this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2023
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No one in the history of civilisation has complained about too many broken chips in a bag.
When people started complaining about the amount of air being included in the bag, "prevents broken chips" was the bs marketing PR line put out. It's just not true.
You know the easiest way to prove it's bs? Pringle's have introduced more air into their cans at the same time. Why? To match the shrinkflation of their competitors. Because adding air to a can of Pringle's can only result in MORE broken chips. Which, again, no one in the fucking world has ever complained about.
I am absolutely sad when I get a bag of broken chips. And it definitely works you can test it yourself with some ziplock bags. There most likely is some shrinkflation hidden in that air, but the majority of it probably is playing an important part for people like me who love their chips but hate the crumbs.
There is definitively a point of diminishing returns. Half a bag of air just allows the chips to smash into each other and break. Only enough air to prevent outside forces compressing the chips is fine.
I'm not going to bother to find out when and how often these bags of completely crumbed chips made you sad in your life. They would no doubt be negligible and more related to transport issues than packaging issues.
But you'll get a bag 3/4 with not broken chips and 1/4 with broken chips on average... ideally for the same price as the half full bag you get now that still may have more or less broken chips, depending on how it was transported.
"Air is preferable to broken chips!"
I've complained about broken chips more than a dozen times in my life I'm sure of it
And how many packets of ships have you opened in your life?
Pretty much every bag of chips I've opened has had enough broken chips for me to be annoyed.
That's more about you than the level of air suitable for protecting chips or shrinkflation.
That's more about the 20% of my chips being broken due to bags with too little air.
Do you think more air will protect more chips? Do you not think there is a point where too much air allows the chips to move around too much in transport and thus you get more broken chips? A point of diminishing returns?
Yes
No
Cool, got a source? Or, is this just about you?
You got a source that more air breaks chips? Cause that's an absurd claim.
https://amzn.asia/d/hpk0kKF When you've done the background requirement for the conversation, we can continue.
I've almost certainly studied far more science including physics than you have, so don't pull that shit on me.
The amount of space you would need for the ships to gain enough speed to break into each other because there is enough air for them to move freely would be pretty damn big. Maybe if family size bags were the size of a large shopping cart your hypothesis might hold water, but chip bags just aren't big enough for that to be a problem.
It's not the size of the space that enables the chips to move at speed. So no, I don't believe you have studied any science. Watching sci fi movies doesn't count.
Here's a practical example for you to try. Make sure you get your parent's permission!
Take a sandwich bag and put ten corn chips in it. Remove as much air as you can and seal it. Now, shake vigorously. You'll find that the chips are held almost motionless by the plastic and thus do not break.
Now add a little air to the bag. The chips can now move. As you shake the bag back and forth, they collide, rotate in the allowed space, reposition inside the bag. You'll get a few broken chips.
Now add heaps of air to the bag. When you shake vigorously, the chips all move in different directions, pin wheeling, bouncing off the bag surface, rebounding into each other, rotating inside the bag to present their crisp faces to the hardend edges of other fast moving chips. You'll notice that it's not the moving of the bag that damages the chips. It's the sharp and abrupt change in inertia. The extra air allows the chips more space to orient in dangerous ways before the change in inertia smashes all the chips together at one end of the bag.
Now that you've done the fun practical part of the lesson today, I'll follow it up with a simple thought experiment. What brands do you think have more broken chips in them?
The brand with the most broken chips is Tostitos, which packs their chips with very little air. And they're usually really broken.
Doritos in my experience is the second worst for broken chips, and they too also use very little air, just a bit more than Tostitos.
The brand I find with the fewest broken chips is Lays, with lots of air.
Wonder why do you?
Try this experiment. Instead of just shaking your chip bags vigorously (something that is highly unlikely to happen in real life). Put your chips in a box full of tons of other bags of chips, and toss those boxes around a warehouse. You will find the bags with less air will generally have more broken chips.
Now stop being a condescending cunt, it's rather unbecoming of you.
Unfortunately, you've missed the point of my experiment, re earning my condescension. I'm demonstrating the terrible effect of air as a cushion against force. I'm not replicating shipping at all.
It's also quite revealing that the brands you named are substantially different in manufacturing process, resulting chips with significant difference in tensile strength and edge thickness. Those figures are far more relevant to broken chips than air.
So here's your next training course in chip packaging. Take ten chips and drop them onto various surfaces from waist height. Drop them vertically and horizontally. Then put individual chips on bags with varying amounts of air and replicate. Then multiple chips. Have your parents help you write up the results and share with all your {online} friends!
Nah, you're just a stupid teen trying to sound smart. And if you are an adult then bye goodness do I feel bad for your immaturity.
Have fun with that, but your ideas are stupid because more air does protect the chips from the actual forces and stresses they will experience while being shipped. None of your hypothetical scenarios are even close to the real world in terms of the forces and stresses experienced.
I don't have a condescending word for the kind of person who believes more = better without comprehending the basic concept of reality. Thankfully, I don't need one as Darwinism ensures there aren't many of you around.
Well published doctors with PhDs in Chemistry and over a decade of academic experience? You're right, there aren't a lot of us around.
Ooh internet credentials! So awesome. And an unrelated field? Mmm very intimidated I'm sure. You're an idiot if you don't recognise the shrinkflation. Regardless of your claims.
Never said their wasn't any shrinkflation, way to completely change the subject. And chips are sold by weight, not bag size, just read the bag and you'll know exactly how much you're getting.
The addition of more and more air has nothing to do with chip protection. It is shrinkflation. That has always been my point, regardless of whatever you've mistaken it for.
And you're a magical level of dumb shit if you don't see they are reducing weight and increasing the air to make bags appear more full. "Protects the chips" and "Weight not volume" are the literal marketing campaigns designed to cover up the shrinkflation. Which, since you read the order of amount of air per brand articles, varies from 17%-73% with ckearly no regard for the optimal chip protection amount and quite obviously "as much as we can get away with" amount.
As I've repeatedly said, you're whiny disagreement is more about you than this actual situation in the market in the real world.
Nope, the chip bags with more air have less broken chips, which makes me happy. I'm smart enough to actually read the bag and know how much I'm getting. Given everything is either inflating or shinkflating, that argument is pointless. Nothing is staying the same price, and I see no need to cry about it.
You being a condescending teen, makes your hilarious attempts at a debate rather quaint and amusing.
A debate requires two reasonable points. Your dull comments lack a point. With no need to cry about it, why do you have the need to comment on it? Just keep on buying more air and thinking you are winning at life. The rest of us can enjoy the laugh.
Let me guess - you don't make your own nachos, do you?
Absolutely do. At least once a week. Was there a point you were trying to make or was it an attempt to gatekeep corn chips?
OK, first off - gatekeep corn chips? You need to get off the internet more often.
Second, you enjoy nachos made of tortilla crumbs?
When did you last get a pack of tortilla crumbs? Ever?
An entire bag? Never. A bag with more than half the chips broken into pieces too small for dipping? More often than I'd like.
And you think more air has and will continue to reduce broken chips? Don't you think there is a point of diminishing returns?
I'm sure there's an optimal amount of air to balance space and protection.
But I was responding to the "no one ever complained about broken chips," which is patently false. I've complained.
Im going to put a crazy idea to you: 95% of bags you open do not have excessively broken chips. That 5% that do, suffered an incident in transport that regardless of air, resulted in broken chips. And if you honestly are complaining about a few broken chips a rare amount of times, the issue is with you and not the chips.
I will also add that as more and more air is introduced, it's creating more space in the bag for chips to move, collide, and break.
Finally, imagining that the more and more air being introduced to chip bags is anything other than a way to increase the size of packaging while reducing the weight and volume of the actual product is just foolish. If that's the path you are choosing, gl with that.