I need help bulk buying stuff

[ChudleyCannons]

I work in theatres attached to icu but we all share the burden, we send staff to them and we share a coffee room. We do intensive procedures on the unit and obviously we bring their patients covid or not to our theatres.

I want to buy some decent tea, coffee and hot chocolate plus salt pepper, sauces etc as we get 2 sachets of maxwell house per person per day (cheers Sodexo) I would buy biscuits but people we hoard them as you don't know when you might get more but tea and coffee is accepted as non hoard able because we all need caffeine

Where can I buy this as catering packs? I need enough tea and coffee for 150 people that isnt Nescafé or maxwell house! Also biros because my staff love pens.

Upper management just cancelled leave til may the least I can do is provide decent coffee, tea, pens and a limited amount of chocolate.

Do you need a Costco membership to go there? Is makro better? Help me people who bulk buy!!

OP mentioned it in their opening post!

Oops! So she did!

Those of you who don’t understand the appeal of a free pen definitely don’t work in the NHS, we can get very excited over a freebie. They stopped giving us pens at work years ago in my trust.

Iceland do pg tips 240 for £3.50 same price each as Costco for example and they deliver. Costco you'd need to buy a pack of 4.

Sometimes it's better to look at supermarkets deals.
We have both Costco and Makro cards (yes worth having) but still buy tea when on offer at supermarkets instead.

Costco is good when on offer but it doesn't always work out cheaper than supermarket offers.

Costco online is more expensive than instore too so you need to go in to get best benefit.

Yes you can sometimes get better deals than Costco or Makro in supermarkets but they don't always have the stock and can refuse to sell bulk amounts of anything, especially now as many are limiting some purchases to a handful of items.

With Costco, no-one is going to bat an eyelid if you buy 10 bags of 400 tea bags.

@Flickoffboris

Are you looking for advice on bulk buying or praise from strangers for spending your own money on teabags? Seems like the latter to me

Definitely seems like the latter doesn't it

Bidfood or another large catering retailer? Also, if you're anywhere near south London please PM me - I run a charity project that is desperate to send drinks and snacks to NHS staff but (unsurprisingly) can't get hold of a person to talk to about how to do that.

Well, it looks to me like OP is asking for advice on where to go for the best bulk buying deals which doesn't seem unreasonable to me

OP seriously it looks like your either asking for donations rather then recommendations or just looking for congrats. If you want donations post in local groups.
This exactly!! You’ve started 2 threads about the same thing. All it needed was either quick google search yourself, or a question asking best place to bulk buy tea and coffee. Where you work, how hard you’re working and that you’re spending your own money are totally irrelevant and you’re either looking for freebies or wanting praise heaping in you. Bet you’re the same sort of NGS worker who wears her ID badge everywhere for some of recognition/queue jumping.

I think OP sounds kind. But OP, will be acceptable in work for a middle manager to spend £300 of their own money on items for staff? That sounds v problematic. And not sustainable.

What does your line manager think?

The problem is a Costco membership card is about £30 and so I have never bought one, hard to make that back on small savings. I have been with friends a few times and often find Tesco cheaper if you buy when things are on offer.

Are people really interested in biros?!

You don’t work in a hospital do you. 😂

Currently 480 Yorkshire tea bags selling in Tesco for £9.50, they are £9.49 on Costco web site, no idea if they would be cheaper in store.

@MojoJojo71

Those of you who don’t understand the appeal of a free pen definitely don’t work in the NHS, we can get very excited over a freebie. They stopped giving us pens at work years ago in my trust.

My huge private sector firm stopped providing lens and day books ages ago.

OP you do seem to want to stress quite what a wonderful manager you are.

Why do t you try and get a local supermarket to sponsor you with free drinks, I’m sure a lot of the big supermarkets who are doing so well at the moment would help.

Aldi do yorkshire tea at a resonable price, plus have a nice instint coffee.

I think the staff will appreicate it, we lost our staff room due to being covid ward in Oct and internal politics. It's been uplifting to see how positive and caring people can be to support each other.

I'd love a bio.

@scubadive

Currently 480 Yorkshire tea bags selling in Tesco for £9.50, they are £9.49 on Costco web site, no idea if they would be cheaper in store.

Probably cheaper in store, about £6/7? Low priced and/or bulky items are usually more expensive on the Costco website than in store due to delivery costs.

@MojoJojo71

Those of you who don’t understand the appeal of a free pen definitely don’t work in the NHS, we can get very excited over a freebie. They stopped giving us pens at work years ago in my trust.

I love a freebie too but a pen instead of a all expenses paid Xmas meal out doesn’t cut it. 😂

There’s is a company called Bookers and they sell large packs of food, tea etc and Cash and Carry wholesalers.

The other message I get from OP's post is that clinical staff are going to be working flat out without a break until May. Maybe some of you should be asking why that wasn't what leaped out at you from this post, if it was anything other than "where's the best place to buy coffee".

No doubt if OP hadn't explained why she wanted to order this stuff she'd have been accused of hoarding at a time of national crisis.

Are you just looking for some praise here OP? What you’re doing is nice and all, but I don’t think you’ll be on the honours list any time soon

@Flickoffboris

Well I for one am appalled at the OP having to do this in the first place.
@ChudleyCannons
Sorry I don’t have any suggestions on suppliers but couldn’t let that shitty comment slide

Sometimes it’s not always cheaper using Costco or a wholesaler. Right now Asda have the massive bags of 1500 tetley teabags for £6, cheaper than any wholesaler I use.

Chocolate is expensive wholesale too, you’d definitely be cheaper in B&M for biscuits and treats.

I use 4 different wholesalers on a weekly basis including Costco, Booker / Makro & Brakes. They’re not always the cheapest option!

If you near us our cafe would feed you for free once a month! I think it’s amazing what you do x

@HOS8595

I don’t get why you would buy biros either.

Instead of our work Xmas do (that my work place normally pay for) this year we got A small ‘happiness’ journal and 2 pens with a positive message written on the side.

I thought it was crap personally. Why would I want a pen as a thank you gift from the company when they provide pens for free.

Although saying that a family member that works for the NHS Said she would have them when I slagged them off in the family group chat.

Also with the buying dominos/Nando’s on the last day of the month... will ALL staff be in that day or will some miss out to the rotation of shifts?

Pens are needed constantly, for every patient interaction virtually, by nurses who are mobile round wards etc. They get scattered to the four winds. ‘Lend’ one and you never see it back. They get through thousands. Why not trust the OP to know what she and her team need?

not from someone who wants to genuinely help her staff get through this shitty pandemic.

Which could have been achieved every bit as well by a post simply asking where was the best place/mechanism to bulk buy decent tea/coffee/potentially biscuits and possibly pens. The background is in no way relevant if not looking to stick the boot in to current services in a public way and seek kudos.

I think for pens, I'd probably buy a supply of cheap but decent basic pens, eg Bic biros, which can be had for about 15 pence each if you buy in bulk.

Then everyone has easy access to pens without having to hunt round for them.