Yes, sooo ridiculous. What is this world coming to??! ZZZZ...

Well, the 15 bottles is less bad for the environment than 24, as it wastes less resources to create and less plastic to store.

I'll sell you 25 bottles of tap water for $3.88 if you want. It's a sweet deal!

The 15-pack has a shinier, prettier price tag. I'd probably buy that one.

Realistically, this is a trick question. You shouldn't even be buying bottled water. It's a total waste of plastic.

Maybe the stock boy made a mistake?

Seriously?... Really?...

Please stop putting these minor mistakes on the front page.

Kind of like when a 20oz pop cost $1.20, yet many times they will have 2 Liters for $0.99

.... of course it is easier to drink from a 20 oz pop then a 2 liter.... even though I knew a friend who would buy and drink from the 2 liter while driving..... surprised he never got into an accedent.

Weak post.

I blame the 'victim'.

Hrmm, my coworker and I were at a Duane Reade the other day, and they were selling 1.5L bottles of Coke for $1.59, and the 20oz bottle was $1.69. Makes no sense..., except possibly to say that it looks really unrefined to drink straight from a 1.5L bottle.

@coan_net: Why not just get one 20 oz bottle, save it, and just pour soda from the 2L bottle for when you go out?

lol

A new low for Consumerist.

@COELACANTH: We pay extra for convenience. It's the American way.

Here's an idea: Don't buy bottled water.

Maybe 15 is the new 12?

Uh, I looked at the picture, and there's no evidence that the 15 pack of water was just in the wrong spot. I used to be from the midwest, and shopped at HyVee often, and they would put the bestseller tags right next to the normal price. Someone probably just grabbed the 15, decided they didn't want it and put it back in the nearest open spot.

coan_net is on the right track. The OP did not mention if the per bottle volume was the same for each package, less or more. If you don't know that then you can't know if its a bad or good deal.

I always find these kinds of things amusing. And I find this one especially amusing because I live in the midewest (for only 28 more days, thank God) and shopt at HyVee - and this is actually pretty typical. You also have to really, REALLY watch them about expired products. Bacon that expired a month ago, Miracle Whip that expires "today," hot dogs that expire in a few days but whose color was obviously very, very wrong, etc. They're pretty bad, but they're about the best in town, sadly. Fortunately I will be back to Seattle soon where I can shop at Trader Joe's and Whole Foods again!

Or you could buy Fiji water and spend $4.99 for 12 OUNCES.
THAT is a real deal!

I agree that people drink too much bottled water, but bottled water has its time and place. My son takes one bottle water to school everyday. At home, he gets water from the filtered fridge water. If I'm going a shirt hike, I might take a small bottle of water instead of wearing a hydration pack or carrying my large Sigg. It is also useful for long trips.

Even if the 15 pack is in the right place, the 24 pack could just be a sale price while the 15 pack is the every day price :-P

Are they phasing out the 24 pack and only carrying the 15 pack at that price point going forward? I have no idea, just throwing the idea out...

I wonder if that HyVee had a helpful smile in every aisle?

(HyVee's old slogan)

All that ever needs to be said about bottled water, Lewis Black has already said it:

+ Watch video

Warning! Bad language.

I see this all the time with Coke. You can get a 12 pack for 2.99 (or less), but a 6 pack will still be 3.99.

@mbgrabbe: Hear hear! We throw away billions of plastic bottles and spend buttloads of money on this stuff every year. It's unnecessary.

@weakdome:

Whoa, where are you getting your Fuji from, it's only $1.69 here!

I still don't drink it, but $5 seems excessive.

@Gev:

I believe they call it a Fema Dozen

Hyvee has not carried 15 count bottles of water in the past. I think it is the same trick Target has been playing recently where they are lowering the actual sq feet of paper towels or toilet paper and then wrapping it in updated packaging as "new and improved".

So my guess is they are moving to 15 packs in order to gouge you even more. Hyvee stores already have higher prices than most other grocery chains. They are also usually about the only game in town other than Walmart in most cities.

@sherryness: I find way expired product on the shelves at our Hyvee stores all the time. They don't care. I can't wait until Super Target opens up in my little corner of midwest hell.

@ncboxer: Nalgene.

@silencedotcom: I remember that slogan from the first time I lived in Iowa! I think they had to disconue using that slogan due to possible false advertising.

HyVee does that all the time, they run the 24 packs on sale and the price ends up being the same or less than the 15pks, or the 24pks of 10oz bottles. I've noticed that from time to time at our HyVee for the past year at least.

@bohemian,Sherryness & Silencedotcom - Not sure what's up at other HyVees, I've never noticed any problems with expired products at mine, then again, it seems to be outrageously overstaffed. I swear the employees outnumber the customers even when it's really busy.

And I think they are still using the Helpful smile in every isle slogan - I'm pretty sure I've seen and heard it recently.

@mobbo: All new articles are added to the top of the front page. It's a chronological thing.

@rjhiggins: This isn't new. There have been several articles about products decreasing in size but the price staying the same (or going higher).

@humphrmi: Nice.

Supermarket brand bottled water = local water in a bottle. In this case, that's still better than water from a region experiencing a drought but I doubt the supermarket has improved the water enough to justify buying it.

The only reason I've got bottle water is for emergencies (that & the water heater). Other than that it's tap water with a filter.

I just went to Sam's and got 36 bottles from $4.88.

True story.

@ncboxer: Put his water in a reusable sports bottle. When you go hiking, use a Camelbak Hydration Pack.

are the bottles in the 15 box larger than the ones in the 24 box?

i got to the commissarie on base and see stuff like that all the time. like they will have 24 packs of soda cheaper than 12 packs sometimes.

@Rectilinear Propagation: By new low I meant this is about the weakest post I've ever seen in Consumerist. Stop the presses: Sometimes because of a store special you can get a bigger item for less than a smaller size of the same one!

Not news.

And your answer to mobbo is equally useless. He's making the same point: This is not worthy of being on Consumerist.

Why would you buy over-priced tapwater?
Buy a Nalgene bottle, fill it yourself with tapwater. Save yourself $3.88 every week or two.

@yikz: See pic. It's Spring Water, not tap water.

I buy the 24 pack for my mom all the time. $3.88 is the sale price. I believe it's usually $4.99.
[www.hy-vee.com]

I shop there all the time and it's always clean and well-stocked. I much prefer it to the other supermarkets here in KC.

I buy the 24 pack for my mom all the time $3.88 is the sale price. I believe it's usually $4.99. I shop there all the time and it's always clean and well stocked. I much prefer shopping there to any of the other supermarkets in KC.
[www.hy-vee.com]

I'm glad Jacob didn't go out of his way to email and inform the company of their mistake unlike the previous post on the Consumerist.

The biggest scam of them all is they're charging you for water.

@mmstk101: You mean pharmaceutical tap water? (Sorry, couldn't embed the Consumerist link.)