'This is ridiculous': 52-year-old sees 66% increase in local coffee price—and costs are up nationwide

In August 2025, Chuck Smith went to buy coffee at a Walmart in Rochester, Indiana. But something seemed off.

"I bent down to pick up the coffee and happened to notice the price," he tells CNBC Make It. "I thought, 'Do I spend that much money every time I buy the coffee?' It really caught me off guard."

He checked his receipts in the Walmart app and found that the 38.2-ounce Maxwell House he'd been buying for years rang up at $21.44 — nearly double the $12.94 he paid less than a year earlier, in October 2024.

Smith, 52, filmed a short TikTok video in the Walmart aisle comparing the two prices: "This is ridiculous," he says in the video. Within days, it had tens of thousands of views.

Walmart did not respond to a request for comment, and Kraft Heinz, the maker of Maxwell House, did not provide a statement by publication time.