Store brand vs. name brand: It’s the eternal grocery store dilemma.
You’re standing in the aisle, comparing prices, wondering if that extra two bucks really gets you better quality. But what if the only real difference is the label?
Are These Milks The Same?
A Walmart shopper filmed himself in the dairy aisle breaking down why buying name-brand might not be worth it. His video has more than 220,000 views.
“Gotta stop scamming yourself,” he says in the TikTok, posted by his wife, Sam (@lipstickkface).
He holds up a gallon of Great Value milk priced at $3.48. He then grabs Producers milk sitting right next to it for $5.57. That’s a $2.09 difference for what appears to be the exact same product.
“If you check that number right there, 064199, that’s the same code on the producer’s milk,” he explains, pointing to the numbers on each container.
To verify his claim, he directs viewers to whereismymilkfrom.com. That’s a website that allows consumers to trace their dairy products back to the source by entering these plant codes.
“The only thing you gotta do is go to where’s my milk from dot com, enter that code. And it’s the same place,” he says.
His wife added important context in the caption about why this information matters right now.
“This is public information that my husband really wants to put yall on. At a time where a lot of us are struggling with the loss of SNAP, this is some helpful info that needs to be shared,” she wrote.
Understanding Dairy Plant Codes
The codes on your milk are part of an FDA-regulated system called the Interstate Milk Shippers List. Every dairy processing plant in the United States gets assigned a unique identification number that appears on all products processed at that facility. The code typically consists of a two-digit state identifier followed by a plant-specific number. For example, a code like “06-1234” means the milk was processed at plant 1234 in California.
This system was established to help with food safety compliance and product recalls. If there’s a contamination issue, regulators can quickly identify every product that came from the affected plant. But it also inadvertently gave consumers a way to see behind the curtain of private label manufacturing.
Where Is My Milk From, the website referenced in the video, is now owned and operated by Virginia dairy farmers. It pulls its data directly from FDA records.
The Private Label Secret The Industry Doesn’t Want You To Know
Here’s the thing about store brands: They’re almost never made by the store itself.
TIME reports that many store-brand foods are made by the same companies producing higher-priced name brands. Sometimes they come out of the same factories with the same ingredients. The only real difference is the label and the price.
Manufacturers compete against their own name-brand products because private labels are a dependable source of extra income, according to Sporked’s investigation. If you’re already running a dairy processing plant, it makes sense to produce additional products and sell them to other retailers.
Plus, supplying private label goods helps manufacturers build strong relationships with retailers. That can help keep their name brands on shelves, too.
The identity of these manufacturers is one of retail’s best-kept secrets. Both manufacturers and retailers are motivated to keep this information under wraps. Manufacturers don’t want to undermine their premium brands. And retailers don’t want competitors poaching their suppliers.
Often, the only time these relationships become public is during product recalls, when items from the same facility get listed under the same recall notice regardless of what label they’re wearing.
Commenters React
“Great Value cheese is Sargento… You’re welcome :)” a top comment theorized.
“Anyone who’s worked in a plant that makes this knows it too. Great value is ALL name brand stuff with the Walmart tag,” a person said.
“My mother worked in a factory for shampoo. At noon the bottles switched from generic to name brand. It was all the same thing,” another shared.
@lipstickkface This is public information that my husband really wants to put yall on. At a time where a lot of us are struggling with the loss of SNAP, this is some helpful info that needs to be shared. #SNAP #milk #walmart #agriculture
BroBible reached out to Sam for comment via TikTok direct message and to Walmart via email.