Dairy Farmer Reveals Why Walmart Great Value Milk Is Cheaper Than Other Brands: "There's More..."

From browsing the aisles in America’s arrays of dollar stores to loading a grocery shopping cart at Costco, cheaper prices are always alluring to customers. But what if two products, that are all but the same, come at starkly different prices? In a video that has been viewed nearly 5 million times, TikTok creator, Iowa Dairy Farmer (@iowadairyfarmer), revealed why there is an enormous price difference between Walmart’s “Great Value” milk and the milk from Prairie’s Farms brand. Turns out that the difference is exactly the same that appears in two cars of different brands, even though both have four wheels and engines.

The video opened with a stitched clip from a Walmart customer, who goes by the moniker @papastone101 on TikTok. “How can half a gallon of Prairie Farms milk be $3.96 and a whole gallon of Great Value milk be only $2.66?” the customer in the stitched clip asked people. “How can you pay less money and get twice as much?” he asks. “Why would anybody buy Prairie Farms? Is there a difference? I’m asking a serious question,” the customer added. At this moment, the video transitioned to show Iowa Dairy Farmer, the title for a man who is a dairy farmer and a cow caretaker.

“There’s one big caveat in the answer to this question,” the farmer said while walking inside a barn filled with cows. Elaborating on the reason behind the massive price difference, he said, “One of those containers of milk was whole milk, the Prairie Farms one. The other one was skimmed milk.” He explained that typically, whole milk costs more than skim milk, even if the two milk products are of the same brand. The reason why whole milk is costlier than skim milk is that “There's more in it, there's more fat in it, there's more nutrients and goodies there.”

Addressing the customer in the stitched clip, he said that comparing the prices of the two milk brands would be akin to comparing “apples and oranges.” Moving on, the farmer expressed his preference for Prairie Farms milk as the milk squeezed from his barn’s cows is usually supplied to this brand. But milk from other brands also comes from farms like his, he said. Therefore, even though he wouldn’t go on “trashing” every other milk brand and say that Prairie Farms milk is infinitely better, he is certainly a little biased about this brand.

The farmer continued the video by laying out several plus points in favor of Prairie Farms milk. Firstly, he said, what makes the company unique “is their average herd size is significantly smaller than Great Value or any other major brand out there.” Adding that their herd size is around 120 to 150 cows, he reflected that buying Prairie Farms milk would end up supporting family-owned farms, which make up almost 98% of all the farms. Wrapping up the video, he advised that when buying Great Value milk, customers can check which plant it came from, to assess its nutritional quality.

In the comments section, some people pointed out how the difference lies largely in the labels and not in the prices. Sometimes, one brand’s milk is sold with the other brand’s label, hence, confusing customers. @crazyfarmwife01 revealed that sometimes Walmart sells “Prairie Farms farmers’ milk with a Great Value label.” @jj883651 also shared, “When I worked at Dairy Fresh the Great Value milk was actually Dairy Fresh milk. They just put a different label on it and lowered the price.”

You can follow Iowa Dairy Farmer (@iowadairyfarmer) on TikTok for more content on dairy farming.