Supermarket Scheming

There's a plot afoot and HEB is the culprit.

Two weeks ago, Fio noticed that Post Shredded Wheat wasn't on the shelves at HEB. A temporary stock outage, she thought, and bought a box of Kellogg's, which tasted sort of yucky. One week later, there was still no Post shredded wheat available. However, a new variety, HEB shredded wheat, was on proud display.

Now, Fiorella is addicted to shredded wheat. Not only does she eat it for breakfast, but she frequently snacks on it, even taking a plastic bag of it with her when she flies off to writing conferences, so she decided to give the HEB brand a try. It was okay, better than the Kelloggs, but lacked the tight compression of the Post product. Besides, she didn't like being manipulated. Obviously, HEB wanted to get its own brand started so it first switched customers to a shredded wheat that would taste radically different, then introduced its own brand which tastes more like Post.

Fio's onto ya, Charles Butt. But never mind--she's found a new supplier for her daily fix. Walgreen's carries not just medical supplies, beauty aids, and candy, but also . . . Post Shredded Wheat.