Vietnamese mooncakes are too expensive

Mooncakes are part of a traditional festival, but they have increasingly become a commercial product that costs much more than their real value, according to readers.

« There’s only one season of mooncakes a year, so people are selling them at any prices they want. I’ve checked prices of mooncake ingredients in supermarkets, and one can certainly secure a 50% profit just by selling at VND20,000 (less than a dollar) a cake. But mooncakes on the market are priced at least three or four times more than that. »
Long

« My family has stopped buying mooncakes for several years. Spending VND60,000-80,000 on a mooncake is too much. That price is more than half a kilo of fine pork. Some high-end cakes cost as much as VND1 million, only to contain too much fat, sweetness and processed food. »
Quangdp

« I’d rather buy toys for the kids during the Mid-Autumn Festival. The cakes are unreasonably expensive and not everyone loves them as they are too sweet. »
Quangthiep

« I used to work as a consultant for a major confectionary company. Every Mid-Autumn Festival, that company shared 40% of revenues to the distributors, and yet it still secured a 100% profit, or even more. A cake that is sold for VND50,000 might cost less than VND10,000. »
Godfather

« The prices of Vietnamese mooncakes are nine times the prices of imported cakes. With VND30,000, you can buy several mooncakes of a foreign brand, but cannot by one made in Vietnam. Vietnamese businesses need to review the way they price their products, or Vietnamese mooncakes will lose to imported ones. »
Messiah

By Thanh Le – VnExpress.net – September 19, 2023