3 On Your Side: Buying Batteries
By Jim Donovan
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- With the start of the holiday season just days away, kids are already making their toys lists and checking them twice.
And parents are making lists too. List of how many batteries they'll need, sizes AA to D.
But as 3 On Your Side consumer reporter Jim Donovan finds battery dependability and price don't always go hand in hand.
To power everything this holiday season from dinosaurs to fire trucks, you better have plenty of batteries. But which ones to pick?
In side by side performance checks, using flash lights and toys, Consumer Reports recently tested AA alkaline batteries from 9 brands.
Duracell's Quantum took the top spot, followed by the Duracell Coppertop.
Kirkland, the Costco store brand was third and the only battery to be named a Consumer Reports best buy.
And doing the math it's easy to see why.
The Duracell Quantum costs around 69 cents a battery, the Kirkland AA, 37 cents. That's almost half the cost. A potential savings of 32 cents each time you change the batteries in the TV or game remote.
Consumer Reports says CVS brand and Rayovac batteries also perform well without a big price tag.
Toy store owner Steven Josephson says it's a lesson he learned years ago.
"Duracell, Energizer, Everready; they're all too expensive. I find that batteries that don't have a name are just as good as batteries with a name," said Josephson.
By the way, contrary to any old wives tale that you may have heard, you don't have to store batteries in the refrigerator to prolong their life.