What a Difference Three Years Makes
Other
There is no longer the excuse of Covid or lack of Lorry Drivers, yet still prices remain at an all time high. While doing my online shop yesterday I went back over my old orders which only went back to March 2021 (the first lockdown was March 2020). It seems most retailers/brands have no intention of bringing costs down and this is what I found (Based on my supermarket of choice, Sainsburys, with no special offers or nectar card offers.
Activia x 4 then £1 now £2.50 over 100% rise
400gms of medium cheddar then £2 now £3 50% rise
Heinz soup 4 pack then £2.50 now £3.75 50% rise some seen at £5
12 Large eggs then £2.05 now £3.15 50%+ rise
4 pints Milk then £1.09 from 99p in 1st year then £1.69 now £1.45 50% rise
Tinned ambrosia custard then £1 or less, now £1.95 100% rise
McCain crinkle chips 1.6kg then £2.50 now £4.50 but today £4.30 50%++
Crisps x 6 then £1.25 now £1.69 (were higher at £2.25 recently) 50%ish rise
Mayo 750ml then £2 now £3.95 almost 100% rise
Dishwasher rinse aid then £1.30 now £2.10 over 50% rise.
All supermarkets will be different and this does not take into account any price rises between March '20 and March '21. One of the worst culprits is Heinz who have maintained disgusting price rises. A can of soup £1.70?! Almost treble what you could find it for 3/4 years ago.
Prices will continue to rise at a lesser rate but we will never get back those 3 years of hyper inflation on food prices even though most people who are unable to strike (unlike train drivers and consultants etc) will suffer the most.
Those in power politically and otherwise (CEO's of big companies etc) should hang their heads in shame.
My dad used to get tin chilli con carne from Lidl it was £1.20 a tin now that £2 he's stopped buying a lot of stuff because it's well over priced
Leannexxx do you know what Leanne, we are one of the 'kindest' countries on the planet, we give humanitarian aid, take in refugees, have a free nhs system, a generous (compared to others) benefits system, free this and that and yet we can't seem to run this country as it should be run.
There are so many ways to make life better (won't go into them) but there will always be the minority (greedy, selfish) who will scream out against them because they have something to hide.
Things aren't going to get better, prices will never go back down, it doesn't effect the rich and that's why they do what they do
martinlufc5637 Yes, exactly right. A bit cliched but the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
Yeah companies are just taking the mick these days always putting prices up for any reason.
I heard prices are due to go up this summer cause the sun will shine
It's profiteering at it's best! From supermarkets to energy companies including heating oil deliveries (which trippled overnight in covid) and everything in between - stamps, petrol, council tax, broadband prices, insurances.
You think to yourself that it needs to/ has to stop but it never does, it's no wonder that the mental health of the country is at an all time low.
tumblespots I know it's a fantasy but wouldn't it be lovely if there were non profit making food stores selling the basics. Pay a decent wage, overheads and put aside anything over for emergencies and any excess a small Christmas bonus for staff.
tumblespots ha ha you never know with all the cloning, gene therapy, stem cells etc.
There are so many things that I don't buy today because they are just too expensive. I was delighted today when I got 4 packets of 8 sausages for £2.04. 52p a pack, was so happy. I always try to get yellow stickers when I can because it helps to keep our food bill down. Everything has just gotten so expensive.
Price fixing by the large companies , even the likes of Aldi and Lidl no longer try to compete on prices anymore.
Good list! I just stop buying overinflated priced goods unless a necessary staple food.
It's terrible and is reflected globally. The core issue is war and unrest which have raised prices of ingredients and fuel.. and we have to resolve the core issue to be able to afford things in the present and future.
Prices rarely come back down because inflation in itself causes all prices to rise including wages so you can't go back in time. The Ukraine war continues to effect many food prices. Often supermarkets themselves are faced with higher prices they try to push to keep prices the same and sometimes refuse to stock items that have gone up in price but there is little chance we can stop price rises generally. I guess the exception is when there is an abundance of some items due to a high yield of that produce.
Branded goods are not as popular as they used to be so many such brands like Heinz are increasing prices due to lower sales which in itself causes lower sales. I rarely buy any Heinz products nowadays but used to buy the occasional soup. I don't think I've bought a single Heinz item in the last year which is probably the first year I haven't bought Heinz products. Nowadays I do fresh soups and freeze them. Homemade soup is very cheap and much healthier. You can probably make 400g of soup for only a few pence if its just vegetable based and then I would spice it up afterwards depending on how I fancied it on that day. £1.70 vs 2-3p for much healthier soup is a no brainer.
BonzoBanana the point I was making is that we have had about 10 years worth (or more) of high inflation rises in less than 3 years and rather than standing still for a while they are continuing to rise, albeit at a slower rate. We can't keep blaming the Ukraine war as I don't believe we sourced all our food from there.
I too make my own soup but I am unsure how you get 2-3p, is this per serving of roughly the same amount in a £1.70 can?
I make mushroom soup, 500gms of mushrooms, a knob of butter, 3 stock cubes, a couple of onions etc is about £3.50 (maybe more) and makes 6 servings. Same if you exchange veg for the mushrooms. Still much, much cheaper than buying cans but there is no way I could make 6 servings for 12-18p. (Cost of fuel to cook as well)
But I agree with your comment on the whole but also believe these overly rich companies should take some of the hit rather than putting their prices up to such an extent that they maintain their profits while the little people can go hungry for all they care.
Lynibis When I bought those £1.50 Lidl boxes of slightly manky fruit and veg I used the scrap bits for soup. However also short life reductions of manky veg from any supermarket. I bought some potatoes the other day for 8p for a bag etc. These very low price veg reductions are ideal for soup. I tend to do soup as a concentrate and then freeze and then when I make it back into a soup I add water. It seems like I can produce about 8 little containers of soup concentrate for about 25p. Manky onions, potatoes, swede, parsnip, carrot, peas or anything really can go into a soup. Even left over veg from the sunday roast.
I think the main exports of Ukraine are grains, oils and corn which form the basis of many products including animal feed and processed foods. Everything is interlinked though and the global population is still increasing, we are at about 8 billion now and doesn't seem that long ago it was 7 billion. That is more people requiring food and with global warming we are losing some capacity to grow crops. Some countries have increased their yields with improvements in farming efficiency but those may have negative effects later on. The value of the pound has dropped a bit which means less buying power too. There is a lot going on that effects prices but the Ukraine war is definitely a major factor as they are such a huge exporter of so much food and have lost some production and logistics getting food out of Ukraine is more difficult.
As I said previously most supermarkets owe billions, many aren't actually profitable and companies like Morrisons and Asda have been taken over and huge debts of billions added to the businesses. Lidl borrowed money for much of its expansion and the UK operation owes about £3 billion and had a recent yearly loss of £76 million. I'm sure many supermarkets would like to increase their margin considerably as many are loss making often because they are servicing a large amount of debt.
BonzoBanana thanks for the update, I understand the politics of it a bit more now. I have not found or know where to get such reductions of veg etc as I don't go out very much these days and do most of my shopping online so pay what they ask though I do scour for the nectar prices and reductions.
I am extremely lucky, no actually I have worked hard all my life so now have my state pension and a private one, they are roughly the same. Because I have paid my mortgage off (at age 70) I only have my bills and groceries to buy so can afford to pay the prices asked without struggling. I will never be well off but I am full of gratitude that I don't have to worry about eating or heating, but again I must stress that is due to my work ethic and being frugal throughout my life. Ooops, sorry to have gone so far off subject.
Its awful, there's a lot of items that I won't buy anymore because of the price and have certainly changed brands for cheaper items. I still see myself looking at items an shaking my head in disbelief at the price.
I think it’s made a lot of us savvy shoppers looking for items on special offers and finding supermarket discount codes.
I found some things have come down in price but the quantity is smaller also. Like tubes of toothpaste that were £1 and u got 100mls, now £1 but only 75mls. Thankfully both my gas and electric is coming down in price from April.
nadinegregg70 I believe everyone has jumped on the bandwagon to enrich themselves even when they haven't needed to. A case of 'well if they can do it so can we'.
The reasons are cost of energy prices and things like Ukraine and Russia. Israel and Palestine and what's going on in the red sea
Jerseydrew that doesn't really explain us having the highest prices in Europe. I saw a chart recently (can't remember where) that showed our fuel prices were the only 4 figure ones whereas most others in Europe were 3 figures. I believe it is mainly due to our government's short sightedness in doing away with our fuel storage facilities and renting them in other countries who inevitably upped the price when the crisis began.
It really is dreadful you can see each week that something has still gone up even now. The food shop is just crippling and I really don't know how we all can go on like it is now. But like you say it will never come back down. I do not condone shop lifting but you can understand how some people are pushed to it
sallylester1 In a first world country it's people should never be that desperate but we continue to care for the larger world rather than our own. What mother would ever care for other mothers kids before her own. Charity begins at home and only excess should be given to others.
As always in the UK. The poor remain poor or are worse off and the fat cats are the 1s who get rich and richer.
Prices are high because of Brexshit. 99% give or take, of our supermarket food comes from abroad, or the ingredients in them do.
Jinky67 Yes there are some cost increases from goods coming in from EU countries due to extra paperwork but then you have the fact the EU put trade tariffs and quotas on many food imports from outside the EU which we now don't have to do and if we do at least those tariffs are paid into our own exchequer now. It really depends on where you get your food from but Brexit is overall pretty neutral in this regard and the reason we have a debt crisis is the huge amount of money we transferred to Europe over 40 years and also ran a large trade deficit with the EU. It's not like just leaving the EU would magically mean all our debts caused by the EU would vanish and the factories would return in a puff of smoke. On every single person's head there is about £150k of government debt, pension liabilities and other liabilities and that is what is crippling our economy and while some of this you can blame on the rise of China as a manufacturing nation I have to say most of the damage caused to our economy was by membership of the EU but that doesn't mean leaving it magically makes everything better.
All I can say is that I look upon a pack of lurpak like I used to look at champagne.... One day and only for a very special day
...
I buy the expensive item I want then add something to make it over a pound..
Started splitting my shopping into 2 & making sure each part of my shopping is just over pounds..Say like £10.10 for one part of my shopping & £25.05 for the other part..
Round Ups from my Royal Bank Of Scotland Account add the 90p from the £10.10 to my Savings Account & the 95p from the £25.05 shop too,they pay Double Round Ups so that saves me £3.70 on my shopping..
This is what I have saved so far this year,yes I might buy a few items I don't need to just tip my spending over pounds but I add those items to FOOD BANKS..
I went shopping for Diet Coke for my sister the other day £1.79,I added a tin of Tesco's own brand of Beans bringing the total up to £2.07,meaning I got £1.86 back into my Savings Account, my sister got a free bottle of Coke as I'm not going to charge her & Tesco Food Bank got the Beans along with some other items I had bought...a winner all round!
Things will never be the same If you keep buying that product. Half the blame goes to the supermarkets because they know you will buy that product. Its the same as everything else, what If you stopped buying It or going there. They would have to do something else then to sell It. Blame It on Inflation too. Not just fuel but everything. Its the same as when the forecourts were charging us more for fuel when the government said no. They didnt do anything about It because they were getting revenue from It. There are a lot of If`s and why`s and I dont think we`ll ever know the truth. Blame the Government as they are the ones who are supposed to be leading us.
Join for free to get genuine deals, money saving advice and help from our friendly community
Chief Bargain Hunter
