Grocery prices are through the roof across the country, but a luxury California grocery store is charging $19 for a single strawberry. The strawberry, which is sold at Erewhon, went viral after influencer Alyssa Antoci posted a glowing review of the fruit on TikTok.
“OK, this is a $19 strawberry from Erewhon, so we’re going to eat it,” Antoci said in the video. “It’s from Kyoto, in Japan, and apparently it’s like the best-tasting strawberry in the entire world.” (Worth noting: Antoci’s family owns Erewhon.)
Antoci then removed the singular strawberry from its special case, noting that it’s “literally sitting on a little tray,” before taking a bite. “Wow. It’s the best strawberry. That’s crazy,” she said. “That is the best strawberry I’ve ever had in my life. I’m going to eat every last bit of it.”
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@alyssaantocii insane
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Erewhon is home to $21 smoothies and an $11 half loaf of bread, which means a $19 strawberry isn’t totally out of place for the organic and natural food chain. The company also sells a more reasonably-priced pound of organic strawberries for $10, so luckily this isn’t the only option for getting your berry fix in its stores.
But even Antoci admitted that the price is wild. “For one strawberry—$19 for one strawberry,” she said. Her post has nabbed nearly 16 million views and 12,300 comments, mostly from people who swear they’d never buy something like this.
Related: The Viral Erewhon Smoothie We Love to Make at Home
What People Are Saying About the Viral $19 Strawberry
“This is genuinely sad,” one person wrote. “Who else thinks Erewhon is a social experiment to see what some people will spend money on?” another chimed in.
The $19 strawberry is grabbing the attention of other shoppers, too. In a joint Instagram post, actress Samantha Wynn Greenstone and actor Jacob Hoff showed off an entire display of the specialty strawberries at Erewhon. “I’ve seen a lot of weird things at Erewhon but this is a new low. A single strawberry for $18.99,” Greenstone said in the video, before gesturing to the display.
The strawberry is from luxury Japanese fruit retailer Elly Amai, which also sells a $90 box of 15 artfully-arranged strawberries and a $95 Japanese musk melon. It’s not clear why the brand’s fruits are so pricey, although the company’s website says its products are the “highest-quality fruits from Japan’s most celebrated farms.” Representatives for Elly Amai and Erewhon didn’t respond to Parade’s request for comment by deadline.
Antoci shared in a follow-up TikTok video that the fruit “does taste like a strawberry but times, like, a thousand.” She added, “the taste is so strong and powerful.”
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@alyssaantocii let’s talk strawberries 🍓
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Despite the cost, apparently someone is buying these strawberries. The $90 pack is currently out of stock and Elly Amai revealed on the brand’s Instagram Story Tuesday that a new stock of berries are “about to board the flight to LA soon!”
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