The pace of inflation might be cooling, but you're still paying a whole lot more at the grocery store. In fact, a new report showing Christmas and holiday meal prices are up around seven % from this time last year. How are customers dealing with this, particularly during these holidays? Well, who better to ask than Stewart Leonard, Jr, President COO, CEO rather of Stewart. Stewart is great. Always great to see you during this time. When I see you, I know it's a festive time no matter what the economy is doing. You know firsthand, you're on the front lines of all of this. How are people making these adjustments?

Well, you know what? Look, prices have gone up, and just look at it even for us right now. We have to hire a tremendous amount of people. We have almost 3,000 people at Stewart. We've had to raise our starting rates $3 an hour. Our chefs, we've had to raise because of compression. We've had to increase that. For us to produce something, the cost is going up. Fuel prices have leveled out energy prices are still up. But as a family business that we have, we have to manage expenses and we try not to pass as much as we can. We try not to pass it on to the customer.

We just had a Democratic strategist on who brought up this issue. I don't think it's caught on, but they really have tried hard to blame all of this on greedflation. They're calling it greedflation. They've zeroed in on your industry more than any other industry. The grocery store saying these boxes of cereal keep getting smaller, the contents keep getting lighter, and the prices keep going up. Where is it all going? Everyone understood the supply-side issue, but they're saying that seems to be resolved. How come prices of food isn't coming down also?

Well, one thing, Charles, about our store, we're 80% fresh, so we're riding that commodity market. Look, you see all the produce behind us. Depending on the weather, prices will go up and down with certain products. But a lot of the price, if you go to a normal supermarket and you look at the center of the store, all of those big consumer product companies, there's been some substantial increases in just ketchup and mayonnaise and just things on the shelf like that. I think you're seeing a larger increase in prices over on those items, and you do more on the commodity side of it.

When you can control, you control. But some of that you're saying is obviously out of your hands. These prices are made somewhere else. But also, hey, listen, you make a fantastic point about the wages. We all want everyone to do better. People go out, they vote for higher minimum wages, but that ripples through the economy, and I don't think sometimes folks connect those dots.

Well, Charles, you know what? I'm all for giving great benefits, and we do that at Stewart. But we've had to raise our starting rate $3 an hour. That's a lot of money. You know, I can't absorb all of that. You got to pass a little bit of that along. But you know what? One thing that has gone up quite a bit, I'll show you, and this is your favorite right here, one of these guys right here.

I know you're going to bring one of those bad boys out. Yeah, hold on to that. I'll see you after the show.

We'll save this for you if you stop by the store. But meat prices are up probably the most right now. The herd sizes, I've talked to our ranchers out in the Midwest, they've had to reduce their herd sizes because there was a lot of drought and the cattle were having a difficult time out in the fields, feeding them and water and so forth. They've cut down on the herd sizes, supply and demand that's increased the price of beef a little bit. You're seeing an increase in beef for this holiday right now.

Stewart, one thing you always do is you always say, okay, there's alternatives. When someone goes to the supermarket and the price is higher, because Americans, particularly in a day like today, but always they want to find value, are you able to at least... What are people moving toward that's surprising you?

Well, you know what happens? Our suppliers want to increase their sales and everything, too. They're always offering us deals. If you put this on sale, if you put that on sale, we'll give you a deal on it. A lot of them, we pass along on our app that we use. I would encourage everybody when they go to the store, look at the different app deals that you can find on your phone. Look for the app deals. The other one is check out the private labels. There's some delicious private labels out there, and those are usually 20% less than your name brand private labels. A lot of times that company will be making those for Stewart or for other supermarkets like that. Check those things out right.

There for sure. Stewart, I just got 30 seconds. A big question right now, particularly on Wall Street, and it's got a lot of folks torn, is where is this economy going? Even the Federal Reserve itself doesn't seem to know. Everyone agrees that it's slowing, but do you feel like it's slowing so fast that we could actually trip into a recession?

Well, I don't know about that, Charles. People are spending right now, but you look at credit card debt, that's so high right now. We're noticing they're spending right now for Christmas and their New Year's holiday. We're selling wine, champagne, and people are buying right now. The question is, during the normal weeks, we usually find people are putting one less item in their shopping cart. They are watching what they're spending. They're buying what they need and not what they want.

Yeah. Stewart, Merry Christmas. You're fantastic. We always appreciate sharing these holidays with you. You always give us great insight. Thank you.

Hey, shall I hold this for you?

Hold on to it. I'll see you in about an hour and a half, depending on traffic.

That says Charles Payne.

All right.

Take it easy. Happy holidays. You too. Thanks a lot. Thank you, everybody.

Happy holidays. Hey, Sean Hannity here. Hey, click here to subscribe to Fox News YouTube page and catch our hottest interviews and most compelling analyzes. You will not get it anywhere else.