her seeds!

The Blonde de Paris lettuce is one that closely resembles iceberg,
At a seed pack of 100 seeds, that is a 100 potential lettuces you can grow right out of the bag! So, for the price of 5 heads of store bought lettuce, you can now potentially grow 100 in your backyard. For the salinas crisphead lettuce, since they have 200 seeds per pack, your potenial savings is even greater!

Additional Benefits of Growing Your Own

When you grow your own food, you have it readily available in your own backyard, you do not even need to go out for this. When you buy a head of lettuce in the store, the time it takes for a lettuce head to reach the store is significant,.. think about this… there is picking, prep and packaging into storage in trays to prepare for shipping, loading on trucks, shipping from California (where most of your lettuce is grown) to your local grocery store warehouse, loading to truck that visits your grocery store, and then it sits there and waits for you to pick it up to poke, squeeze, and prod it, to see if this head of lettuce is still edible. Then, when that old poor tired lettuce passes the test, it comes home with you. And it will potentially sit in your refrigerator for another week. Yes, that lettuce is probably at least a week old when you bought it and another week older when you eat it!

Now, the other thing to consider is how are these lettuces are grown at a mass production enterprise? Well, in soil that is subjected to drought, in soil that is overworked and exhausted, then fertilized to bring some sort of life back into the soil, essential healthy microbes are missing, and pesticides are abundant to keep that lettuce head growing big. All these processes are cause for potential issues and it can be the cause for some of the salmonella outbreaks, and a significant degradation of your “healthy lettuce”.

Now, I just took an example with lettuce, though with every single thing you grow from seed, your savings and health benefits are unbelievably significant and this makes growing in your own backyard totally worth the try…

One thing that Deltona Garden club can help you with, is that we can provide you with education, suggestions, and resources on how to become more self-sufficient right in your own backyard, no matter where you live. If you act now, even if it is small, and try to start growing things you like today, you will secure yourself a better tomorrow by attempting to inflation proof at least your grocery bill.