why are there 8 hot dog buns in a pkg. when 12 dogs are in a pack?

Answer 1

it is a marketing ploy so that you have to buy three packages of hot dog buns and two packages of hot dogs to make sure they are equal.

3 x 8 = 2 x 12

Answer 2

Well, economics come into play. If you have 12 hot dogs and 8 buns and everyone wants a bun you have to buy another package of buns. Then, you have too many buns so you buy more hot dogs, then you are short buns again. So you buy another package of buns. 2 packages of hot dogs equal 3 packages of buns. Do the math! LOL Unless you are lucky enough to have 4 people who don't want a bun or you don't mind using the 4 left-over hot dogs in a casserole such as baked beans and hot dogs.

Ask bun makers why they don't just package buns in 12's and they would answer, "because this is the way we have ALWAYS done it". Dumb isn't it? :}

Or it could be a terrorist plot aimed to make everyone nuts and it's working because look at how many people ask the same question!

Answer 3

It's a marketing gimmick. When people see that there are 8 buns in a pack and 12 hot dogs in a pack, they automatically think "There's not enough buns for the hot dogs. I must buy enough buns to make up for the hot dogs. So they'll think of what is the fewest packages they need to buy so that there will be one hot dog for each bun. If you do your math, you will find out that the lowest amount for each would be 24, so they would buy 3 packages of buns and 2 packages of hot dogs. It makes more money than if there were 8 buns in one pack and 8 hot dogs in one pack. Then people would just buy 1 of each. Pretty clever, I think.

Answer 4

I actually own a book that researched this question! Hehe. They couldn't even figure it out!

"It is clear that the number of buns or hdogs in a package is more the result of tradition than energetic plainning."

They go on to state how, in the early 20th century, hot dogs were sold in butcher shops where a person could specify how many they wanted. Sandwich rolls and kaiser rolls were baked in clusters of four in pans designed to hold eight rolls. That is how they believed how the hot-dog industry originally came up with 8 as being convenient to their customers.

Answer 5

Because some people use hot dogs to chop up and put in beans...or chili. Not everyone uses them just for hot dog buns. Then too the hot dogs taste good on their own sans bun.

Answer 6

I find 8 + 8 in the store. I burn a few buns and I lose a dog here anf there. All in all- things work out OK.

Answer 7

this is a question that has baffled the greatest minds for years. the answer is simple though. it promotes the buying of more buns. also the weiners i buy come 10 to a pack. then you buy more buns then more weiners then more buns trying to make it come out even. I usually just eat two weiners while I make hotdogs out of the rest

Answer 8

Your mistake, Bjorn, is in assuming that businesspeople always have some rational basis for their actions. On the contrary, my experience is that many corporate decisions are arrived at by a process not far removed from consulting sheep entrails. Things are further complicated in this instance by the fact that the principal players are suffering from a case of collective amnesia. Nobody at any of the major hot dog companies can offer a convincing rationale for why things are packaged the way they are. Nonetheless, by a system of anthropological inquiry not unlike Margaret Mead's researches among the Samoans, I have been able to construct the following hypothesis: you get ten hot dogs and eight buns per package because meat packers like things that come in pounds and bakers hate things that come in tens.

The meat-packing side of this is easiest to understand. Your standard-issue hot dog, a product that generations of consumers have found to be convenient, comes ten to the pound. Jumbo hot dogs come eight to the pound, and occasionally you'll see some symptom of wretched excess that comes four to the pound. If you've got 10,000 pounds of hot dogs, therefore, you know you've got 10,000 packages. A few packers deviate from this rule and give you, say, eight standard dogs per 12-ounce package, but they're in the minority.

The situation with bakers is a bit murkier. Here are some of the "explanations" you'll hear: (1) We do it that way because everybody else does. If we started doing ten to the package we'd have to charge more, consumers wouldn't notice they were getting more, and we'd lose business. Fine, but why did the first guy start packing eight? (2) There is something inherent in baking tray or oven design that makes ten impractical to produce. Not true. Continental Baking, maker of the Wonder brand and one of the largest companies in the industry, sells both eight-packs and ten-packs, depending on "consumer preferences and local market conditions." What this means is that if enough people want ten-packs and everybody else is selling them, Continental will too. St. Louis, for one, is said to be a big ten-pack town. (3) Ten-packs are a clumsy shape and tend to get broken up when they're tossed around on supermarket shelves. This is close to the truth, I think (see below), but obviously not that close, since Continental somehow manages to cope.

The true explanation, in my opinion, is that bakers just don't like tens. They prefer dozens, or more generally, multiples of three and four, notably four, six, eight, and twelve. These quantities lend themselves to compact packaging--three rows of four, two rows of three, two slabs of two by two (e.g., hamburger buns), and so on. Ten lends itself only to one row of ten or two rows of five, which are seldom compact shapes. Therefore, the baking mind-set--and here's where we start getting into anthropology--is such that you instinctively regard ten as an unwieldy number. When the pioneers of bun baking were trying to figure out how to package their product, they probably figured what the hey, eight makes a squarish package, so that's what we'll go with, without even considering the unique circumstances that made ten more appropriate. The situation has been allowed to continue because the Teeming Millions meekly submit to it. Oscar Mayer says that of the 50,000 or so consumer letters they get each year, only 10 or 15 complain about the hot dog/bun mismatch.

There are a few cynics, some of them employed in this office, who do not buy the preceding analysis, and indeed regard it with something approaching scorn. I pray for these people every night. Some of us, I guess, are capable of daring leaps of imagination; the rest, sadly, just pick nits.

--CECIL ADAMS

Answer 9

actual, i replaced into 4tunate 2 discover at Vons a kit of Ball Park warm dogs that had ate, an similar # of buns in yet another kit. i wager no longer all warm dogs or buns are bought interior an similar parts if u go searching. yet that is merely me.

Answer 10

i buy packs of 8 buns and 8 dogs...i guess i don't have to try and solve the mystery.