This is bananas.
For the first time in store history, Trader Joe’s has raised the price of their bananas.
The banana has had the same 19-cent price tag at the grocery store chain for 25 years, but inflation has hit even staple items, leading to a 20% price hike.
Trader Joe’s most popular produce as voted by customers is now being sold for 23 cents.
“We only change our prices when our costs change, and after holding our price for Bananas at 19 cents each for more than two decades, we’ve now reached a point where this change is necessary,” a Trader Joe’s spokesperson told CNN.
The 19-cent banana has long been a point of pride for the grocer, crediting the “unbeatable price” for the widespread love for the product.
This year marked the fifth time bananas — which have a host of health benefits, including helping improve sleep quality — copped the top produce spot in the Trader Joe’s Customer Choice Awards, sending it to the Hall of Fame.
Pricing of bananas at TJ’s is also unique because they are priced by the piece rather than by the pound — a change they made in 2001, according to CNBC.
In the first-ever episode of the “Inside Trader Joe’s” podcast, then-CEO Dan Bane said they made the choice to sell bananas individually when he noticed an elderly woman looking at the bananas but not buying any. Bane questioned why she didn’t pick up a bag.
“She said to me ‘Sonny, I may not live to that fourth banana,’” he said in the 2018 episode. “And so we decided the next day we were going to sell individual bananas. And they’ve been 19 cents ever since.”
