Aibu to shed a tear, when he gave his mum a hug on " eat well for less"

[Lowhangingfruit]

The kids autistic and so his mum sturggles with food and when she's getting tearful, he gives her a cuddle 😭. Plus he now loves his cooking. Such a lovely sweet scene

At the beginning I thought the children were never going to like anything. It was lovely when they all started liking the same meals.

It does annoy me though that the swaps are all from different shops, when one of the issues was having to go to different shops in the first place because she had fussy kids.

But you don't have to go to all the different shops every week. Just rotate and stock up for non perishables or anything frozen or with a decent sell by date. Some fresh stuff like cheese lasts for months.

The point of the programme is saving money on food shopping and one of the main ways you can do this is by shopping at a variety of shops to get things you like at the best price and making use of offers etc. Buying the same things from the same shop every week usually ends up costing more.

It's also BBC impartiality. They can't say 'get everything in Tesco/Aldi/etc' they have to show a range of shops.

I think the "different shops" thing is just to prove the point that you have to try things. Rather than defaulting to the expensive Tropicana orange juice, try the one from whatever supermarket you go to.

Most of the people on the show are stuck in a rut of always buying the major brands and the idea is to challenge that by giving them a variety to try. If you're buying all branded and swap to even 50% branded and 50% own brand you're going to save money whether you shop at Aldi or Waitrose.

I think lots of people don't live within easy distance of at least 4 retailers. But the BBC has to make sure it's not free advertising. Fine line to tread

I think the "different shops" thing is just to prove the point that you have to try things.

I agree. I also think they have to show products from all the shops to avoid any hint of favouritism.

@Lowhangingfruit

I think lots of people don't live within easy distance of at least 4 retailers. But the BBC has to make sure it's not free advertising. Fine line to tread

But many people do. When I used to actually go to my office to work, I passed M&S, Morrisons, Aldi, Iceland, Tesco, Lidl, Asda and several of the cheap shops like Home Bargains on the way home from work, or could do so with only a minor detour. Anyone who drives a few miles to work by car in a city/suburban area is probably the same.

Therefore I could drop in a couple of times a week to get whatever we needed, what I liked from that particular shop and have a quick scan of the aisle ends for any good offers.

Seeing as many people will do a big weekly shop and a top up shop each week, it's hardly more time/effort than usual and probably less as it was a journey I was doing anyway and the shops are quieter then than at the weekend or some weekday evenings.

I thought it was lovely.
Me and my friend used to do something similar when we were both single parents. It works well if you plan.

I have Lidl, Aldi, Asda and Saimsburys within 5 mins if my house with Tesco being a whole 10 mins away. However I do.prefer to use one shop but sometimes pop into others for something particular. What I cant work out is where folks get the £13k to spend on the food in tge first place!

What I cant work out is where folks get the £13k to spend on the food in tge first place

They don't. Most of the people who go on the show want to cut down on food because they can't afford something else that they'd also like, usually a holiday, or they've run up debts by spending far more than average on food and more than is affordable on their income.

Excluding the very poorest and the very richest, most people will have some discretion about how they spend their money, but will run out before they've bought everything they want and need. But there's usually scope to cut back somewhere and food is a big one.

If you're spending far more than average on food there's usually some scope to cut back without having to eat things you don't like, not have enough to eat or be eating nutritionally poor food. And because food is a significant part of most people's budget and is bought frequently, even a relatively small saving each week really adds up over time. If the £200 pw people cut down to even £150 pw, that's over £2.5k per year, which would pay for a very nice family holiday.