Things that are inexplicably cheap

[ChewChewIsMySpiritAnimal]

Inspired by the thread about things that are inexplicably expensive!

My pick is bananas. You can buy a huge bunch of bananas for a few pence - I'm always shocked when i get to the till and find I've got about 22 bananas for less than a quid exaggerating but they've been imported from halfway round the world - yet the British apples next to them are twice as much.

What do you find inexplicably cheap?

"Paracetamol and ibuprofen. Can be under 20p in Home Bargains and Savers etc. Other than that I cant think of much which is universally cheap"

Home bargains aren't "universal"

A 16 pack of paracetamol was around 30 euros in Cape Verde

A local ironing business that charges 50p per item with free drop-off and pick-up. I have no idea how they make it pay. Everywhere else in the area seems to charge far more.

Used books. (Not all of them, obviously.) You can pick up quite a lot of second-hand books on ebay from the huge sellers for less than a couple of pounds per item, with free postage. How can that possibly make them any profit when most of it must go in postage? Many of them turn up really quickly too.

Aldi! I always fill a trolley to excess just get whatever I want and it's always less then I think. 69p for posh biscuits!!! £2.49 for four cans of posh lager. I got some slippers for the bf and a t-shirt five pound fifty!

Broccoli and potatoes

Food in general is ridiculously cheap in the U.K.

This is not the case in other countries. Where I live, a kilo of bananas is the equivalent of £6. A litre of milk is £1.30. Beef is £28 per kilo, chicken about £7.50. Tinned goods are very expensive, and mostly imported. The minimum wage here is £400 per month.

"Broccoli and potatoes"

Potatoes yes, but broccoli? Can be a pound for a head although that's probably out of season.

@noclarification because it is made in mass quantities generally in factories in Germany

Key items are cheap to hook you into doing the whole shop at that supermarket by suckering you into thinking everything else will be as good value. Supermarkets use all kinds of sly tricks to get you to spend more, as everyone should know.

Tesco’s click and collect. I’ve been paying 50p for someone to go around the store, do all my shopping for me, bag it all up and then even put it in the car for me! Amazing value! (Large family shop for 5, 3 of which are hungry teenagers).

None of these things everyone has mentioned is cheap here in Belgium. My food bills are enormous and always stock up when I go to the UK.

@Mylifesadrama Some of the other supermarkets would blow your mind then.....it's free!

Pineapples. They are so big. They come from far away. How can they be so cheap.

Bleach. I always think it must be a right pita to make and store and yet only 39p a bottle.

In Georgian times people would rent a pineapple to have a table centrepiece to show how wealthy and on trend they were. How things change.

This is why i shop in waitrose - i pay £12-15 for a free-range/organic chicken and happy to pay more money for good quality fruit and veg and appreciate their excellent customer service when i need it. I know i am lucky to be able to afford to do this - but i know families who earn way more than we do but still insist on shopping in the cheapest places for food but are happy to pay massive amounts for expensive clothes. I would rather spend good money on good food to go inside my body than waste it on unnecessarily expensive clothes for the outside of my body!

Other countries seem to make a point of buying the best food they can whilst we seem to go out if our way to buy the cheapest - and then complain about the quality or lack of taste.

Waitrose. Ooooooh get you

I'm happy to pay a fair price for food and agree it's too cheap but what I don't want is to pay more than average if that money is not going to the producers (I understand the supermarket or store will need to make profit too and that's fine). We shop at Waitrose anyway semi frequently, but do they pay their suppliers proportionately more?

A TV is really so much cheaper than it was 30 years ago and the quality and reliabilty are amazing.

I paid a £100 for a 24 inch samsung monitor....a mind blowing amount of work in designing the manufacturing process to enable them to be churned out at that figure

Calculators.

Poundland.... brilliant.

I always buy the small bananas, the ones they sell for kids lunch boxes I think. They taste much better than the big ones and I can't eat a whole big one anyway.

@scoutsoutforcovid. My mind really is blown! 🤣

In 1968 a Phillip's 25" colour tv set, with a choice of 3 channels and most programmes in black and white, cost a princely £357 19s 9d. The average weekly wage for an unskilled worker was around £19.

I saw a 50" smart TV on offer a few days ago at £259.99 / £259 19s 11d.

That's an excellent fascinating fact @AngryAngel.

Imagine making money by renting out pineapples!

Were houses more affordable though in comparison to now?