Osem joins the price hikes: These products will soon cost more

After Strauss and Unilever, food giant Osem-Nestlé is also joining the wave of price increases. The company announced today (Thursday) to its customers that it will raise the prices of some of its products by an average of 2.2%. Among the products that will become more expensive starting January 1, 2025: Coffee (Nescafé and Taster’s Choice brands), chocolate and baked goods, ketchup and sauces, Tivall products, and Tsabar's spreads and salads.

The company explained the price hikes due to “the continued significant increases in raw material and packaging costs, production expenses, and logistics costs at the company’s factories in Israel.” It is worth noting that Osem already raised prices last July for some of its products, including ptitim (Israeli couscous), Vitaminchik syrup drinks, coffee, and more.

Just yesterday, Unilever decided to increase the prices of some of its chocolate products, such as Klik products, by 12%-16%. In a letter sent to retailers, the company claimed that “the unusual and ongoing rise in global cocoa prices, which have increased by over 100% in the past year alone, does not allow us to continue absorbing the rise in production costs, and therefore we are forced to update the price list for chocolate products only.”

Last week, Strauss announced a price hike for its chocolate and coffee products by up to 18%. It also justified the decision by citing “raw material prices for coffee and cocoa, which have soared by hundreds of percent in recent years.”

The announcements by the three food giants about price hikes—which will be felt directly in consumers' wallets and on supermarket shelves—are, as a reminder, only part of a wave of increases that will impact Israeli consumers starting next month. These will be compounded by price hikes resulting from the VAT increase by 1% to 18%, increases in monthly municipal taxes, electricity, water bills, and many other sectors.