With food prices on the rise, buying generic or store brands can pay off. But do you lose taste value when you don't buy name brand? We put taste buds to the test to find out.

At the grocery store, brand name, generic, and store brand items share the shelves.

But most know, generic is in a league of its own when it comes to price. We wanted to find out which is king when it comes to pleasing the pallet?

We put three brand name products to the test against the competition.
Chips Ahoy cookies, Lays Potato Chips, and Coca Cola against the Kroger brand equivalent.

We put the products side by side and recruited hungry college students to take our exam.

"They really do taste pretty much the same," said one taste tester.

Our first subjects said there was no difference in the taste of the potato chips, or the cookies. But they thought Kroger's Big K cola brand tasted more like the real thing.

But overall, most said they could not tell the difference between the name brand and store brand products. In fact most people we tested said they could not tell the difference.

Five times the store brand was voted best.

We recruited ASU Economics Professor Barbara Coleman to give us some insight. She says research shows store brands can be a win win for many families.

"The best option often is the store brand. It has to be close to the name brand and often at a better price point," said Coleman.

The economics professor put the research to trial by taking our taste test. Even to her surprise, she preferred the store brand every time.

"It shows either I have a very unsophisticated pallet or there is really not a lot of difference between the name brand and the generic."

Fact or fiction? It's for your mouth to decide.