\u201cAre we actually asking Americans \u2026 to spend more on their diet? The answer is no,\u201d Rollins told anchor Connell McShane of NewsNation. \u201cIt can cost around $3 a meal for a piece of chicken, a piece of broccoli, a corn tortilla and one other thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though Rollins has since clarified<\/a> her statement, it has spurred significant backlash from critics, who argue that Rollins\u2019 meal suggestion was an unrealistic goal for shoppers and that the available options in that price range lacked necessary nutrients or required extensive preparation times.\u00a0<\/p>\n Whatcom and Skagit County residents shared that in their experience, Rollin\u2019s claim was far from reality.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that they are disillusioned to the fact that most average Americans are still struggling,\u201d said Dickie Gleason, a shopper at Super Duper Boomtown in Sumas. \u201cIt\u2019s extremely expensive, and with things internationally, it\u2019s only getting worse.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n From March 2025 to March 2026, the U.S. saw a nationwide\u00a0 2.7% <\/a>\u00a0increase in grocery prices. The average gallon of whole milk \u2014 $3.20 per gallon in 2020 \u2014 now sits at $4.07 per gallon. Similarly, products like beef and chicken breasts have increased in average price<\/a> by over a dollar per pound in the last five years.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cYou can\u2019t go to the grocery store to get eggs, milk, cheese, some bread and maybe a bunch of bananas,\u201d said Gleason. \u201cYou\u2019re still walking out of there spending almost $50, $60. Maybe $100. It\u2019s ridiculous.\u201d<\/p>\n Sumas, which sits along the Canadian border in northeastern Whatcom County, only received a full-sized grocery store \u2014 Sumas Market \u2014 in 2022 after a period of nearly six years without.\u00a0<\/p>\n Among the customers who shared their experience with Salish Current, several said that extra time spent shopping across multiple stores was necessary to meet their budgets. Neko Wolf, a shopper in Bellingham, said that she mainly circulates through stores like Grocery Outlet, Costco and WinCo Foods to feed her family.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere aren\u2019t consistent items at Grocery Outlet, so that is a bit of a challenge. There are a few things that I predict I can get here that are way cheaper than anywhere else,\u201d said Wolf. \u201cI spent $300 here today, and it would have been ridiculous anywhere else.\u201d<\/p>\n Grocery Outlet operates on an opportunistic buying model, where instead of sourcing products based on demand, they purchase cheaper surplus goods from manufacturers. While this leads to unreliability on the consumer end, it also allows Grocery Outlet to sell goods at heavily discounted prices. According to the nonprofit Consumer\u2019s Checkbook analysis service, Grocery Outlet stores in the Puget Sound area sell goods at 21% lower<\/a> than average prices.\u00a0<\/p>\n Justin Ver Burg, another Bellingham shopper, has been following some of the new recommendations under the updated food pyramid. While he found the information helpful, he disagreed with Rollins\u2019 statement.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI found that way off,\u201d said Ver Burg. \u201cEspecially if you\u2019re going to eat whole foods that are healthy, like what RFK Jr. is recommending, I feel like it\u2019s going to be way more than that.\u201d<\/p>\n Bellingham is home to large retailers like Walmart, Costco, Safeway and Fred Meyer, making trips between them slightly more manageable. For people in more rural communities, the search for affordable deals looks far less realistic.<\/p>\n \u00a0A one-way drive from Everson \u2014 sparsely populated with local markets \u2014 to the Safeway or Grocery Outlet in Lynden, takes at least 10 minutes. Factoring in the time it takes to shop, the drive home, and the likely possibility that even cheaper groceries lie another 26 minutes away in Bellingham, makes the difficulty of maintaining a $3-a-meal diet apparent.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201c$3 for a healthy meal? No. No, no, no,\u201d said Wolf. \u201cIf you can find what you need at Grocery Outlet or places like that, I feel like there it will be $3 on the lowest end, but it\u2019s closer to $5 per person, if not $6 or $7.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014By Jae Ranney <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Agriculture secretary says healthy meals cost as little as $3; shoppers disagree.\u00a0 In a television interview early this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":646261,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[25139,97,2402,16766,269,278829,278830],"class_list":["post-646260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nutrition","tag-grocery-prices","tag-health","tag-inflation","tag-maha","tag-nutrition","tag-skagit-county","tag-whatcom-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646260"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646260\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/IMG_3300-1024x683.jpg\")
JAE RANNEY \/ SALISH CURRENT 2026. A container of Michelada mix sits on a shelf at Video La Gloria Corner Market in Everson. While small in size, the market offers a variety of food items and household goods. <\/p>\n