The cost of 5 common grocery items has gone up 35% in Colorado in 5 years. Here’s the breakdown.

Every “beep” at the end of the grocery-store conveyor belt now hits like a jolt, invoking anxiety and silent swearing.

+14 . . . . Chicken breasts

+$6.50 . . . Box of cereal

+$20 . . . . Laundry detergent

+$10 . . . . Left-over bag of Halloween candy.

+$3.50 . . . Jar of spaghetti sauce. 

When the beeps finally stop, and the register racks up the total, there’s a moment of shock over how few bags it takes to hold $150 in groceries. Because it’s noticeably fewer bags than before.

It’s on trips to the grocery store that Coloradans most often have to deal with the cost of inflation, because most of us go there once or twice each week. Grocery prices, which have been on a roller coaster since the pandemic, rose 3.5% nationally in 2021, then 11% more in 2022. By the end of this year, they’re predicted to rise another 5%. 

The rate of inflation for food in 2022 was the highest since 1979, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

Flour is up 28% since the beginning of 2022. American cheese and white rice are up 20%. And lemons are up 8% — just to mention a few of the foods that have had the highest increases. Eggs prices have come down lately, but remember a few months ago when they were $7 a dozen?

Here’s a look at five of the most commonly purchased grocery items and how their price has gone up a whopping 35% in Colorado in five years.

Reporting by Jennifer Brown. Photography by Hugh Carey. Design by Danika Worthington.