I live in North America and I would like to know why Pepsi has changed. Their 12 pk cans to 8 pks and raised their prices . With the economy so bad it seems counter productive

The best people to ask would be Pepsi's own marketing and sales departments.

I've tried that. I can't find the right link. Do you have that link?

The price of everything has gone up. Most companies blame the price of gas for their higher prices.

This is kind of on the topic, and I don't know of a better opportunity to bring it up.

Talking about sodas and pricing, if you think that's weird, I have something I think is even weirder. In the states, sodas and their diet versions cost the same, don't they? Meaning, if you were to buy a diet coke, it would cost exactly the same as a regular coke. Am I remembering this correctly? I certainly can't remember ever being charged extra at the movies for choosing a diet version of the soda I wanted.

Well, here in italy, I noticed that many times when I go to buy a liter bottle of soda, the cokes and the diet cokes will be priced differently. Usually the diet version is slightly more expensive. I asked a store owner about this, and he said that it's in proportion to what he's being charged by his distributor. Has anyone ever heard of something like this?

By the way, ever since europe moved to the euro, everything is much, much, much more expensive. At least in italy, the general consensus on a majority of the things one buys on a daily basis is that it now costs about double the price. I was here during the crossover, and it was pretty shocking. I hope prices remain as stable as possible back home.

Basically it is called downsizing which many companies do instead of just increasing the price. They figure that it is less of a shock for you to see the product with a slightly higher price and less of it. For example a standard size of canned food at one time was 16 oz. Every time they wanted to make more profit or needed to increase to keep up with inflation they downsized the can and raised the price a few cents. Like from 16 oz and 60 cents to 15 oz and 85 cents rather than keeping it at 16 oz and raising the price to $1. and keeping it at 16 oz.