Supermarkets are taking the pi$$

[ButterflyTable]

I can’t believe how expensive food is now especially in the likes of Sainsbury’s for the same product. Total P-take, e.g. Organic Milk Sainsbury’s £2 Aldi £1.79.

Why give us ‘nectar’ prices when they are inflated prices in the first place? £5.50 for a Pizza Express Margherita and £2.75 on Nectar. I think actually it’s the fakery with making us think we are getting a good deal that’s pissing me off.

I went to Aldi today (we don’t have one near us) as I was doing a drop off nearby and the price difference is huge!!

How about every day staples? EVOO isn't necessarily something on most people's lists every week!

It is mine. We eat a lot of veggie food, pasta etc.

EVOO isn't on my list at all and I'm a veggie. I never knowingly eat oil.

It's not for loads of people though.

I honestly don't find Sainsbury's expensive for what I regularly buy and our food bills are way lower than many on here (2 adults, two junior aged kids).

Our Aldi and Lidl has the same amount of processed crap as any other supermarket.

We eat very little processed crap and eat completely from scratch yet shop mostly at Aldi.

It was noticeable how much processed food and over use of plastic was in Waitrose in the chiller cabinets. Masses of it. It may be £££££ but it’s still there. As it is in Sainsbury’s too.

It is for loads of people. There was a thread on the cost of evoo not so long ago.

My bill is extortionate in Sainsbury’s. Really noticeable if I can’t be arsed to go to both and give myself a week of just going to Sainsbury which isn’t often now. I do it once, nearly faint at checkout and drag myself round Aldi for weeks after.

Weird. Given the number of Aldi price match products, I'm surprised!

Aldi is barely any cheaper for me and I can't do a full shop. Plus, Nectar points (I earned £7 today in points).

I really work hard at reducing it too and we’re not extravagant. Aldi price match is only on a few things.

I'm just waiting for DD having her hair done, so I've popped into a couple of 'bargain shops' Its been a while since I've been in either. There doesn't seem to he any difference in price any more, and they are now all similarly priced along with the big supermarkets. B&M and Farm Foods are next door to each other so I had a quick browse in each. 6 packs of crisps for £2 is an example; the same as I pay in Waitrose or Sainsbury's.

Years ago, I'd go in these shops and marvel at the fact there were often many items half the price of the supermarkets (mainly tinned goods, pasta, sauces and rices) and I'd come out with all sorts of goodies.

That said, a lot of the obscure brands have now disappeared, so it's all main household brands on offer. They aren't going to be able to buy in these brands at any better deal than the big supermarkets do, as the big brands name their price and contribute to controlling the market (wasn't there a big thing with Heinz last year and the supermarkets threatening to boycot unless they dropped prices? Didn't work by the looks of things)

Sainsburys have 500 Aldi price matched products. I was quite surprised to see this when doing my Mam's online order the other week. You can actually filter just the Aldi price match products and shop from that. I'm considering trying it on a month where I really want to try and save. It will be interesting to see if I could get everything I needed (I suspect not, though)

I disagree - there's definitely a difference in quality. Aldi fruit and veg isn't as fresh, the meat often has bone shards in it. The different supermarkets all have their own contracted milk suppliers. The standards they impose vary and the prices they pay do too. Tesco for example pay well but impose high hygiene standards so the milk has a good shelf life. They also spend on research to improve quality and animal welfare and expect their farmers to do regular training. Tesco milk contracts are much coveted.

You have to spend like £3500 to get £7 back in nectar points

I had bonus points on loads of items (710), a 5 x points coupon (540), plus 135 for my shopping. So almost £7.

Proof attached!

Organic milk will generally be outdoors I think? Only in summer obviously. Organic is restricted on how much they can top-up with cereals so it tends to be less intensive. McDonald's is pretty good for dairy products too.

Oops, @RainbowZebraWarrior got there before me!

Not true, dairy cows are not fed food waste and are certainly not fed antibiotics in the UK.

The trend towards bigger more intensive farms is largely due to price pressure from supermarkets

It depends if you would be buying those items. Clearly not as when I do a full shop in Sainsbury’s the bill is hugely bigger than in Aldi even though I always go the for the cheaper options.

Yes, but you were wrong to say it's 'a few'. You may only buy 'a few', but hundreds more exist!

organic mainly means that the feed is grown without use of artificial fertiliser, pesticides, herbicides. plus some measures around animal husbandry.

you can't for example keep densely stocked barn chickens organically. they would all die if you can't use certain medication, like preventative antibiotics, in case of disease outbreak.

some of the certifying bodies are completely bonkers though.

Its worth looking at the website ‘Trolley’
They update on all prices in all shops for individual items.

( not Lidl though )

The trouble with the price match is that it's only a limited selection (500 sounds like a lot but that's across all products in the store so it's not that many is each category)
So for eg. At Tesco packs of 4 baking potatoes are priced matched to a 4 pack at Aldi, but I buy the big bag of baking potatoes from Aldi which has around 8 potatoes depending on their size. Buying 4 may be price matched, but it's a more expensive way of buying them so it's not really iyswim. It's the same with peppers. 3 pack is price matched, but the wonky pepper bag with 5-6 peppers at Aldi is much better value.

Absolutely this.

I don't agree. I don't really buy ultra processed foods but I know by looking at the list of ingredients that Aldi and Lidl have tons of upf compared with other supermarkets. On lots of their items the list of ingredients is ridiculous and I don't even know what half of them are.

If you look at the ingredients list on items in the Waitrose chiller cabinet or freezer and compare them to Aldi and Lidl there are far less ingredients.

We find as vegetarians that it is impossible to buy a full shop in Aldi or Lidl and their veg is not fresh enough nor do they have as much variety of veg as our Sainsbury's does.

We eat lots of lentils, beans, chickpeas, veg and want to be able to buy them all in one place. We make lots of curries and want to be able to buy the spices when we shop.

Aldi and Lidl do very little in tinned fruit too. I liked tinned grapefruit as well as fresh grapefuit and neither of them sell it.

Even though both our Aldi and Lidl are large stores they just don't have enough variation and choice. Probably because of all the stuff they sell in the middle aisles which take up so much space. I would rather they sold a greater variety of food