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

[Yummmyy]

I earn a decent salary. Whenever I go to Tesco for a basic food shop, sone items are going up literally 50p plus within a matter of two weeks. Orange juice was 2.20 for Tesco’s basic, the most expensive 4.30!!

Yes I know orange juice isn’t an essential but when you’re well above minimum wage and have to cut something like that out of your food shop it does make you question what’s the point… anyone else relate to this? I just don’t know where it’s going to end

I earn 17k. It's terrifying.

Shop at Lidl or Aldi if you can?

It's madness! Once I've paid my rent, council tax, standard bills, travel costs, and utilities. I literally have around the amount I would have if I received UC. I work full time, and my commute is fairly long.

You genuinely end up thinking what is the point 🤔

Prices are rising while it's contents are reducing.

It's not going to end.

But we're still one of the cheaper countries for groceries 😂

Unless salaries fall in line with inflation, we're f'd.

My concern is rent prices. Most salaries are way off to be able to afford housing costs these days.

I don't buy orange juice but the price of fresh oranges hasn't risen. Maybe juice your own ? It's much nicer.

I cook from scratch, buy unprocessed foods and the prices seem to be holding steady.

Is it processed foods that are rising in price?

£2.80 for black peppercorns!! don't even look at olive oil any more.

You are not being unreasonable @Yummmyy in the slightest

So many are struggling. And sinking. It's awful.

A cucumber has doubled in price in the last year. It's not just processed food at all. Everything has gone up.

YABU for shopping in Tesco. I've swapped my full weekly shop to Aldi. Apart from 2 items i can't get there everything is Aldi. My weekly food bill for a family of 3 including extras like washing stuff etc. Has gone from.nearly £130-£140 a week at tesco to ~£90 in Aldi. I meal plan and cook from scratch.

I'm originally not from here and one of the things I will always disagree on is the price of food. It's really dirt cheap and people must not have travelled or just lived only in this country to not know what expensive food is. Ironically a lot of fruit and veg is imported from my home country and dirt cheap if you had to buy it there!
Oh and there's things like yellow stickers, offers on everything going and so MANY different grocery stores not to mention farmers markets all over the place.

I've literally just said to dh the other day that I have done a full week food shop from M&S and it was around 60 and we cook Almost everything from scratch for a family of 4. I appreciate what you are saying op, as that's how you feel.
To me food is one of the cheapest things about this country.

I agree. I also have fussy children who like certain foods and even things like their preferred pasta sauce keeps going up.
I don't find Aldi much cheaper (and no clubcard points to collect) also the fruit and veg usually doesn't last from the cheaper supermarkets either so isn't cost effective for me personally.

Oh ffs 🤣 no - it's not the evil processed foods that have gone up, it's everything. All fruit and veg, toiletries, everything.
Lovely humble brag, but if you haven't noticed then it can't be you doing the grocery shop.

People on UC still need to pay those things. So, imagine what they have leftover. You are still better off working.

Let’s not turn a cost of living thread into a UC bashing thread.

No, it isn’t ‘only processed foods’. Prices have risen across the board. A pack of 6 chicken breasts has increased substantially.

I cook from scratch the majority of the time, bar the odd fishfinger. I make my own fish, and chips though, and pay a lot less than I would buying it from the Chip shop, or the equivalent in the supermarket ready made. Prices have gone up, no doubt, but I have noticed more so, that the sizes of things have gotten smaller.

You know you'd very possibly still have to work to be entitled to universal credit though?

We shop at Lidl.

My partner does the weekly shop and it's been pretty standard for the last year in terms of what we buy.

When I first started shopping at Lidl, what he bought would have cost around £35. Then for a while, it went up to around £50. Then £75.

£101 it cost last week!

Not even Aldi and Lidl are cheap options anymore.

Food is cheaper here than some other countries, yes. That doesn’t change the fact that the price of food has risen faster than wages have, meaning British people now have to make their money go further. The price of food in other countries is irrelevant, as we don’t live there.

If they're on UC they won't be paying rent (they'll receive HB) and council tax. I'm not bashing it at all. My point was that working full time isn't creating much of financial gap between working and not. Which wasn't previously as obviously the case.

I'm on UC and I still pay rent and council tax. The housing element of UC doesn't cover all of my rent.

Since time began, prices have risen. That's why salaries (including NMW) also keep rising.
And actually, some things are cheaper - my first washing machine in 1989 cost over £400 - imagine what that would be now if white goods had kept up with inflation?!

Where do you buy your oranges from that it would be any where near the same cost to squeeze them yourself

It takes about 8 oranges to get enough juice for a small glass!

Which is totally separate to what is being discussed here, which is the price of food! There is no need to bring people on UC into this, many who are working, just like you.

@Truth25 I agree, even in the 90s we were paying a proportionately larger amount of salaries on food, I think it's quite dangerous how much we are wanting to drive down the price of food and it's pushing people to unhealthy options. BUT, I don't blame people for that (big business and shareholders I do) when housing costs have risen as much as they have here people are having to look at where they can make up the cost.