To think this increase in cost is going to break me?

According to the article I posted, suppliers are claiming an increase in ‘bureaucracy and transport times’ so extra staff wages to sort out the import / export paperwork plus extra staff wages for the drivers of the lorry plus possibly needing to buy more vehicles to transport the same amount of goods in the same time.

It isn’t even close to the only reason for the increase but it does exist as a factor.

I have been reading this post with interest as I think I'm from the same continent as @Truth25

Olive oil has been unaffordable here for a long time. It has gone up somewhat, along with most things, and a general average price for a 1l of extra Virgin olive oil converted is around 12 pounds. Some are even more. This is for an Italian import, but the local brands are similarly priced. Most people do and have just used a blend which is a lot cheaper.

The same with butter. I have only had Kerrygold if it's been offered while eating out, but just unaffordable to your average household. Even locally produced butter is about (converted) 4 pounds for 500g.

These are considered luxuries and not on most people's general shopping list.

We do get cheaper fruit and veg and that is because we grow it here. And we get grade B of them as grade A is mostly exported or only sold in the more expensive supermarkets. But these have all gone up a lot for us too, as we have had bizarre weather which has affected crops. We have gone from drought to floods and all sorts in between which of course pushes up the price for everyone.

But we also have had above average inflation, fuel is up, electricity is up etc. Which all affect the end user.

I assume the pp buys their weekly shop cheaper as perhaps it's only in season items. Real genuine basics that make up meals, but take time.

I do read here often about people complaining they went to the shops and couldn't find berries, strawberries, oranges. These are very seasonal. We would not even consider them them out of season and they aren't really available then either. Like now for eg. The poster who says squeeze your own oranges. We can't even get oranges now. It's summer here and they are a winter fruit. Those that are available have had a storage cost, which is shown in the price.

It seems that people are finding it more difficult to adjust as you are used to having most things available all the time. Which is great, but now the cost of that can't be absorbed as much. And as such is being filtered through.

I really don't think there is anything wrong with beans on toast as a general meal. But I also think social media and keyboard warrior experts make people believe that it is not, and that every meal needs to include hummus and 7 types of nuts and seeds.

It's difficult to change habits though, but unfortunately I do think its going to be necessary for many.

When people say “Brexit” what is it about Brexit that has actually put prices up?

so for farmers, our costs mainly went up due to Russia invading Ukraine. That’s what sent feed and fertiliser rocketing. The former has stabilized a bit but the latter has stayed high. Electric also went up due to Russia. Water increases aren’t due to Brexit. Staff costs are a huge part of our costs and are increasing massively (eg they get their council tax paid and that goes up). I can’t think of one thing that Brexit has caused for our costs to increase. What am I missing?

@Meadowfinch I don't buy processed food either. I also don't buy big brands...

Olive oil has almost doubled
Butter block is more expensive and now only 200g
Halloumi up 50p and down to 200g
Toothpaste up

You got a full weeks shop, for 4 people for £60? Please tell me what you bought as I really can't see how you'd do that

While everything has gone up, olive oil has gone up by a huge amount due to conditions affecting the olive crop.

https://www.thetimes.com/money-mentor/income-budgeting/olive-oil-price-uk

Add in the increase due to Brexit plus the factors that are affecting all food and the rise has been astronomical.

I agree with this. I cook mostly from scratch and haven't seen much difference in price.

Mince lamb has gone up a lot so I make beef kebabs instead now.

I do my main shop from Ocado then a few bits from Lidl.

The only thing I don't make from scratch is lasagne as I find it a lot of hassle ans you can buy a 1.5kg M&S one for £8 which feeds 5 of us.

If anything does go up then I adapt my meal plan. I also use a lot of lentils with dishes to bulk them out as they're so good for you and delicious.

That's an insane increase - so tough when you multiply that across a range of products.

UK here.. Aldi's olive oil used to be less than £3 a bottle last time I bought it a couple of years ago, I stopped buying it when the price suddenly jumped but it was £7.49 in Aldi this week.

It does suck.

Olive oil isn't a necessity so I've swapped to cheaper oils but even sunflower oil has doubled since I switched to it.

I cook almost everything from scratch, I buy very little convenience food, and my food bill has at least trippled in the last few years.
Fresh salad items have doubled in price, olive oil has sky rocketed (and all other oils have gone up), the coconut milk I use in curries has almost doubled in price, herbs and spices have gone up, the fruit juice I used to buy has more than doubled in the last few years.

Yes, black pepper is the height of indulgence.

For Tudor times maybe. Give it a rest!

I agree I looked up this too!! It’s a strange one…however the other difference here is that wages and Min wage/living wage have risen a good bit too. We pay a tiny bit more tax but have no council tax and no water bills.

I would rather go without something else than give give up olive oil, which is what I’m doing. Less snacks, cheaper pasta, using less olive oil so it stretches.

Yep, you're not wrong - I'm in Ireland & have watched our grocery bill climb here too.

However, one thing that keeps coming up on this thread is olive oil. That surprised me as it's something that I haven't clocked as jumping in price that much. So I checked the Aldi IE vs Aldi UK websites & many of the olive oils are actually cheaper in Euro than in Sterling - e.g. 1 litre for €5.49 vs £6.29 - which is very unusual as a straight currency swap would have the UK oil costing c. £4.59. So it looks like there is a specific UK factor here too?

Whatever it is, it sucks, and OP is definitely not BU.

What is your salary?
Food is not cheap if the prices are going and our wages are not.

*and increases profit for butchers?

I read recently on MN about meat from China being sold in butchers shops in the UK. The expectation when buying from a butchers is usually that the meat will be local or at least mainly from the UK. I wonder how open the butchers are with customers about the origin of the meat. It would never have occurred to me that I might be buying meat from China. I assume those butchers selling meat from China are doing so for cost and profit reasons. How can it be cheaper to produce meat in China and transport it all the way over here? This is presumably because of poorer conditions in China for the animals and workers. Then there are the freshness and carbon footprint issues of unnecessarily transporting food so far. Has the UK really come to this? That our local butchers are reduced to selling meat from China? I wonder how much this actually reduces prices for consumers and profit for butchers?

Five years I used to buy Waitrose via Ocado. I generally kept my weekly shop under £50. If it was over, I checked in case I'd made a mistake. Usually, it was just because I'd accidentally put two of something in or left the gin I used to hold the delivery slot in the basket.

Now, I struggle to keep the same shop under £50 in Aldi. I only buy gin for my birthday and I actively restrict treats on cost, not nutritional grounds! I've lost around £1000 of disposable income. EVERYTHING has gone up by about 50%. Mortgage, energy, house, pet and car insurance, mobile phone, water, Netflix, Disney+, Equifax. EVERYTHING.

It's like I've had a £1000 a month payout. I feel like I've dropped two income brackets. All the fun and frivolity is gone. All the spontaneity. Its crap. AND it's OK to feel it's crap even if you aren't starving and are still grateful for what you do have.

Some things are just beyond the pale now; olive oil a distant memory, the price of jam has especially shocked me. Luckily I like plain basic things, especially lentils and they've not gone up afaik- can still get a big tub of meridian peanut butter for £5 when tesco have it on offer. I try to be strategic and stock up on the bargains when they are on!

They do.

I've said before on this thread that supermarkets are a highly competitive business, and their profit margins are very low. Last year's, Tesco had a profit margin of 4.1%. For people that don't understand accounts, that means for every £100 of sales, £95.90 was costs and £4.10 was profit.

To put price rises in perspective, minimum wage is going up by 6.7% in April.

National insurance is going up from 13.8% to 15%. Which sounds like a 1.2% increase - but it's an increase of £1.20 in every £100 earned by their employees - but in terms of their own costs, it's a £1.20 increase for every £13.80 they spend, which is an increase of 8.7%.

And that's on top of an additional £615 per employee earning over £9,100 per year (and a smaller increase for every employee earning between £5k and £9.1k).

And then you have to understand that every business that Tesco buys from will be facing the same increases in costs, so everything they buy will also have price increases.

Yeah, they make a massive amount of profit, there's no denying it. But it's because it's a massive business with massive sales. They simply don't have the profit margin to absorb every increased cost

Oh bullshit. I cook from scratch due to dietary restrictions and my shopping bill has gone up by almost a third in the last year. The only processed food I ever buy is the odd packet of beige freezer food for when DD’s friends come round!

Our council tax is going up by 10% for the fourth year running. 40% in four years is depressing when the council have cut back on bin collections, public toilets, libraries, shut down many council buildings. It's down to social care and increased police costs they say.

Our water bills are going up 40% over the next five years. My 19 year old car road tax was £350 this month.

It's not just food, but everything that's increasing.

We rely on a weekly supermarket delivery. Living rurally, the delivery fee is cheaper than petrol would cost driving to a supermarket. It means that we miss out on cheaper prices available at Lidl, Aldi, Home Bargains and so on, and the stickered reduced items at the end of the day, but again I factor in what it would cost in petrol and time to drive around looking for those cheaper priced items.

Another benefit of doing the main grocery shop online is that it is easier than in the busy store to check the price per ml or 100g to find the cheapest, best value items and to work out whether special offers are actually cheaper or not.

I have set a budget and meal plan for the full week, but it has become increasingly difficult to stick to that budget and it has got much harder so far this year. Even buying absolutely everything at the cheapest price per ml or 100g, (and removing from the basket any treats like an inexpensive bottle of wine, chocolate, non-basic biscuits and a weekly newspaper all of which used to come within budget not so long ago), I can't stick within budget now unless I cut back on food. As a family we are far from overeaters as it is and there is never any food or other products wasted.

I avoid going to the shops in between the weekly delivery as that just results in spending more money over the budget and being tempted to buy things we can do without. The exception to this is that I want to support our local small rural shops as much as I can, so I keep an eye on what is not massively more expensive in them and buy those things there instead of from the supermarket.

We have to pay our full mortgage and council tax on UC. No help for that whatsoever. We do work as well.

No. Refuse to Buy, not Refuse to Pay - that would be stealing!!