It’s been 34 years since Kevin McCallister first arrived on our screens to invite in Christmas with some very unique — and potentially deadly — home security.
The years since have seen Home Alone become a beloved holiday tradition. The flick is a late-year constant, these days, but that’s one of the only things that hasn’t changed in the three and a half decades since Kevin’s family first forgot him. The fuzzy feeling we get inside when Kevin wrecks the Wet Bandits will never change, but the prices attached to his clever thief-deterrents sure have, as discovered by one curious TikToker.
Early in the treasured 1990 film, Kevin makes his way to the local store for supplies, a trip that runs him just under $20 in 1990 cash. The prices attached to the items he purchased even seem pretty accurate — something that can’t always be relied on in cinematic shopping trips — which makes the experiment tackled by @themistressmelt all the more intriguing.
The content creator decided to re-examine Kevin’s shopping list through a 2024 lens, and her findings reveal just how much prices have changed over the last few decades. She carefully makes her way through Kevin’s shopping list — which consists of “the big loaf” of Wonderbread (our TikToker is forced to trade out for Butternut large), a half gallon of whole milk, Tropicana pure premium orange juice, a “savory single serving” of Kraft mac & cheese, Stouffer’s turkey dinner supreme, a package of Quilted Northern toilet paper, some “criminal catching cling wrap,” a bottle of Tide, Snuggles drier sheets, and tiny toy soldiers (traded out for chocolate penguins) — and quickly wracks up a much higher price tag.
Kevin shelled out $19.83 for his 1990 trip to the store, which is a breeze compared to the same haul in 2024 — costing a full $36 more at $55.99. That price difference isn’t really surprising, in our current floundering economy, but it’s still stark when compared against those cozy 1990 prices.
@themistressmelt took her experimentation one step further, a few days after posting her initial TikTok, and re-examined the same list with a regional shift. Instead of just shopping willy-nilly, the TikToker took her shopping to the same town where the real-life McCallister house is located. The exact same shopping trip, this time regionally recreated, once again soars above Kevin’s original price tag, but this time it’s even worse.
The TikToker really went all-out with her second shopping trip, this time visiting the exact store — located in Winnetka, Illinois — to make her purchases. When she discovered how few necessary items they had in stock, however, she cruised a few miles further down and instead hit up the local Jewel. A few substitutions were still necessary, but her overall haul had quite a bit in common with Kevin’s — apart from the price tag, of course. She shells out almost $10 additional for her on-site shopping spree, this time spending a full $62.54 for a shopping list that didn’t quite hit $20 three and a half decades ago.
Published: Dec 25, 2024 09:39 am