{"id":621823,"date":"2026-09-11T21:50:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T21:50:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/621823\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T21:50:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T21:50:12","slug":"grocery-inflation-flat-in-august-up-2-2-for-the-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/621823\/","title":{"rendered":"Grocery inflation flat in August, up 2.2% for the year"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Consumer Price Index for food at home was unchanged from July to August, compared with an overall CPI gain of 0.4% for all goods, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday.<\/p>\n

For the 12-month period through August, grocery-price inflation was up 2.2%, compared with 3.4% inflation overall, driven largely by energy price increases.<\/p>\n

The index for lettuce, which saw a sharp decline in consumption after a cyclosporiasis outbreak earlier this summer, was down 6.2% for August, following a 16.4% decline in July. That contributed to a 0.7% decline for fresh fruits and vegetables overall for the month.<\/p>\n

Most of the other major grocery categories were up slightly in August. The index for eggs was up 2.9% on a seasonally adjusted basis for the month, helping drive a 0.1% gain for the meat, poultry, fish and eggs category. Dairy and related products were up 0.3%, nonalcoholic beverages were up 0.2% and other food at home was up 0.1%. The index for cereals and bakery products was flat.<\/p>\n

Related:The Retail Daily podcast<\/a><\/p>\n

For the 12-month span, the index for several products remained elevated, notably beef and veal, which was up 5.9% compared with a year ago. Uncooked ground beef was up 7.2% over the last 12 months, and uncooked beef roasts were up 8.4%.<\/p>\n

The index for fish and seafood was up 6.5% relative to a year ago, including 6.3% for fresh fish and seafood and 8.2% for frozen fish and seafood.<\/p>\n

The index for food away from home was up 0.3% in August and 3.4% for the past 12 months, primarily driven by increases at full-service restaurants.<\/p>\n

Energy costs were largely to blame for the overall CPI increase, including a 10.1% increase in the index for fuel oil in August. The 12-month index was up 52% over year-ago levels. Motor fuel was up 4.1% in August and 27.9% for the 12-month span.<\/p>\n

Airline fares were up 2.7% in August and 23.4% for the past 12 months. Other categories contributing to ongoing inflation over the last 12 months included recreation (up 2.7%), Medical care (up 1.6%) and personal care (up 3.6%).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Consumer Price Index for food at home was unchanged from July to August, compared with an overall…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[72,113,61,60],"class_list":["post-621823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=621823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}