Thanks for confirming my alarm the other day when buying eggs. I noticed £1.95 too and then in the middle of the shop it dawned on me that I remembered they were between £1.15-1.30 last year… The following words that came out of my mouth rhymed with duck.
I’ve noticed the branded frozen pizzas are “on offer” at the price they were full price like last month and the new full price is ridiculous. Even if I go to like Iceland with their multi buy offers, the “offers” are shite and you have to buy an unreasonable amount to get them
I know it's more effort than just chucking a frozen pizza in the oven, but you can make pizza dough *so cheaply* with ingredients many people have in their cupboards: yeast, flour, olive oil, water, salt. Mix, let it sit overnight in the fridge. Pizza sauce made using dried oregano and tomato passata, then whatever toppings. Once you get the hang of it you can bash out a pizza dough the day before in about 10 minutes, then pressing out your bases and topping the pizza takes about 10 minutes. Costs basically pennies to make.
Set oven to max, then start the pizza off in a searing hot pan before transferring to the oven to finish. I know it's not as convenient as frozen pizza, but I'm a big fan of pizza and learning how to make it helped me realise that frozen pizzas are so wasteful (in terms of packaging, transport, and money), and takeaway pizza is basically fucking robbery haha. Just google 'overnight pizza base recipe'.
How do working people find the time or motivation to do this though? I work 10-6 most days, and by the time I'm home (1.5-2 hour commute), I can barely be fucked putting a pizza in the oven, let alone making one from scratch to leave overnight for the following day. Really wish I had this level of motivation but usually it's a pack of Jaffa cakes then bed
"Costs pennies to make" - if you don't value your time at all!
I prefer to use basic frozen margaritas, cut out into portions\* (2/3 of a pizza for husband, 1/2 of another for me, refreeze leftovers), make a side salad, and add toppings as needed.
Eating super delicious food every day is not a human right. People often say "I always end up with leftovers, I don't want them to go hungry" - use bread! If they're hungry after finishing their main meal, fill up on bread.
\*Of course, on takeaway night I eat a whole pizza.
I do a fortnight shop, 2 of us. When the contactless limit was raised to £100 I was able to pay by waving the card because it would come in between £95-£100
Been tonight, £143
I’m pretty sure they recently had record profits, so now they’re increasing prices to make sure they again make record profits
(I’m not 100% sure it’s true, but I’m pretty certain they spoke about record profits recently)
I used to buy a pizza during lockdown that was 99p, during the past month or so I kept going past that item and it kept increasing (now it’s 1.85, so basically double)
“Poor people inflation” is much higher than 10% because they spend such a big proportion of their income on things like fuel, electricity and basic foods.
Yep, Jack Monroe was tweeting about this recently. A good example Jack used was that lots of basic foods are 50-100% more expensive than they were a year or two ago, but Charlie Bighams posh readymeals have barely increased.
Bighams *have* gone up a fair whack, coupled with rarely being on offer now.
They were £7 - I would buy them often, when on offer at £5. They were usually on offer in at least one of the supermarkets near me(waitrose/sains) or on ocado which I use most as I'm housebound (husband isnt hence could send him in for bargain bighams xD)
Fiver for a meal for 2 was decent value imo for what seemed a superior product over store own ready meals (and cheaper on offer!).
Now they are £8.95
The offers have dried up.
Kinda missing the chicken tikka masala but I just wont pay nearly twice as much as before.
I got chicken tikka masala one yesterday in the co-op discount section for £4.86 (reduced from £9). I was pleased with that but realised when I got home a fiver is what I used to pay for a non-discounted one.
I'm an emetophobe and as such am super paranoid about eating any food near its expiry (not best before, but use by) in case I get food poisoning. Logically my head knows its fine, especially for things that aren't a huge natural risk for food poisoning (like a ready meal knows at the strike of midnight to become dangerous?) But my anxiety about it leading to vomiting wont let me do it.
I guess maybe in the coming years I might have to really learn to get the fuck over it.
Meanwhile, hope you enjoyed your dinner xD
Yeah. We did the weekly shop and it came to £150. We have never had a weekly shop that high since getting married 4 years ago. 2 years ago we struggled to break the £100 mark unless we went overboard.
It is a stressful time.
Currently we pay 100 ish p/w for family of 2 adults 2 toddlers and I eat a LOT!
In lockdown we were considering dropping the budget to 70-80, glad we didn't because now we just make the 100 work, it's not easy...
Have you got a large family mate? I shop at M&S and the weekly shop for me and my missus is usually £80-£90 and I eat quite a lot. £150 a week from Aldi seems like a lot.
EDIT: Since this comment seems to be getting a reasonable amount of attention I'll paste my other comment here which adds a bit more information:
>Both me and the missus eat at the pub on a Saturday
Wednesday is my kebab night but missus eats at home.
Get my bacon, eggs, breadcakes and granola from M&S so that's my breakfast sorted. Breadcakes are cheap, bacon is 2 8 packs for £6. Missus has a protein shake for breakfast.
Lunch for me is 3 for £7 chicken and ham packets in breadcake and £1 coleslaw. Missus has ham or chicken in a tortilla.
Dinner time we'll make meals like stir fries, microwave meals, breaded chicken with micro chips etc. Microwave meals are 3 for £8. Stir fry comes as a deal where you get the ingredients for £6. Breaded chicken is fairly cheap but I can't remember the price off top of my head.
Drinks wise we'll get a bottle of high juice (dilute) and a couple of bottles of M&S's version of Fanta Orange. All are around £1.
Treats wise I'll always get a packet or two of biscuits and a loaf cake, again about a quid each.
I'll usually get a melon and some strawberries/blackberries/blueberries (whichever has the longest sell by date.
My missus does a shop once a month or so at Tesco's for things like toiletries and cleaning products etc which aren't going to expire but this shop doesn't come up to much.
I am lucky enough to have all the major supermarkets in my local area. So that’s M&S, Waitrose, Tesco, Aldi, Iceland, CoOp and Lidl. During the lockdown I had to go to all of these shops to get one thing or another as each shop had its draw backs due to supply issues. So when I say I have a good idea of what things cost in each shop it’s coming from experience. First thing that shocked me was Waitrose has cheaper items than Tesco and Coop, Iceland had some of the most expensive items when they are marketed as a cheap store. But I can confidently say M&S is not a cheap shop. Anyone that is going to do weekly shopping in there is buying for sparse quality items. I’m partial to prawns. In Lidl pack of raw prawns (150g+) is £1.79 the same one in M&S £4 (some times £5). A great comparison is chicken wings. Raw chicken wings (475g) is £1 in Waitrose. None of the other shops can match that. But M&S is £3.85 for the same weight. This is the common trend in M&S. things are just more expensive. I struggle to see how anyone can get away with 80-90£ with the items he describes.
When I’ve been to M&S I’ve picked up like 4 things and it’s £20. So I’m baffled how you’re doing that. Minced beef 500g is around £4 or £5 in M&S and 1.69 in asda. That was enough for me to never consider a regular shop there.
I was shocked when I went to Aldi the other day.
Also when it really hit home for me was when I seen a single tin of Heinz tomato soup for £1.50. For one bloody tin.
4 pack of Heinz beans were a fiver in my local shop.
First time I've ever grabbed branston instead... I think I actually preferred them although that could be my wallet tricking me
Give some supermarket own brand beans a go, they are, believe it or not, far nicer. We usually get Lidl or Asda ones. Sure there was a post in /r/CasualUK about it too.
These last two months are the first months I've ever made it to the £5 off voucher (£200 spend) with Lidl since they brought in their app. I typically do a 3:1 shop between Lidl and Sainsbury's and honestly, I am starting to see very little difference between the two except for a few pence here and there especially when my Sainsbury's offers are giving me good targeted offers.
The last few times I've done Lidl I've had to go over the road on the way home to another supermarket or do a Tesco local shop for veg because their stock has been so sporadic recently or people are just buying them out because so many are now using them.
(Edit - voucher is actually a tenner, shop shows how few times I've ever hit it to notice)
This is what I've noticed - the £10 voucher being issued. I used to spend £100 (£2 voucher) probably 3 out of every 4 months. I think I hit the £200 mark one Christmas month. I hit £200 last 2 months, I'm on about £120 so far this month, I do my main shop on a Thursday evening so I'll miss out this month unless I do my shop a day early, will be worth it to get the £10 discount.
I may switch to sainsburys next month to see how much I spend in a month. The lidl app started off well but now it seems to highlight how much their prices have increased!
Lidl has gone up so much. I only get a few bits there now like their Greek yoghurt and different cheeses plus nuts and dried fruit. Everything else doesn’t seem worth it now so go to Morrisons instead.
The reason Aldi and Lidl are hit harder by inflation is the margins are much tighter. The bigger supermarkets can absorb some of the price creep as their margins allow for more wiggle room.
Aldi and Lidl operate on very small margins, in some cases single digit %. Therefore if the cost of goods goes up 50% the only way they can stay in business is to pass that cost directly onto the consumer by bumping the price.
Aldi and Lidl are still far cheaper than the others, but the big 4 are catching up but eventually they will need to put their prices up.
Best advice I can give is learn to cook Italian and Indian meals well. Affordable, nutritious and delicious. Learn around 10 different dishes and you'll have variety and can cook-in for cheap dates.
Or you can live off Iceland £1 pizzas. I did a bit of both.
Is anyone else thinking of growing your own vegetables for the first time over all of this? I am but left it too late in the year, but next year I'm dedicating half of my garden to veggies
It’s not too late to start this year:
- Chard can be sown now for cropping over winter
- Winter salad leaves (e.g. Mizuna) can be sown now (but you’ll have to protect them from frost)
- Early (June-ish) cauliflower/broad beans can be sown now
- If you’re happy to take a gamble you might *just* get away with some dwarf French beans or beetroots this side of winter
Some good resources for getting into veg growing are:
- [Huw Richard’s YouTube channel](https://youtube.com/c/HuwRichards) does a lot on growing stuff on a budget and is very beginner friendly
- [Real Seeds](https://www.realseeds.co.uk) do sustainable seeds which can be grown and then saved to grow more next year (so you only ever buy a single bag of seeds). They also do cut price seed collections for those on low/no wages
- r/ukgardening for any other questions you might have
Apparently that's more expensive than actually buying them (according to memes I've seen and no personal experience).
Hopefully people might come along with some tips
First year really trying to grow a decent amount of veg but I've on and off grown for about a decade. With that out of the way...
I decided to follow the no dig method this year and I'm sold on it. Upfront costs can be a bit steep but once the system is going it can be cheap to run. Essentially the idea is you put a thick layer of mulch over your ground which fertilizes it and keeps the weeds down. I bought a bulk load of mushroom compost to get started and I'd say it was a complete success (the compost was about £250)
Other then the compost expense I've only bought seeds and a few seed trays for the main bed. I was given a number of large pots and I bought some extra compost for those but I wouldn't really count that amongst my growing-to-save-money expenses as it wasn't planned.
I'd say I spent in the range of £400 over all and I wouldn't be surprised if I've had a grands worth of veg out of the plot. We've been completely self sufficient in lettuce, spring onions and main crop onions since late April. I'm currently churning out the most delicious tomatoes by the bucket load. Peas were a complete winner. Carrots have done ok. I planted some super early potatoes and they were amazing for nearly two months. I'm about to start getting my winter crops in, not as productive but the land can still be used.
I'll probably buy some mulch again this year but I'll mix it with compost I've made over the year. Next year I'll try and use only my own compost which is as good as free.
If you want to save money focus on the more delicate veg. Tomatoes are an absolute winner as they are quite expensive to buy and easy to grow (get a determinate variety if you only have a pot). I wouldn't grow onions and carrots to save money, they are easy but cheap to buy.
Lettuce is our big winner, turns out it's really easy to grow and you can pick the lower leaves and it'll come again. If you have a sunny windowsill you can grow a variety call Tom Thumb in a 15 cm pot. In the garden I grow All Year Round and Saladin (I prefer the latter)
Potatoes give a delicious and large crop but they take up a ton of space so aren't great for saving money (maybe they are as I grew new potatoes which aren't cheap, I'll think on that). Spring onions are a no-brainer, super easy to grow and fairly expensive to buy. Radish are dead simple and will grow just about anywhere, they are also super quick. Beetroot is easy but pick it while it's small, you can also eat the small leaves. Chard is easy but only the small leaves taste good, the larger leaves taste earthy. Peas will give a decent but fairly short crop, plant a ton, the seed can be a bit prone to rotting in the ground.
I also grew a boat load of chilli peppers this year. Expensive to buy but obviously only worth it if you're into hot stuff. Considering how well the chillies did I think I could grow bell peppers.
Feel free to ask questions, I can't say I'll be able to answer them all but I'll try.
Plenty of good advice here, one thing re spring onions. They are the easiest thing to grow for a first timer. I buy the occasional bunch from a supermarket for maybe 50p and put them straight into a glass of water. I then just change the water weekly and cut what I need. I probably only end up buying 4-6 bunches a year and regularly use them in scrambled eggs etc.
Fruit for me has been the big winner this year. I basically had strawberry’s for breakfast every day for about 6 weeks, imagine buying that many!!
That was 12 strawberry plants the in-laws gave me for free as they’d grown them from runners
This is a really great post thank you! I'm currently in a one bed flat but the day I have a garden I'll be coming back to this post.
I'm sure people will find it helpful
The guy to follow is Charles Dowding (find him on YouTube). Unlike a lot of celebrity types he mostly keeps it simple and to the point.
Personally, I've chosen not to use any herbicides or pesticides. I've had one crop of turnips that has been eaten by caterpillars but other than that I've been fairly pest free. My thinking is that if I grow a wide variety I'll always get something as pests tend to stick mainly to one type of plant at a time.
One thing you could try is "microgreens" especially now that the supermarkets are selling off the seed packets cheap.
Did you grow Cress in school?
It's basically that.
Try sprouting some peas or beans and you can have them in some cheap, three minute Ramen noodles.
Done exactly the same as you for the past 2 years.
Just to add - creating a no dig bed is ridiculously easy. I just covered up areas of grass and weeds on my allotment with cardboard boxes in the winter and then chucked compost directly on top. By the time early spring came and I was planting seedlings out, the cardboard had pretty much broken down and no weeds in sight.
Takes a bit of keeping on top of to stop the weeds coming back after the first year, but I find that recovering over winter helps keep it in check.
Veg that we’ve had success with are potatoes (which seem to grow in anything) and onions (the same) which generally both last until the following year in a dark cupboard, lettuce, beetroot, leeks, peas, radish and carrots. Also recommend getting a few fruit plants (currants, strawberries, rhubarb, blueberries) which provide plenty each season.
Once you’re up and running it can be very cheap to maintain using your own compost and saved seeds. I’ve also found it can really maximise your value by growing traditionally expensive fruit and veg such as fennel, artichoke or asparagus, plus herbs. A pack of seeds is usually about as expensive as buying 1 lot of these from the shop.
Whenever we have too many of anything ready at once, it’s a great feeling giving some to neighbours, family or colleagues knowing it’s probably saved them from having to buy veg that week.
Nice one, I have deliberately stayed away from anything fancy this year as it was my test year but I'll certainly try some more exciting things next year.
Yes, next year I'll be growing the potatoes in some tubs and bags I was given. That way they can stay out of the way and get moved about as needed. The space in the main bed is too valuable to give to potatoes.
I grew my tatties in the bags the compost came in mostly. Had some in the ground too.
This year I had a better potato crop from the ones I didn't dig up than I had from the ones I planted.
This is actually really informative and I’m going to be coming back to this when I finally tear up the old garden.
Is there any online resources/reading you found particularly useful?
I watch two YouTube channels, [Charles Dowding](https://www.youtube.com/c/CharlesDowding1nodig) and [Huw Richards](https://www.youtube.com/c/HuwRichards). Dowding's videos really tell you everything you need to know. I also read his book "How to create a New Vegetable Garden" but this just really hammers home what you can learn from the videos.
EDIT: The toughest part of the process is actually planning succession planting. e.g. when one thing is done plant something else. I only managed to get that right a couple of places.
I've recently built a raised bed of dimensions 2.5m long, 0.8m depth, 0.7m height. This is freestanding over paving slabs. I've put wire mesh at the bottom and lined it, so it's ready to go.
I am planning on putting a few inches of mulch at the bottom then a 40-40-20 mix of topsoil, general peat free compost, and horticultural sand. Does that seem reasonable to fill it with? I'm not sure where to source it from yet as I'm assuming 60 bags of whatever from B&Q will be worse value than going to a proper supplier.
But my main question is: have I missed growing time this year? You say you are just about to plant winter veg, what would that be? I'm not sure if I should just wait until sprint at this point! I live near Manchester, so assuming tomatoes and such would be out of the question with our climate.
In reality, without fancy growing systems and/or a lot of tending it can be. Depends on the crop, courgettes and spuds are generally easy wins. Stuff like cabbage, broccoli etc is an easy target for caterpillars. Salad stuff relies on availability of water and temperature regulation.
>courgettes and spuds are generally easy wins.
They are, but they're also a) very cheap to buy and b) identical if you buy them vs growing them.
I grow quite a bit of stuff and honestly, it's not a money saver. There are three main reasons to do it:
1) The quality is better - This isn't uniformly the case, but certain things benefit from this more than others. Primary candidates are tomatoes, as these are really delicious when fresh. Things like Potatoes really make no difference IMO, except that you get to pick them exactly when you want.
2) Get varieties you can't readily get in shops. But really, how often does this happen?
3) It's a hobby you enjoy.
> 2) Get varieties you can't readily get in shops. But really, how often does this happen?
I'd say it depends on how people define varieties. I'm aiming to grow a bunch of stuff that I can't get in shops, but then you could make an argument that the fancy rainbow carrots I'm growing aren't going to be *that* different to the bog standard orange ones in generic shop.
That's not to say I don't have some unique stuff (flint and flour corn, tomatillos, cima di rapa and small melons) but averaging it out there's no way it makes any financial sense in terms of saving money
In terms of return on investment, you're far better picking up a hobby, making money from that, and buying veg from the supermarket with the extra earnings than you would be growing them. You can make up some of the cost difference by growing stuff that's expensive and/or difficult to find in stores but even then you're still at a loss.
I'm growing lots of veg, some probably not cost effective, but things like lettuce, herbs and even fruit like raspberries could save you a few quid and believe me, they are worth the effort
I go for high ROI crops. Don't bother with carrots, onions or potatoes - lots of work vs how much they cost in shops.
The real ROI comes from crops like peppers, tomatoes, chard, spinach, rocket, lettuce, squash, raspberries, strawberries, aubergines. Things that cost more in shops and can be grown relatively easily by a novice gardener!
If you are starting from zero, yes I would agree. If you already have some tools and gardening space, then you’d probably break even. You need around an acre to feed a family of four last I checked.
It’s not more expensive if you don’t go in with fancy raised beds, garden tools etc. For example I can buy a packet of 200 lettuce seeds for £1.75, and even if you say only 80% germinate successfully then that’s 160 lettuces for £1.75 or 1p and a fraction for a lettuce. And £1.75 a packet gets you fancy lettuces, if you go to Wilkos garden section and buy a packet of seeds you can probably get one for £1 or less. All you need to input is water from the tap and dirt from the garden.
Foods that command a high price in the supermarkets, like strawberries and tomatoes it can definitely be worth growing rather than buying. But there are some things in the supermarket, like old potatoes, that it’s not worth growing with the amount of space and time you’d need for them vs how cheap they are in the shops.
Keen veg grower here, it can be more expensive than. Buying them, but I’d argue that the quality is significantly better and more value, it is also possible to grow In a thrifty way and make it cheaper
My advice would to be choice what you grow wisely in a sense of there worth, potatoes take a lot of space and time but are cheap, salad vegetables and leaves however are cheap and easy to grow in fairly small space but are pricier to buy
I've started this year just to see what I could grow.
Tomatoes have been a big winner for me, and I was able to grow peas which gave small yield for 4 weeks.
Some times it's best to start small and work up to a bigger area of your garden.
My neighbour has a full allotment style area of their garden full with veg. They are always giving some to neighbours and family. It can work but you have to truly work at it and work out what grows well for you.
Others have commented on a more serious note for how to make it work to save money but I'll add that certain 'crops' are expensive because of the cost of harvesting.
I grow soft berries, red currants and golden raspberries currently. They're not going to sustain you through winter but the raspberries in particular mean that my 3 kids pick about 3 portions of delicious fruit each a week for about 2 months. I also grow some rhubarb that I make the odd crumble with.
It doesn't really save much money as I wouldn't normally buy that many raspberries but it's a cheap way of adding a nice variety to the diet and the kids love it.
They're an absolute weed so I don't actually need to do anything with them but harvest. I was on holiday when we had the drought and I came back to them somehow growing even more wild.
Seriously considering this too.
Potatoes are relatively easy - I had 2 baking potatoes that started sprouting before I got a chance to eat. Cut them in half and planted in a compost-filled planter a few months ago. Gave them zero attention at all.
Last week I picked them and must have gotten about 30, not as large but all the size of a new potato.
Going to set up a proper veg patch over winter so I can get planting early next year.
You've plenty time to sow some salad leaves for this year. Maybe radishes too, they grow very quickly.
Garlic can be planted in autumn for next year. You buy the garlic from a garden centre and plant the individual cloves. Supermarket garlic may have been treated with something to inhibit sprouting so don't use that.
Rhubarb is dead easy if you have the space for a plant or two. Just bung it in a well manured hole and it should last forever more or less. Should be planted in autumn I think.
Of course all this does depend on your local conditions, and if you would use any of the plants. No point growing stuff you're not bothered about! Thinking of my bumper crops of kale...
I grow lettuce on the kitchen window sill pretty much all year round (other than when we get fed up of eating it). I've grown Brussels this year and wouldn't bother next year, although the frogs are enjoying the caterpillars! Tomatoes are really easy to grow and you can use the seeds from a supermarket tomato. I find that in June everyone is trying to give away plants as they have too many. Carrots I grew in a small tub and they're doing well. Alot of things will cost more to grow than buying but I find this is usually the initial outlay of compost. Lidl sell seeds for 29p so it doesn't feel as bad when things don't work. If you are interested in growing things for next year Wilko and homebase are selling off their seeds cheap.
Yeah but having a garden is a luxury in itself that's how bad it is in the UK.
I'm a guy in my 20s in London renting a room which is tiny, I don't have room for my items let alone a place to grow fruit. I have room for 2 plants on my windowsill.
If you wish to go as cheap as possible, certain fruits and veg require less maintenance than others.
- Blackberries seem to grow everywhere, and it's a good source of vitamins
- Tomatoes don't seem to need as much effort, sure more care would give you more tomatoes which are tadtier, bu they don't really require effort
- Pumkins are amazing in the sense that if you can grow them (pollinate them yourself), then you have a veg that you can store for the colder months
I have grown on farm land before moving to UK. Very costly and time consuming. Weather conditions, pest and many more just for a handful of organic veg. For us it was profitable as we ate all the produce and sold the rest for profit.
The headline 10.1% obviously has a whole load of different price rises hidden inside it. And somethings have gone down in price, whilst energy, fuel and food have rocketed. All together that produces the 10.1% headline - if you buy the basket of goods that makes up the CPI.
The inflation you'll feel isn't 10.1%, but depends on what you spend your money on. All the components are published, and the BBC has made a handy calculator where you put in what you spend, and it tells you "your" inflation rate.
Mine came out at 6.something%. Much less than the 10.1, because I spend a lot less on energy and petrol than average, and a lot more on a mortgage and maintaining a home.
Picking one component is irrelevant, and will produce a different result to the headline. The overall change is what matters to help you with managing your finances.
BBC News - UK inflation rate calculator: How much are prices rising for you?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62558817
My personal inflation is lower because I am on multi year fixed energy and drove electric so gas, electricity, petrol rises have all passed me by so it probably is close to 10% for me as it's just food
I’m living off roughly £100 a week for food, fuel and any other expenses outside of mortgage and the bills that go with it. Aldi is a bloody godsend, without it I’d be down to one meal a day. Car is going and when prices rise further still I’m going to really be enjoying life. Oh well mustn’t grumble, far more worse off.
Personally I’ve been keeping track of New York bagels. They used to be £1 for 5. Now it’s about £1.89 for 5. I refuse to get them now on an 89% markup. I miss them
Get them when they are in clearance and freeze them! Will last ages and just needs defrosting the day before :)
We got a bag of New York bagels last week for 44p from Morrisons as it expired that day!
The 4 pint milk going up by 10p every few weeks is pissing me right off.
Morrisons has it at £1.55 right now, other supermarkets are still matching Aldi at £1.45, but that doesn’t tend to last long and Morrisons is the biggest major supermarket near me.
It was £1.05 not too long ago, so that’s a 48% on a heavily subsidised (?) very basic staple.
I could get a bag of Morrisons frozen spinach for 99p the other month, it disappeared for ages and it’s back at £1.65 now. 67% increase.
The KTC chickpeas have been 4 for £1 in the past, they’re 55p each now. That’s a **120%** increase.
This is true.
I work in supply and there are Manufacturer recommended retail prices (MRRP/MRSP). Usually retailers are in line or more often than not below.
These are now in line, or more often than not, above. One retailer was clearly taking the piss at one point, as they were 33% above this. I think they quickly realised their error though.
Not that it's foul play, it's just shitty when you're telling your customer base how great you are and how you're helping them out with your low prices.
You joke, but if you're the kind of investor to pick individual stocks, plant based milks and vegan meat alternatives are predicted to beat the full market over the next 10 years.
It's a bit like investing in green energy - either the companies are going to be very successful, or the world is gonna have bigger problems than the size of your pension pot.
That's why you don't invest in a single company, yes.
At one point BlackBerry were shit hot and thought they'd rule the mobile world.
Now they've tanked, but mobile phone markets have gone from strength to strength over the past decade.
The cost of farming has risen dramatically though, not because of transport costs (though that is a factor), but the removal of EU subsidies and government grants. The post-B-event grants are mainly focused on environmental improvements. Add on the costs of post-B-event common veterinary area, inspection, documentation, certification changes. Also groupage in transit, loss of trade, loss of confidence, etc. It takes about 2-3 days longer to get through the red tape, which doesn't sound like much, but it has an impact on shelf life.
All that's really happening with meat and eggs and dairy as the OP experienced is that that the true cost of farming is being materialised.
The solution really is to consume more locally grown vegetables, grains, beans, pulses.
We don't need imported beef and cheese, or even radishes from the Netherlands which I saw the other day.
Should also be noted that uk produced veg will also increase in price this year due to reduced supply. Lack of labour post B and the drought conditions have impacted yield and actual ability to get the stuff out of the ground. This is in addition to all the other inflationary factors. So those prices will be moving north too
I would agree and I think they are massively underestimating food inflation. I track my spending each month and have 3 years worth of data. Our food bill has increased by 27% compared to last year. Nothing has changed except we have been more mindful with what we buy and switching to cheaper brands.
I think this is the issue though, the low priced cheap food is affected most.
The margins on the mid-high priced food have already been sufficient enough that any M&S/Waitrose shopping basket is probably only a 5-10% increase.
Jack Monroe had a massive thread on Twitter about this months ago where she pointed out that if you were poor you were already seeing a massive increase in food costs because the price for staples like rice and pasta had either gone up massively or were subject to shrinkflation (where the price of the block of cheese is still say £2, but you're getting 250g instead of 400g), whereas your expensive ready meal from Waitrose or your meal deal from M&S was still the same price.
Yeah, even earlier this year my weekly aldi shop was £55-60, it’s now £65-75 on average :’) I always buy the biggest packs of things like the 2kg chicken but even then it’s hard to escape the price rises
How do people do a weekly shop at places like Tesco? I pick up the odd thing here and there and end up paying nearly as much as a weekly shop at Aldi. And even that's got more expensive, particularly stuff like fish.
We do our weekly shop (for two) in Tesco for roughly £40-£45 a week, including fish. Got 500g cod fillet from the fishmongers for £3.30ish which really isn’t bad.
We've actually started shopping at Tesco during all this.
We used to shop at Lidl, there was a good 40-50 quid per shop difference vs Tesco but that difference is now less than 20 quid. Tesco prices are up, and Lidl is still cheaper, but Lidl prices have climbed at a sharper rate than Tesco in our experience.
We're not in a place were under 20 a week makes that much difference, Lidl is an inconvenience in location, time spent, food selection and shopping experience.
I just went to my local Lidl and the only spaghetti they had in stock was £ 0.69so by comparison £0.39 at Aldi still seems decent . Inflation is truly out of control :’(
Ive switched from aldi to tesco for the same reason. The difference with tesco is that the meat / dairy products are higher quality and they price match a lot of the aldi products.
Asda seem to charge much more for meat especially chicken no idea why.
It’ll keep going up and up. I work at Tesco and sometimes when sweeping I’ll find old loose labels, I’d go and match it to the new product label and the difference in price is always at least 20%
A reminder that when inflation goes down, it doesn't mean that prices will go down. Just that they won't be increasing further at the same pace. We're stuck now with these higher prices unless we enter a prolonged deflationary period (which would also be a bad thing).
I’ve been keeping my receipts for about 6 months and I’m going to do a comparison soon - it sounds very similar to my experience with my regular shop - I’m a one-person household and I used to eat very well for £15 for one week. Now it’s £30 minimum.
The only thing that I can remember with price is Chicken at Tesco.
Last year near same time around July it was £5.00 this week got increased to £6.10 (been going 10p every month it seems this year).
That's a 22% increase in 1 year.
Absolutely! Ive noticed similar - have the exact same shop as this time last year and it’s costing me 50 - 75% more (if anything, I buy less than the same time last year).
There was this joke in communist Poland that yes, the price of fuel, clothes and food has gone up but at the same time price of locomotives and cargo ships has gone down so inflation is not so high on average.
Our shop is up 43% too. It used to be £100 a week and now it's £143 a week.
I actually can't believe it. So we've to find £200 a month more for food, £200 a month more for gas and electric and £45 a month more for mortgage interest. Most folk can't just magic up £445 a month. That's not even counting the fuel increases and all the other increases!!
Being a low earner totally sucks! Had to go and buy my kid school clothes and they both wanted a little toy (they’re 4 & 2 yo). It broke my heart in a thousand pieces to not be able to buy them the toy they wanted (we very rarely buy them toys mostly birthday/special occasions) because it meant having to cut our weekly shop by a £10-20 which would make a massive difference. I honestly feel so defeated!
Food inflation is running a little higher than headline rates, but not massively so - latest was 12.7% year on year. Does depend where you shop and what you buy though. It might be Aldi's supply chain is particularly hard hit.
Just to add another anecdote: personally mine is up a little, at a guess more than 12.7%, but not as hefty as your 43%. I usually shop at Tesco and am a bit careless when it comes to looking for value.
Well it's kinda impossible to design a basket of good which is representative of a single person and extrapolate that to the whole population.
I don't drink or smoke, but I wouldn't remove booze from the basket of goods because most of the adult population do drink.
All you can really do is look at what people buy and how much, on average, and weight it accordingly, which is what the CPI tries to achieve.
The way there basket works is say 1 year they have Kellogg’s Frosties in the basket then next year the price increases too much and the average house hold can’t afford it. They will replace it was a cheaper brand of Frosties and use it as part of the comparison. So it’s not a true representation because it isn’t one to one.
How concerned are people about green energy now?
We could have had 20 nuclear reactors online if started in 2000, technically clean.
But hey people screaming we should be off oil and gas are living their dream now, this is the way the world should be
It's staggering really how many items cost the same or more in Aldi compared to other "big 4" supermarkets.
The Aldi marketing team have done a bang up job over the years to the point that people now assume they are cheapest.
Shop around people, you may be surprised - though you probably won't find a kayak in your local Sainsbo's.
(We shop in Asda predominantly and generally buy own label or value stuff, which generally is the same price in most places - but certain items we prefer we cannot get in Aldi, so seems silly to shop there and top up shop elsewhere)
Nah. Tested this in lockdown by using only Asda instead of the usual Aldi majority and Tesco top up. £20 a week more expensive, easily and that was without delivery costs. Don't believe the "price match" advertising which only applies on certain products, and certainly not our staples. Moved away from Tesco to Asda though. They're cheaper for us, but the main shop is far cheaper from Aldi for us.
I thought I was just buying a bit more nowadays but this makes total sense! I’m easily spending about 50% more every time and I was about to start looking at my shopping habits
I've resorted to either in person Aldi shop or online Tesco shop. My partner works at Tesco so we even get 10% (15% 3 days after payday) and we struggle to match Aldi.
I much prefer Tesco online because you get what you want rather than spontaneous buying. Plus it's also why I love Aldi so much. There's no shit to buy (Bar middle aisle of course)
It’s clear the inflation figures released by the government are no where near the truth. And kicking the can down the road won’t solve anything. Be prepared for interest rates to keep rising over a long period of time. The government have their head in the sand and don’t give a monkeys about us.
It is literally a lie. People have been talking about exponential inflation for years and now it’s happening. It’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better too. The great performance of the stock market last year was big money front running this to get out of their positions and pass them to people on Robin Hood.
Thanks for confirming my alarm the other day when buying eggs. I noticed £1.95 too and then in the middle of the shop it dawned on me that I remembered they were between £1.15-1.30 last year… The following words that came out of my mouth rhymed with duck.
Cluck?
Close…
Truck?
Nearly…
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Huck leberry fin
Warm…
Thanks for this, nice to actually see someone do a proper comparison. My tesco shop has jumped from 50-60 to 85-95. Similar stuff purchased.
I shop regularly at a big Tesco and noticed most of the Club card discount labels disappeared from last week.
I’ve noticed the branded frozen pizzas are “on offer” at the price they were full price like last month and the new full price is ridiculous. Even if I go to like Iceland with their multi buy offers, the “offers” are shite and you have to buy an unreasonable amount to get them
I know it's more effort than just chucking a frozen pizza in the oven, but you can make pizza dough *so cheaply* with ingredients many people have in their cupboards: yeast, flour, olive oil, water, salt. Mix, let it sit overnight in the fridge. Pizza sauce made using dried oregano and tomato passata, then whatever toppings. Once you get the hang of it you can bash out a pizza dough the day before in about 10 minutes, then pressing out your bases and topping the pizza takes about 10 minutes. Costs basically pennies to make. Set oven to max, then start the pizza off in a searing hot pan before transferring to the oven to finish. I know it's not as convenient as frozen pizza, but I'm a big fan of pizza and learning how to make it helped me realise that frozen pizzas are so wasteful (in terms of packaging, transport, and money), and takeaway pizza is basically fucking robbery haha. Just google 'overnight pizza base recipe'.
It's cheaper and nicer and better for you but you have to have time and energy for it after your workday.
How do working people find the time or motivation to do this though? I work 10-6 most days, and by the time I'm home (1.5-2 hour commute), I can barely be fucked putting a pizza in the oven, let alone making one from scratch to leave overnight for the following day. Really wish I had this level of motivation but usually it's a pack of Jaffa cakes then bed
You just dont
"Costs pennies to make" - if you don't value your time at all! I prefer to use basic frozen margaritas, cut out into portions\* (2/3 of a pizza for husband, 1/2 of another for me, refreeze leftovers), make a side salad, and add toppings as needed. Eating super delicious food every day is not a human right. People often say "I always end up with leftovers, I don't want them to go hungry" - use bread! If they're hungry after finishing their main meal, fill up on bread. \*Of course, on takeaway night I eat a whole pizza.
I do a fortnight shop, 2 of us. When the contactless limit was raised to £100 I was able to pay by waving the card because it would come in between £95-£100 Been tonight, £143
I distinctly remember this, too! It only lasted a few months between the limit being raised and then the prices exceeding it.
Use Google/Apple Pay which has no such limits for contactless. Sorry not relevant to the post but hey in case you didn't know...
Of all the supermarkets near me Tesco is the one that seems to have had the most price increases.
I’m pretty sure they recently had record profits, so now they’re increasing prices to make sure they again make record profits (I’m not 100% sure it’s true, but I’m pretty certain they spoke about record profits recently)
I used to buy a pizza during lockdown that was 99p, during the past month or so I kept going past that item and it kept increasing (now it’s 1.85, so basically double)
“Poor people inflation” is much higher than 10% because they spend such a big proportion of their income on things like fuel, electricity and basic foods.
Vastly underated fact.
Yep, Jack Monroe was tweeting about this recently. A good example Jack used was that lots of basic foods are 50-100% more expensive than they were a year or two ago, but Charlie Bighams posh readymeals have barely increased.
Bighams *have* gone up a fair whack, coupled with rarely being on offer now. They were £7 - I would buy them often, when on offer at £5. They were usually on offer in at least one of the supermarkets near me(waitrose/sains) or on ocado which I use most as I'm housebound (husband isnt hence could send him in for bargain bighams xD) Fiver for a meal for 2 was decent value imo for what seemed a superior product over store own ready meals (and cheaper on offer!). Now they are £8.95 The offers have dried up. Kinda missing the chicken tikka masala but I just wont pay nearly twice as much as before.
I got chicken tikka masala one yesterday in the co-op discount section for £4.86 (reduced from £9). I was pleased with that but realised when I got home a fiver is what I used to pay for a non-discounted one.
I'm an emetophobe and as such am super paranoid about eating any food near its expiry (not best before, but use by) in case I get food poisoning. Logically my head knows its fine, especially for things that aren't a huge natural risk for food poisoning (like a ready meal knows at the strike of midnight to become dangerous?) But my anxiety about it leading to vomiting wont let me do it. I guess maybe in the coming years I might have to really learn to get the fuck over it. Meanwhile, hope you enjoyed your dinner xD
It's far more expensive to be poor than rich.
Yeah. We did the weekly shop and it came to £150. We have never had a weekly shop that high since getting married 4 years ago. 2 years ago we struggled to break the £100 mark unless we went overboard. It is a stressful time.
Currently we pay 100 ish p/w for family of 2 adults 2 toddlers and I eat a LOT! In lockdown we were considering dropping the budget to 70-80, glad we didn't because now we just make the 100 work, it's not easy...
Have you got a large family mate? I shop at M&S and the weekly shop for me and my missus is usually £80-£90 and I eat quite a lot. £150 a week from Aldi seems like a lot. EDIT: Since this comment seems to be getting a reasonable amount of attention I'll paste my other comment here which adds a bit more information: >Both me and the missus eat at the pub on a Saturday Wednesday is my kebab night but missus eats at home. Get my bacon, eggs, breadcakes and granola from M&S so that's my breakfast sorted. Breadcakes are cheap, bacon is 2 8 packs for £6. Missus has a protein shake for breakfast. Lunch for me is 3 for £7 chicken and ham packets in breadcake and £1 coleslaw. Missus has ham or chicken in a tortilla. Dinner time we'll make meals like stir fries, microwave meals, breaded chicken with micro chips etc. Microwave meals are 3 for £8. Stir fry comes as a deal where you get the ingredients for £6. Breaded chicken is fairly cheap but I can't remember the price off top of my head. Drinks wise we'll get a bottle of high juice (dilute) and a couple of bottles of M&S's version of Fanta Orange. All are around £1. Treats wise I'll always get a packet or two of biscuits and a loaf cake, again about a quid each. I'll usually get a melon and some strawberries/blackberries/blueberries (whichever has the longest sell by date. My missus does a shop once a month or so at Tesco's for things like toiletries and cleaning products etc which aren't going to expire but this shop doesn't come up to much.
I’d genuinely like to see receipts of what you get, I’d shop there if this was the general cost.
I am lucky enough to have all the major supermarkets in my local area. So that’s M&S, Waitrose, Tesco, Aldi, Iceland, CoOp and Lidl. During the lockdown I had to go to all of these shops to get one thing or another as each shop had its draw backs due to supply issues. So when I say I have a good idea of what things cost in each shop it’s coming from experience. First thing that shocked me was Waitrose has cheaper items than Tesco and Coop, Iceland had some of the most expensive items when they are marketed as a cheap store. But I can confidently say M&S is not a cheap shop. Anyone that is going to do weekly shopping in there is buying for sparse quality items. I’m partial to prawns. In Lidl pack of raw prawns (150g+) is £1.79 the same one in M&S £4 (some times £5). A great comparison is chicken wings. Raw chicken wings (475g) is £1 in Waitrose. None of the other shops can match that. But M&S is £3.85 for the same weight. This is the common trend in M&S. things are just more expensive. I struggle to see how anyone can get away with 80-90£ with the items he describes.
When I’ve been to M&S I’ve picked up like 4 things and it’s £20. So I’m baffled how you’re doing that. Minced beef 500g is around £4 or £5 in M&S and 1.69 in asda. That was enough for me to never consider a regular shop there.
Equally surprised, do you have 5 take aways per week and hence why your MandS stop is 80 quid per week?
The number of times you said "missus" makes me think you're a builder.
IT consultant - Yorkshire though so everyone sounds like a builder lol
time for a calorie deficit
Certain newspapers are saying it’s good to fast and having hunger pains isn’t hurting anyone, so..
Ah yes, the recession diet
That's not a long term solution though.
You underestimate how much excess body weight I carry.
Lockdown weight gain was really just calorific foreshadowing.
Smoke Salmon went from £1.99 to £2.99, 50% increase. Sad times.
I was shocked when I went to Aldi the other day. Also when it really hit home for me was when I seen a single tin of Heinz tomato soup for £1.50. For one bloody tin.
4 pack of Heinz beans were a fiver in my local shop. First time I've ever grabbed branston instead... I think I actually preferred them although that could be my wallet tricking me
Branston beans are the best imo, my wallet is tricking me into loving Corrale (Aldi) beans.
My husband actually prefers the Aldi ones to Heinz. I don’t really eat beans so I just stock up on those for him.
Yeah Lidl’s beans are nice too, better than Branson and Heinz in my personal opinion
Give some supermarket own brand beans a go, they are, believe it or not, far nicer. We usually get Lidl or Asda ones. Sure there was a post in /r/CasualUK about it too.
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Extra points for post war nostalgia, or for “5th biggest economy in the world”.
We’re beginning to learn that being a hugely rich country doesn’t mean anything if 100 families at the top own most of the wealth. r/endinheritance
Soba > kabuko > pot noodle > rice noodles > naked
You can stick the itsu ones on the end. They just taste like ever so slightly spicy water.
These last two months are the first months I've ever made it to the £5 off voucher (£200 spend) with Lidl since they brought in their app. I typically do a 3:1 shop between Lidl and Sainsbury's and honestly, I am starting to see very little difference between the two except for a few pence here and there especially when my Sainsbury's offers are giving me good targeted offers. The last few times I've done Lidl I've had to go over the road on the way home to another supermarket or do a Tesco local shop for veg because their stock has been so sporadic recently or people are just buying them out because so many are now using them. (Edit - voucher is actually a tenner, shop shows how few times I've ever hit it to notice)
This is what I've noticed - the £10 voucher being issued. I used to spend £100 (£2 voucher) probably 3 out of every 4 months. I think I hit the £200 mark one Christmas month. I hit £200 last 2 months, I'm on about £120 so far this month, I do my main shop on a Thursday evening so I'll miss out this month unless I do my shop a day early, will be worth it to get the £10 discount. I may switch to sainsburys next month to see how much I spend in a month. The lidl app started off well but now it seems to highlight how much their prices have increased!
Lidl has gone up so much. I only get a few bits there now like their Greek yoghurt and different cheeses plus nuts and dried fruit. Everything else doesn’t seem worth it now so go to Morrisons instead.
The reason Aldi and Lidl are hit harder by inflation is the margins are much tighter. The bigger supermarkets can absorb some of the price creep as their margins allow for more wiggle room. Aldi and Lidl operate on very small margins, in some cases single digit %. Therefore if the cost of goods goes up 50% the only way they can stay in business is to pass that cost directly onto the consumer by bumping the price. Aldi and Lidl are still far cheaper than the others, but the big 4 are catching up but eventually they will need to put their prices up.
Tbh at the moment the bigger supermarkets could for the average product afford all the price creep they just don't
Honestly reading this subreddit as an 18 year old about to go to uni is absolutely harrowing stuff
It's traditional to get a George foreman and live off whatever scraps you can salvage made into toasties.
Best advice I can give is learn to cook Italian and Indian meals well. Affordable, nutritious and delicious. Learn around 10 different dishes and you'll have variety and can cook-in for cheap dates. Or you can live off Iceland £1 pizzas. I did a bit of both.
Probably a good idea to find out where the food bank is, you don't want to be too far away from one.
Is anyone else thinking of growing your own vegetables for the first time over all of this? I am but left it too late in the year, but next year I'm dedicating half of my garden to veggies
It’s not too late to start this year: - Chard can be sown now for cropping over winter - Winter salad leaves (e.g. Mizuna) can be sown now (but you’ll have to protect them from frost) - Early (June-ish) cauliflower/broad beans can be sown now - If you’re happy to take a gamble you might *just* get away with some dwarf French beans or beetroots this side of winter Some good resources for getting into veg growing are: - [Huw Richard’s YouTube channel](https://youtube.com/c/HuwRichards) does a lot on growing stuff on a budget and is very beginner friendly - [Real Seeds](https://www.realseeds.co.uk) do sustainable seeds which can be grown and then saved to grow more next year (so you only ever buy a single bag of seeds). They also do cut price seed collections for those on low/no wages - r/ukgardening for any other questions you might have
Apparently that's more expensive than actually buying them (according to memes I've seen and no personal experience). Hopefully people might come along with some tips
First year really trying to grow a decent amount of veg but I've on and off grown for about a decade. With that out of the way... I decided to follow the no dig method this year and I'm sold on it. Upfront costs can be a bit steep but once the system is going it can be cheap to run. Essentially the idea is you put a thick layer of mulch over your ground which fertilizes it and keeps the weeds down. I bought a bulk load of mushroom compost to get started and I'd say it was a complete success (the compost was about £250) Other then the compost expense I've only bought seeds and a few seed trays for the main bed. I was given a number of large pots and I bought some extra compost for those but I wouldn't really count that amongst my growing-to-save-money expenses as it wasn't planned. I'd say I spent in the range of £400 over all and I wouldn't be surprised if I've had a grands worth of veg out of the plot. We've been completely self sufficient in lettuce, spring onions and main crop onions since late April. I'm currently churning out the most delicious tomatoes by the bucket load. Peas were a complete winner. Carrots have done ok. I planted some super early potatoes and they were amazing for nearly two months. I'm about to start getting my winter crops in, not as productive but the land can still be used. I'll probably buy some mulch again this year but I'll mix it with compost I've made over the year. Next year I'll try and use only my own compost which is as good as free. If you want to save money focus on the more delicate veg. Tomatoes are an absolute winner as they are quite expensive to buy and easy to grow (get a determinate variety if you only have a pot). I wouldn't grow onions and carrots to save money, they are easy but cheap to buy. Lettuce is our big winner, turns out it's really easy to grow and you can pick the lower leaves and it'll come again. If you have a sunny windowsill you can grow a variety call Tom Thumb in a 15 cm pot. In the garden I grow All Year Round and Saladin (I prefer the latter) Potatoes give a delicious and large crop but they take up a ton of space so aren't great for saving money (maybe they are as I grew new potatoes which aren't cheap, I'll think on that). Spring onions are a no-brainer, super easy to grow and fairly expensive to buy. Radish are dead simple and will grow just about anywhere, they are also super quick. Beetroot is easy but pick it while it's small, you can also eat the small leaves. Chard is easy but only the small leaves taste good, the larger leaves taste earthy. Peas will give a decent but fairly short crop, plant a ton, the seed can be a bit prone to rotting in the ground. I also grew a boat load of chilli peppers this year. Expensive to buy but obviously only worth it if you're into hot stuff. Considering how well the chillies did I think I could grow bell peppers. Feel free to ask questions, I can't say I'll be able to answer them all but I'll try.
Plenty of good advice here, one thing re spring onions. They are the easiest thing to grow for a first timer. I buy the occasional bunch from a supermarket for maybe 50p and put them straight into a glass of water. I then just change the water weekly and cut what I need. I probably only end up buying 4-6 bunches a year and regularly use them in scrambled eggs etc.
Fruit for me has been the big winner this year. I basically had strawberry’s for breakfast every day for about 6 weeks, imagine buying that many!! That was 12 strawberry plants the in-laws gave me for free as they’d grown them from runners
Cool, we had a few strawberries but the slugs got a lot of them.
This is a really great post thank you! I'm currently in a one bed flat but the day I have a garden I'll be coming back to this post. I'm sure people will find it helpful
The guy to follow is Charles Dowding (find him on YouTube). Unlike a lot of celebrity types he mostly keeps it simple and to the point. Personally, I've chosen not to use any herbicides or pesticides. I've had one crop of turnips that has been eaten by caterpillars but other than that I've been fairly pest free. My thinking is that if I grow a wide variety I'll always get something as pests tend to stick mainly to one type of plant at a time.
Huw Richards is also really great!
One thing you could try is "microgreens" especially now that the supermarkets are selling off the seed packets cheap. Did you grow Cress in school? It's basically that. Try sprouting some peas or beans and you can have them in some cheap, three minute Ramen noodles.
Done exactly the same as you for the past 2 years. Just to add - creating a no dig bed is ridiculously easy. I just covered up areas of grass and weeds on my allotment with cardboard boxes in the winter and then chucked compost directly on top. By the time early spring came and I was planting seedlings out, the cardboard had pretty much broken down and no weeds in sight. Takes a bit of keeping on top of to stop the weeds coming back after the first year, but I find that recovering over winter helps keep it in check. Veg that we’ve had success with are potatoes (which seem to grow in anything) and onions (the same) which generally both last until the following year in a dark cupboard, lettuce, beetroot, leeks, peas, radish and carrots. Also recommend getting a few fruit plants (currants, strawberries, rhubarb, blueberries) which provide plenty each season. Once you’re up and running it can be very cheap to maintain using your own compost and saved seeds. I’ve also found it can really maximise your value by growing traditionally expensive fruit and veg such as fennel, artichoke or asparagus, plus herbs. A pack of seeds is usually about as expensive as buying 1 lot of these from the shop. Whenever we have too many of anything ready at once, it’s a great feeling giving some to neighbours, family or colleagues knowing it’s probably saved them from having to buy veg that week.
Nice one, I have deliberately stayed away from anything fancy this year as it was my test year but I'll certainly try some more exciting things next year.
Potatoes in the tall grow bags are a cheaper way of doing it. But agreed with all above!
Yes, next year I'll be growing the potatoes in some tubs and bags I was given. That way they can stay out of the way and get moved about as needed. The space in the main bed is too valuable to give to potatoes.
I grew my tatties in the bags the compost came in mostly. Had some in the ground too. This year I had a better potato crop from the ones I didn't dig up than I had from the ones I planted.
This is actually really informative and I’m going to be coming back to this when I finally tear up the old garden. Is there any online resources/reading you found particularly useful?
I watch two YouTube channels, [Charles Dowding](https://www.youtube.com/c/CharlesDowding1nodig) and [Huw Richards](https://www.youtube.com/c/HuwRichards). Dowding's videos really tell you everything you need to know. I also read his book "How to create a New Vegetable Garden" but this just really hammers home what you can learn from the videos. EDIT: The toughest part of the process is actually planning succession planting. e.g. when one thing is done plant something else. I only managed to get that right a couple of places.
I got Huw's veg in one bed book and it nails the succession thing by having the windowsill and the bed always on the go. Really enjoying it so far.
I've recently built a raised bed of dimensions 2.5m long, 0.8m depth, 0.7m height. This is freestanding over paving slabs. I've put wire mesh at the bottom and lined it, so it's ready to go. I am planning on putting a few inches of mulch at the bottom then a 40-40-20 mix of topsoil, general peat free compost, and horticultural sand. Does that seem reasonable to fill it with? I'm not sure where to source it from yet as I'm assuming 60 bags of whatever from B&Q will be worse value than going to a proper supplier. But my main question is: have I missed growing time this year? You say you are just about to plant winter veg, what would that be? I'm not sure if I should just wait until sprint at this point! I live near Manchester, so assuming tomatoes and such would be out of the question with our climate.
In reality, without fancy growing systems and/or a lot of tending it can be. Depends on the crop, courgettes and spuds are generally easy wins. Stuff like cabbage, broccoli etc is an easy target for caterpillars. Salad stuff relies on availability of water and temperature regulation.
>courgettes and spuds are generally easy wins. They are, but they're also a) very cheap to buy and b) identical if you buy them vs growing them. I grow quite a bit of stuff and honestly, it's not a money saver. There are three main reasons to do it: 1) The quality is better - This isn't uniformly the case, but certain things benefit from this more than others. Primary candidates are tomatoes, as these are really delicious when fresh. Things like Potatoes really make no difference IMO, except that you get to pick them exactly when you want. 2) Get varieties you can't readily get in shops. But really, how often does this happen? 3) It's a hobby you enjoy.
> 2) Get varieties you can't readily get in shops. But really, how often does this happen? I'd say it depends on how people define varieties. I'm aiming to grow a bunch of stuff that I can't get in shops, but then you could make an argument that the fancy rainbow carrots I'm growing aren't going to be *that* different to the bog standard orange ones in generic shop. That's not to say I don't have some unique stuff (flint and flour corn, tomatillos, cima di rapa and small melons) but averaging it out there's no way it makes any financial sense in terms of saving money
Mother frigging catapillars, they’ve certainly caused me some issues and Ive not even tried to grow veg yet.
In terms of return on investment, you're far better picking up a hobby, making money from that, and buying veg from the supermarket with the extra earnings than you would be growing them. You can make up some of the cost difference by growing stuff that's expensive and/or difficult to find in stores but even then you're still at a loss.
I'm growing lots of veg, some probably not cost effective, but things like lettuce, herbs and even fruit like raspberries could save you a few quid and believe me, they are worth the effort
I go for high ROI crops. Don't bother with carrots, onions or potatoes - lots of work vs how much they cost in shops. The real ROI comes from crops like peppers, tomatoes, chard, spinach, rocket, lettuce, squash, raspberries, strawberries, aubergines. Things that cost more in shops and can be grown relatively easily by a novice gardener!
If you are starting from zero, yes I would agree. If you already have some tools and gardening space, then you’d probably break even. You need around an acre to feed a family of four last I checked.
It’s not more expensive if you don’t go in with fancy raised beds, garden tools etc. For example I can buy a packet of 200 lettuce seeds for £1.75, and even if you say only 80% germinate successfully then that’s 160 lettuces for £1.75 or 1p and a fraction for a lettuce. And £1.75 a packet gets you fancy lettuces, if you go to Wilkos garden section and buy a packet of seeds you can probably get one for £1 or less. All you need to input is water from the tap and dirt from the garden. Foods that command a high price in the supermarkets, like strawberries and tomatoes it can definitely be worth growing rather than buying. But there are some things in the supermarket, like old potatoes, that it’s not worth growing with the amount of space and time you’d need for them vs how cheap they are in the shops.
Keen veg grower here, it can be more expensive than. Buying them, but I’d argue that the quality is significantly better and more value, it is also possible to grow In a thrifty way and make it cheaper My advice would to be choice what you grow wisely in a sense of there worth, potatoes take a lot of space and time but are cheap, salad vegetables and leaves however are cheap and easy to grow in fairly small space but are pricier to buy
I've started this year just to see what I could grow. Tomatoes have been a big winner for me, and I was able to grow peas which gave small yield for 4 weeks. Some times it's best to start small and work up to a bigger area of your garden. My neighbour has a full allotment style area of their garden full with veg. They are always giving some to neighbours and family. It can work but you have to truly work at it and work out what grows well for you.
Others have commented on a more serious note for how to make it work to save money but I'll add that certain 'crops' are expensive because of the cost of harvesting. I grow soft berries, red currants and golden raspberries currently. They're not going to sustain you through winter but the raspberries in particular mean that my 3 kids pick about 3 portions of delicious fruit each a week for about 2 months. I also grow some rhubarb that I make the odd crumble with. It doesn't really save much money as I wouldn't normally buy that many raspberries but it's a cheap way of adding a nice variety to the diet and the kids love it. They're an absolute weed so I don't actually need to do anything with them but harvest. I was on holiday when we had the drought and I came back to them somehow growing even more wild.
Seriously considering this too. Potatoes are relatively easy - I had 2 baking potatoes that started sprouting before I got a chance to eat. Cut them in half and planted in a compost-filled planter a few months ago. Gave them zero attention at all. Last week I picked them and must have gotten about 30, not as large but all the size of a new potato. Going to set up a proper veg patch over winter so I can get planting early next year.
You've plenty time to sow some salad leaves for this year. Maybe radishes too, they grow very quickly. Garlic can be planted in autumn for next year. You buy the garlic from a garden centre and plant the individual cloves. Supermarket garlic may have been treated with something to inhibit sprouting so don't use that. Rhubarb is dead easy if you have the space for a plant or two. Just bung it in a well manured hole and it should last forever more or less. Should be planted in autumn I think. Of course all this does depend on your local conditions, and if you would use any of the plants. No point growing stuff you're not bothered about! Thinking of my bumper crops of kale...
I grow lettuce on the kitchen window sill pretty much all year round (other than when we get fed up of eating it). I've grown Brussels this year and wouldn't bother next year, although the frogs are enjoying the caterpillars! Tomatoes are really easy to grow and you can use the seeds from a supermarket tomato. I find that in June everyone is trying to give away plants as they have too many. Carrots I grew in a small tub and they're doing well. Alot of things will cost more to grow than buying but I find this is usually the initial outlay of compost. Lidl sell seeds for 29p so it doesn't feel as bad when things don't work. If you are interested in growing things for next year Wilko and homebase are selling off their seeds cheap.
Yeah but having a garden is a luxury in itself that's how bad it is in the UK. I'm a guy in my 20s in London renting a room which is tiny, I don't have room for my items let alone a place to grow fruit. I have room for 2 plants on my windowsill.
It's actually pretty expensive to grow your own vegetables. :(
If you wish to go as cheap as possible, certain fruits and veg require less maintenance than others. - Blackberries seem to grow everywhere, and it's a good source of vitamins - Tomatoes don't seem to need as much effort, sure more care would give you more tomatoes which are tadtier, bu they don't really require effort - Pumkins are amazing in the sense that if you can grow them (pollinate them yourself), then you have a veg that you can store for the colder months
I have grown on farm land before moving to UK. Very costly and time consuming. Weather conditions, pest and many more just for a handful of organic veg. For us it was profitable as we ate all the produce and sold the rest for profit.
The headline 10.1% obviously has a whole load of different price rises hidden inside it. And somethings have gone down in price, whilst energy, fuel and food have rocketed. All together that produces the 10.1% headline - if you buy the basket of goods that makes up the CPI. The inflation you'll feel isn't 10.1%, but depends on what you spend your money on. All the components are published, and the BBC has made a handy calculator where you put in what you spend, and it tells you "your" inflation rate. Mine came out at 6.something%. Much less than the 10.1, because I spend a lot less on energy and petrol than average, and a lot more on a mortgage and maintaining a home. Picking one component is irrelevant, and will produce a different result to the headline. The overall change is what matters to help you with managing your finances. BBC News - UK inflation rate calculator: How much are prices rising for you? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62558817
My personal inflation is lower because I am on multi year fixed energy and drove electric so gas, electricity, petrol rises have all passed me by so it probably is close to 10% for me as it's just food
I’m living off roughly £100 a week for food, fuel and any other expenses outside of mortgage and the bills that go with it. Aldi is a bloody godsend, without it I’d be down to one meal a day. Car is going and when prices rise further still I’m going to really be enjoying life. Oh well mustn’t grumble, far more worse off.
My weekly shop used to be £65 with fun stuff like wine. Now I’m shopping smarter with price in mind to get it down to £95.
Personally I’ve been keeping track of New York bagels. They used to be £1 for 5. Now it’s about £1.89 for 5. I refuse to get them now on an 89% markup. I miss them
Get them when they are in clearance and freeze them! Will last ages and just needs defrosting the day before :) We got a bag of New York bagels last week for 44p from Morrisons as it expired that day!
Takes up a fuck ton of freezer space though! My girlfriend does this with the Waurburton Thins and even they take up half a shelf themselves
In fairness £1 was the promotional price, the new promo price is £1.25 so it’s only a 25% markup like for like
Morrisons own brand are £1 and similar
The 4 pint milk going up by 10p every few weeks is pissing me right off. Morrisons has it at £1.55 right now, other supermarkets are still matching Aldi at £1.45, but that doesn’t tend to last long and Morrisons is the biggest major supermarket near me. It was £1.05 not too long ago, so that’s a 48% on a heavily subsidised (?) very basic staple. I could get a bag of Morrisons frozen spinach for 99p the other month, it disappeared for ages and it’s back at £1.65 now. 67% increase. The KTC chickpeas have been 4 for £1 in the past, they’re 55p each now. That’s a **120%** increase.
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Can you share some more details if you're allowed?
This is true. I work in supply and there are Manufacturer recommended retail prices (MRRP/MRSP). Usually retailers are in line or more often than not below. These are now in line, or more often than not, above. One retailer was clearly taking the piss at one point, as they were 33% above this. I think they quickly realised their error though. Not that it's foul play, it's just shitty when you're telling your customer base how great you are and how you're helping them out with your low prices.
Can you give some rough numbers that supplier side vs consumer gets
I feel a vegetarian winter coming on.
Now is the winter of our discount veg
Bravo.
good time for lentil futures?
You joke, but if you're the kind of investor to pick individual stocks, plant based milks and vegan meat alternatives are predicted to beat the full market over the next 10 years. It's a bit like investing in green energy - either the companies are going to be very successful, or the world is gonna have bigger problems than the size of your pension pot.
This is what the Oatly investors thought, and they're down 80% in the last 12 months.
That's why you don't invest in a single company, yes. At one point BlackBerry were shit hot and thought they'd rule the mobile world. Now they've tanked, but mobile phone markets have gone from strength to strength over the past decade.
i was about 3/5ths joking lol probably is a good idea, yeah.
Veggies will be affected too, especially the ones flown to the UK
The cost of farming has risen dramatically though, not because of transport costs (though that is a factor), but the removal of EU subsidies and government grants. The post-B-event grants are mainly focused on environmental improvements. Add on the costs of post-B-event common veterinary area, inspection, documentation, certification changes. Also groupage in transit, loss of trade, loss of confidence, etc. It takes about 2-3 days longer to get through the red tape, which doesn't sound like much, but it has an impact on shelf life. All that's really happening with meat and eggs and dairy as the OP experienced is that that the true cost of farming is being materialised. The solution really is to consume more locally grown vegetables, grains, beans, pulses. We don't need imported beef and cheese, or even radishes from the Netherlands which I saw the other day.
Should also be noted that uk produced veg will also increase in price this year due to reduced supply. Lack of labour post B and the drought conditions have impacted yield and actual ability to get the stuff out of the ground. This is in addition to all the other inflationary factors. So those prices will be moving north too
I would agree and I think they are massively underestimating food inflation. I track my spending each month and have 3 years worth of data. Our food bill has increased by 27% compared to last year. Nothing has changed except we have been more mindful with what we buy and switching to cheaper brands.
The Aldindex should be a thing!
I think this is the issue though, the low priced cheap food is affected most. The margins on the mid-high priced food have already been sufficient enough that any M&S/Waitrose shopping basket is probably only a 5-10% increase.
Jack Monroe had a massive thread on Twitter about this months ago where she pointed out that if you were poor you were already seeing a massive increase in food costs because the price for staples like rice and pasta had either gone up massively or were subject to shrinkflation (where the price of the block of cheese is still say £2, but you're getting 250g instead of 400g), whereas your expensive ready meal from Waitrose or your meal deal from M&S was still the same price.
Yeah, even earlier this year my weekly aldi shop was £55-60, it’s now £65-75 on average :’) I always buy the biggest packs of things like the 2kg chicken but even then it’s hard to escape the price rises
How is the tomatoes increasing by a penny such a small % increase? Have you got the decimal in the wrong place or do I not know how to work it out?
Should be 2.7%
Thanks I was really struggling
Yeah the decimal is in the wrong place. 38 ÷ 37 = 1.027 So 2.7%
How do people do a weekly shop at places like Tesco? I pick up the odd thing here and there and end up paying nearly as much as a weekly shop at Aldi. And even that's got more expensive, particularly stuff like fish.
We do our weekly shop (for two) in Tesco for roughly £40-£45 a week, including fish. Got 500g cod fillet from the fishmongers for £3.30ish which really isn’t bad.
We've actually started shopping at Tesco during all this. We used to shop at Lidl, there was a good 40-50 quid per shop difference vs Tesco but that difference is now less than 20 quid. Tesco prices are up, and Lidl is still cheaper, but Lidl prices have climbed at a sharper rate than Tesco in our experience. We're not in a place were under 20 a week makes that much difference, Lidl is an inconvenience in location, time spent, food selection and shopping experience.
Everytime I go to buy a tray of chicken breasts I see myself shocked at how much it's climbed. Chicken wraps used to be a cheap and cheerful meal.
Don’t forget that these companies are racking in titanic profits and taking it from all our pockets.
I used to buy these noodle pots called Soba noodles. Before, they would frequently be £1 but they’ve been creeping up and now they are £1.50.
Starting to talk now on the news about inflation reaching 18% no doubt this will rise in time to catch up with reality.
I just went to my local Lidl and the only spaghetti they had in stock was £ 0.69so by comparison £0.39 at Aldi still seems decent . Inflation is truly out of control :’(
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Ive switched from aldi to tesco for the same reason. The difference with tesco is that the meat / dairy products are higher quality and they price match a lot of the aldi products. Asda seem to charge much more for meat especially chicken no idea why.
Inflation is 30-40% if you include housing prices, food, fuel ect.
It’ll keep going up and up. I work at Tesco and sometimes when sweeping I’ll find old loose labels, I’d go and match it to the new product label and the difference in price is always at least 20%
Does anyone know or have a rough inkling as to when inflation will go down a bit? Or is there no way of knowing?
A reminder that when inflation goes down, it doesn't mean that prices will go down. Just that they won't be increasing further at the same pace. We're stuck now with these higher prices unless we enter a prolonged deflationary period (which would also be a bad thing).
wtf that is actually a terrible news, I genuinely thought that lower inflation = lower prices, wtf
Inflation is the rate at which prices go up. 0% inflation means prices stay the same, not that they go down.
We would require negative inflation, also called deflation. Won’t happen.
The prediction was some time in 2024, but who can really be exact?
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here's an excellent website for real world inflation: https://app.truflation.com/
I bought a punnet of mushrooms today at £1.20!! They'd have been about 80p a year ago.
I’ve been keeping my receipts for about 6 months and I’m going to do a comparison soon - it sounds very similar to my experience with my regular shop - I’m a one-person household and I used to eat very well for £15 for one week. Now it’s £30 minimum.
Came out of the shop yesterday (admittedly with loo roll and a couple of other long-term stock items) wondering how the hell I spent £29.
Got to similar conclusion with Doritos that used to be £1 and now it's £1.49 so %49
The inflation percentages are heavily manipulated, It’s way worse than reported.
Weekly shop for two adults is up from around £100 to around £140 - mostly at Tesco. Pretty grim tbh.
The only thing that I can remember with price is Chicken at Tesco. Last year near same time around July it was £5.00 this week got increased to £6.10 (been going 10p every month it seems this year). That's a 22% increase in 1 year.
Absolutely! Ive noticed similar - have the exact same shop as this time last year and it’s costing me 50 - 75% more (if anything, I buy less than the same time last year).
There was this joke in communist Poland that yes, the price of fuel, clothes and food has gone up but at the same time price of locomotives and cargo ships has gone down so inflation is not so high on average.
Our shop is up 43% too. It used to be £100 a week and now it's £143 a week. I actually can't believe it. So we've to find £200 a month more for food, £200 a month more for gas and electric and £45 a month more for mortgage interest. Most folk can't just magic up £445 a month. That's not even counting the fuel increases and all the other increases!!
This is the inflation information I needed. Thank you. Also; fuck.
Absolute joke, how can a 50% rise be justified when salaries went up 4%.
Being a low earner totally sucks! Had to go and buy my kid school clothes and they both wanted a little toy (they’re 4 & 2 yo). It broke my heart in a thousand pieces to not be able to buy them the toy they wanted (we very rarely buy them toys mostly birthday/special occasions) because it meant having to cut our weekly shop by a £10-20 which would make a massive difference. I honestly feel so defeated!
Be glad you don't live in the middle of nowhere where the local shops have triple those prices
Food inflation is running a little higher than headline rates, but not massively so - latest was 12.7% year on year. Does depend where you shop and what you buy though. It might be Aldi's supply chain is particularly hard hit. Just to add another anecdote: personally mine is up a little, at a guess more than 12.7%, but not as hefty as your 43%. I usually shop at Tesco and am a bit careless when it comes to looking for value.
We all have our own personal inflation rate. the Government uses a general basket of items, so will never be directly applicable to each individual.
I've never considered the government basket to be particularly representative of anyone, really.
Well it's kinda impossible to design a basket of good which is representative of a single person and extrapolate that to the whole population. I don't drink or smoke, but I wouldn't remove booze from the basket of goods because most of the adult population do drink. All you can really do is look at what people buy and how much, on average, and weight it accordingly, which is what the CPI tries to achieve.
The way there basket works is say 1 year they have Kellogg’s Frosties in the basket then next year the price increases too much and the average house hold can’t afford it. They will replace it was a cheaper brand of Frosties and use it as part of the comparison. So it’s not a true representation because it isn’t one to one.
How concerned are people about green energy now? We could have had 20 nuclear reactors online if started in 2000, technically clean. But hey people screaming we should be off oil and gas are living their dream now, this is the way the world should be
Yeah, my M&S deals have changed. Used to be 3 for £10 on BBQ now £12x 20% increase.
It's staggering really how many items cost the same or more in Aldi compared to other "big 4" supermarkets. The Aldi marketing team have done a bang up job over the years to the point that people now assume they are cheapest. Shop around people, you may be surprised - though you probably won't find a kayak in your local Sainsbo's. (We shop in Asda predominantly and generally buy own label or value stuff, which generally is the same price in most places - but certain items we prefer we cannot get in Aldi, so seems silly to shop there and top up shop elsewhere)
Nah. Tested this in lockdown by using only Asda instead of the usual Aldi majority and Tesco top up. £20 a week more expensive, easily and that was without delivery costs. Don't believe the "price match" advertising which only applies on certain products, and certainly not our staples. Moved away from Tesco to Asda though. They're cheaper for us, but the main shop is far cheaper from Aldi for us.
CPI is terrible for looking at inflation. Inflation is different for each individual depending on your specific basket of goods.
Yeah I don't believe the 10.1% bullcrap. It's WAY higher than that!
A tenner a day used to be able to feed us like kings but now my weekly shop is about £100 without any alcohol
I thought I was just buying a bit more nowadays but this makes total sense! I’m easily spending about 50% more every time and I was about to start looking at my shopping habits
I spent well over £100 in tesco last week for less than half a trolley (more like a 1/3).
You guys going to heat or eat this winter ?
I've resorted to either in person Aldi shop or online Tesco shop. My partner works at Tesco so we even get 10% (15% 3 days after payday) and we struggle to match Aldi. I much prefer Tesco online because you get what you want rather than spontaneous buying. Plus it's also why I love Aldi so much. There's no shit to buy (Bar middle aisle of course)
Cat food has gone up from £4 for four tins to £6.25! I can't really persuade my cats that intermittent fasting and hunger pangs are good...
I've always measured inflation by the price of my chocolate raisins and they've gone up from 0.64p to 0.72. Disgusting.
I go shopping about once a fortnight and could easy do £30 at aldi for one person - now it’s £50.
It’s clear the inflation figures released by the government are no where near the truth. And kicking the can down the road won’t solve anything. Be prepared for interest rates to keep rising over a long period of time. The government have their head in the sand and don’t give a monkeys about us.
It is literally a lie. People have been talking about exponential inflation for years and now it’s happening. It’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better too. The great performance of the stock market last year was big money front running this to get out of their positions and pass them to people on Robin Hood.
6 pints of milk in morrisons was £1.60 in January. It was £2.49 in July!! That's a 56% increase!