Why Purchase Individually Wrapped?

I was at the store a little while back and overheard a mother telling her son to get ONLY the individually packaged snacks to pack for his school lunches.  Really?  REALLY?  In some cases, I can see doing this, but in others, not so much.

For one, the price of getting pre-packaged, individually wrapped, snacks costs a whole lot more than buying in "bulk" and portioning them out yourself.  You're just paying for the extra packing material with the brand name slapped on in pretty colors.  The only time I could find this useful is to keep foods that I know I don't eat too much of, fresh.  Others would argue that it takes too much time out of their morning (WTF???) to pack them.

Anyway.  How do I combat this?  I purchase items that I know will be eaten before their "best by" date and portion them into smaller containers for easy, grab-n-go awesomeness.  I personally use the "Small Rounds" (1/2 cup) containers from Glad.  They hold up pretty well and I find them to be a great size for snacks.  Waste of time?  Nah.  It takes but 2 minutes to portion everything out.  o_O  Don't be lazy.

This week, I have honey mustard pretzel bits and trail mix.  For less than $2.00 for either, I was able to get 4 servings of trail mix (only because I bought the more expensive, non-raisin type of trail mix)  and 6 servings of pretzel bits.