Mark Ritson: Why ‘maximiniflation’ is about to blow up in brands’ faces

The source of her fury? Not immigration. Not the government. Not even the weather. This was about Cadbury Creme Eggs. “What do you mean a family bag of mini eggs costs over £6????” she raved. “A person on minimum wage has to work an hour to buy two bags of mini eggs?”

And she wasn’t alone. One man claimed to have “stopped eating chocolate in silent protest”. Another observed, “The price of mini eggs is going to equal printer ink soon.” Consumers called it “absurd”, “outrageous”, “ridiculous”, and “scandalous”. “Shoppers brand UK ‘a disgrace’ as Cadbury Mini Egg prices more than double” screamed one headline. “Popular Galaxy and Cadbury Easter eggs shrink in size AGAIN” wailed another.

People have a point. Sort of. The vagaries of UK discounting make price comparisons deliberately difficult. But based on RRP and sizing, some value fuckery is clearly underway. Cadbury’s website shows a standard bag of Mini Eggs at 74g with an RRP of £2.36. A year ago, that bag was 80g and priced at £2. That’s an 18% higher price for 8% less product. A quarter of the value, gone in 12 months.

The anger is driven by three factors. First, this change runs 20 points higher than current food inflation. Second, it isn’t communicated. If you’re not paying attention, you think you’re buying the same thing while actually paying more for less.

And third – crucially – this isn’t just shrinkflation. The term, coined by economist Pippa Malmgren, describes a hidden form of inflation where shrinking packs replace obvious price rises. It lets manufacturers manage costs without triggering backlash. But what’s happening with Mini Eggs is different. Companies are quietly reducing pack sizes and sliding in simultaneous price rises. It’s a kick in the balls followed by a kick in the face. That double indignity, executed without declaration, is why it’s causing significantly more noise than standard shrinkflation.

I called this “maximiniflation” in my top 10 marketing moments of 2025. It’s a clumsy name for a clumsy marketing tactic: companies maximizing price while minimizing size. I made it number one in my annual countdown partly because it’s so endemic, and partly because I expect it to combust in waves of consumer anger this year. Mini Eggs are just the start.

The behavioral economics are simple. Kahneman and Tversky showed that losses loom larger than gains – people feel the pain of losing something twice as intensely as the pleasure of gaining the equivalent. Maximiniflation triggers this loss aversion twice: you’re losing product AND losing money.

Then add betrayal aversion, from the work of Iris Bohnet and Richard Zeckhauser. Losing because someone you trusted chose to let you down feels far worse than losing the same amount in a more open manner. Experiments on drip pricing show that when key information is hidden until late or discovered after purchase, consumers report stronger feelings of deception than when full – even higher – prices are disclosed upfront. When people feel a trusted brand has cheated them, their response is disproportionately negative: higher anger, lower repurchase intent, more word-of-mouth punishment. Mini Eggs, basically.

The psychological impact isn’t additive; it’s multiplicative. Shrinkflation angers customers. Maximiniflation enrages them.

Germany provides the cautionary tale. Milka reduced its classic bar from 100g to 90g while raising prices from €1.49 to €1.99 – a 48% increase per gram, executed so stealthily the bar became just one millimeter thinner. Astute German consumers caught wind. Nothing makes decent Germans angrier than disingenuous commerce and da sind die Puppen am Tanzen – basically it all kicked off.

Social media blew up. The Hamburg Consumer Advice Centre filed a lawsuit for unfair competition. Foodwatch awarded Milka the “Goldene Windbeutel” – Germany’s prize for the most shameless advertising bullshit of the year. Sales tanked. Retailers slashed prices to clear inventory. A quiet margin tactic became a full-scale brand crisis with regulatory implications.

But despite the apparent risks, we’ll see more maximiniflation in 2026. Input costs remain brutal – cocoa sits 70% above 2023 levels and JP Morgan expects it to stay elevated. Coffee, sugar, and dairy continue their march upward. Meanwhile, in the absence of new markets and growing demand, FMCG companies remain addicted to price-led profit growth. According to Bain, three-quarters of 2024’s industry sales growth came from price increases rather than volume. Volume growth has now turned negative. When unit demand is declining and costs keep climbing, maximiniflation becomes the desperation profit play.

But that sets up a mighty collision. At the very moment big food companies are embarking on maximiniflation, consumers have become hyper-vigilant. McKinsey’s ConsumerWise survey shows 43% of American consumers rank rising prices as their number one concern – ahead of tariffs, healthcare, and job security. Across all 18 global markets surveyed, rising prices remain the dominant worry.

Consumers are comparing unit prices, switching to private label, photographing receipts and posting them online. Price vigilante videos have become sport. Average consumers have always been convinced that “marketing” means the subliminal ways that marketing fuckers like you get them to buy stuff they don’t need at prices they weren’t aware of. Maximiniflation feeds that paranoia perfectly. We will see more exposés as punters seek social media fame outing “marketing” tactics.

Retailers pose further risk. Supermarkets, with their trademark customer proximity, have always been ahead of manufacturers in spotting trends and consumer movements. Another trademark is their total lack of concern for the brands that supply them. It’s not evil, just the indifference inherent in selling dozens of different brands per category. Put these two traits together, and many big retailers are now highlighting attempts to reduce size while increasing price. Carrefour uses orange labels to signal brands like Lipton or Viennetta engaging in maximiniflation. German retailer Netto uses yellow labels. In Hungary, such moves must be declared on shelf by law. Not a good look.

So what do marketers do instead?

First, proper pricing. When marketers join the pricing team, they bring perspectives the finance and operations people lack. Pricing is as much about communication as hard numbers. Remember Pret’s coffee subscription increase from £20 to £25? Too smart to sell smaller coffees for more money without explanation, the company executed textbook price-rise communication. Six weeks’ notice. Stated in pounds, not percentages. Precise explanation – inflation, staff wages, VAT – framed around what customers love: Pret’s people. Concluding with a reminder of value even at the higher price. If you must raise prices, be clear, be early, be specific, and connect it back to something customers value.

Second, genuine value engineering. Reduce packaging waste, which customers prefer anyway, rather than product. Introduce smaller sizes at genuinely lower price points, giving budget-conscious consumers options rather than smokescreens and indignity.

Third, portfolio rationalization. Some products cannot sustain their margins. The brave move is discontinuing them or repositioning with premium pricing, rather than diminishing them into shadow versions of their former selves.

The common theme here is that transparency preserves procedural fairness: “you told me, now I decide”. Even if the outcome is financially identical, shoppers judge upfront communicated price rises as fairer, making them more likely to stay and less likely to go or turn nuclear.

Maximiniflation is a coward’s approach. It assumes consumers are stupid, inattentive, and passive. In 2026, they are none of these things. They’re stressed about money, scrutinizing every purchase, armed with smartphones, and ready to broadcast your deception to millions. And your retail partners are – as ever – ready to take the consumer’s side while enjoying the margins at the register from you or your competitor or their conveniently priced private label. Once inside their store, they care not one jot which way the consumer turns.

2026 is not going to be the year consumers pay more and get less. It’s the year they punish the companies that tried.

Mark Ritson is a former marketing professor, brand consultant, and multi-award-winning columnist. He is also the founder of the MiniMBA in Marketing. It’s still £1,949. Still 12 weeks. No maximiniflation here. Kicks off April 7. I want you.