I often think all this supermarket advertising is a scam, all these special offers and price match deals.
I mean, if you think about the “Price Match” it really is a safe bet for the supermarkets. Over say an average £100 shop (average for me anyway) some items will be on ‘a deal’ , reduced or on promotion or you select ‘own brands’ which aren’t included; and others will be dearer. So, over the course of totting up the 70 or so items in your trolley the odds are the price total will even out . However, just in case, the supermarkets add a proviso to their price promise… for Tesco, (who I’ve used for this experiment), they set their refund to a maximum £7 (I think).
Of course they only offer this price comparison over the ‘leading’ supermarkets: Tesco, Sainsburys, Asda, Morrisons. I would at this point argue that Lidl and Aldi may have a claim to that title too but I don’t think the BIG FOUR dare.
Watch the Aldi ad and you’re encouraged to: “Take the Aldi Challenge”
So I have. I wanted it to be a day I had a large shop to do so I ended up with a broad range of products.
I went to Aldi today and bought 94 items at a total cost of £86.45
- My Aldi shop – 94 items, £86.45…. please ignore all the chocolate and concentrate on the fresh fruit!
It was an interesting experiment because as I was adding things like yoghurt and frozen desserts I noticed that the portion sizes in Tesco were SMALLER. In these instances I have added extra units to get the same grams. With the meat I added the slightly smaller pack sizes (Rump Steak for example- 2 in Tesco =500g in but in Aldi =566g that’s 10% more meat).
As such, the comparable Tesco order was made up of 109 items ( The luxury yoghurts in Aldi were 150g I had 12; the Tesco Finest were 125 g so I had to get 4 more: The Aldi Chocolate desserts were 190g; the nearest equivalent, a Tesco Chocolate Surprise, was only 125g so instead of 12 I needed 18. The other differences in numbers were the loose red onions)
The total in Tesco was a staggering £123.03.
Tried Lidl last week for the first time in 2-3 years and was AMAZED at the savings. Gradually trying out different things in there, so that eventually (and hopefully) I will hardly have to go into the big supermarkets again for my favourites.
i generally find the quality as good if not better – especially with frozen meat/fih and dairy products – the only things i haven’t yet moved away from: Heinz ketchup, Persil Non-Bio (only one my lot aren’t allergic to), Twinings Everyday Tea. And i buy my bacon and sausages for the B&B from local butchers
You mean like politics? 😉
In my view, we ought to have a nationalised food supplier to act in competition with private suppliers. It would be managed to produce a profit in-line with those of private concerns, but instead of it going to shareholders, it would return to the national pool of collected taxes. Food is a public good, just as is money, energy, transport, and in fact all utilities. Sadly, the supply all such public goods has been under the control of private enterprise, wherein even money can be brought into existence by virtue of debt creation. This is all proving disastrous of course. As to British supermarkets, then they have been running a cartel in cahoots with suppliers for years, as evidenced by the fact that only when non-cartel competition was introduced from Germany, did prices slowly begin to fall.
I am very pleased that Aldi & Lidl have come in and created some competition – but as you say, cartels and corporations still have the control and the politicians are in on it too. Supermarkets don’t offer’great deals’ to benefit poor consumers, they offer ‘fake deals’ to line their pockets. They price small suppliers and independant retailers out of the market and thereby kill the competition and gain more control…. one of my gripes for example – living in Wales is that Welsh lamb isnot only unaffordable but New Zealand lamb is the main supply in the supermarkets and is much cheaper – just one example of control of the market place. AS a nation we made a huge mistake privatising services (gas/electric/transport) and now possibly the NHS – it ceases to be about the consumer and becomes about maximising profit
I’m pleased that my little political rant met with your accord Berni – I’m not usually so heavy!
I used to live on the Pembrokeshire coast by the way, in the Preseli Hills, and miss it at times.
All best wishes, Hariod.
fortunately you can see from the variety of blog posts that i have many lighter facets!
Bloody marketing people have ruined life as we once knew it.
all marketing is a ‘play’ with words, using positive phrases and convoluted sentences to sound like you are offering something extra, miraculous or better value… my pet hate is “up to 100%”. I always new Aldi was cheaper without compromising quality – in fact , often the opposite, i just didn’t realise how much.