Penny chew? Bag of crisps for 5p? What did you splurge your pocket money on when you were a DC? Share your memories of all things pocket money with Santander - you could win £250*! DRAW NOW CLOSED

[AnnMumsnet]

Santander have asked us to find out from Mumsnetters what you spent your precious pocket money on back when they were a kid. They'd also like to know how much you used to get versus how much you give your DC now.

Cast your minds back to the time when a packet of crisps was 5p/ 10p/ 20p/ cheaper than they are now and you could buy all manner of teeth-rotting sweets with a fraction of what your children are getting each week.

So indulge us - let us know what you used to love to spend your pocket money on. And tell us how much you got when you were a child, and how much you're now giving your children. Where did you prefer to spend the money? Or were you a saver?

Everyone who adds their thoughts to the thread will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £250 shopping voucher*.

Please note that any comments posted on this thread may be used by Santander in further marketing material (anonymously, of course).

Thanks and good luck!
MNHQ

• NB Standard MN terms and conditions apply - see here. Closing date 8 October 2014 10am

** Voucher can be chosen from www.voucherexpress.co.uk

Penny chews actually cost a ha'penny and you could by loads of Fruit Salads and Black Jacks with your pocket money. I once watched in awe as a small boy bought £1 worth of ha'penny chews!
I did eventually progress to the sophistication of a quarter of pineapple cubes.

I didn't get regular pocket money but used to buy a bag of 1/2p and 1p sweets.
My DC pocket money varies by age.
At the moment DS1 17 and DS2 14 get £5 a week plus anything left over from dinner money.
DDs 11 and 10 get £1.50 a week, probably about time it went up a little but they only waste it on sweets or drinks!

I got £1 a week from my grandmother, I used to buy 2 packets of sherbet dipdabs, 1 for me and 1 for Dad and we'd eat them in the carpark before taking the shopping home, and I used to get a bounty for me and my mum to share when the boys were at cubs/scouts and the little ones were in bed, I'm 1 of 8 kids so time by myself with either parent was rare, then I'd save the rest to buy fish and chips for my family one night in the summer so mum could have a night off.

My DC get £2 a week and I make sure they spend it on themselves

Sometimes used to get a sixpence from my nan and my sister and I used to leg it down to the corner shop to buy as many sweets as we could. Black jacks and fruit salads were real favs. At 13 I used to babysit everyday and earned £1.50 a week. I used to go mad and buy a record when I was feeling particularly affluent. My first record was Puppy Love by Donny Osmond. Oh god how I used to love him and the Bay City Rollers.
Lot of parents seem to give their kids 50p per week for every year of their age. Think kids are definitely richer nowadays but during my childhood when money was so tight I used to really value things and spending tuppence at the corner shop was a fantastic feeling.

I used to love freeze pops and penny sweets. DC is too young for pocket money at the moment.

Post office near to primary school had penny sweet counter so things like snakes and chocolate logs as well as fruit salads and black jacks. oh and liquorice strings. Most were a penny I think. I also remember school used to sell crisps (2 and a half pence a bag) and homemade tablet.

As a teen after swimming on a Saturday morning, I had a thing for peaches in the summer and rock and roller salt and vinegar crisps!

Pocket money as early teen I think was £5 a month but I would save up and buy clothes with that too. I also had post office savings account so some went there. This was I. The days when it was easier to do babysitting and other jobs as an under 16. I do remember always trying to work out how to get more money for cinema etc.

£1 a day (2000-2004-ish), two cans of Iru-Brun& a box of Cadburys Cookies and 20p left over a day.
I was a bit of a wheeler dealer and would sell my free school meals lunch (baguette, fruit & a calypso drink) for .30p cheaper (£2) than the cost to none free school meal kids and then use that money for the weekend...so I'd have just over £10 to spend at the weekends.

Primary school, the local sweet shop had my favourite, Apple Jacks...fruit salads and black jacks just don't compare

I was a saver. I didn't get pocket money as such but remember saving all my birthday etc money all year for Christmas presents, including a proper watch for my mum (it cost £25, a fortune at the time). She cried when she opened it and I was gutted, thinking it had got her something she didn't want when in fact she was thinking the exact opposite.

Around 1980 I got pocket money - 30p to get a comic plus a small chocolate bar, unless the comic had a toy.

Now would need to give £3 a week to ds for that, except every comic comes with toys and he gets chocolate at other times anyway, so he gets a quid until he asks for more.

I remember when I was around 6/7 and I had probably been naughty for a change Dm refused to buy my copy of the beano so I scrabbled down the back of the sofa, rummaged in drawers and eventually managed to rustle up enough to get it myself. 2 1/2p!! Bargain.

We spent our money in the little sweet shop near the church....on the way into Church Parade with Brownies.

We bought Tom Thumb Drops and Sherbet Pips because they were easier to eat surreptitiously.

But one morning they had run out and we bought Pineapple Chunks, with disastrous results, as it is not easy to conceal a large sharp edged cube in the cheek of an 8 year old.

We also bought 'suckers' from the shop on the way home from school - but as we were not allowed to eat in school uniform this also led to disasters as occasionally an ice lolly had to be stuffed in a coat pocket if a tacher was walking along the same pavement.

We got a penny for each year of our age. We tried to maximise our potential by having co-operative schemes with friends, and when we couldn't decide which of our favourite chocolate bars to choose: my friend would buy a Caramac on Wednesdays when she got her pocket money, and share , and I would get a Milky Bar on Fridays, also to share. Sometimes we would buy both on the same day and sit in her garage and break all the bars up into chunks and share the out equally.

Of course, this collective strategy was also prone to failure: one person buying a bar the other didn't like, accidentally eating it before the share out, getting their pocket money stopped (for throwing Brownie Beret in the air like a Frisbee and it ending up in the Trent, or climbing over the garden fence in order to bounce on the top of the wire fence of the neighbours on the other side, etc).

Now my secondary school DS gets £15 a month, and mostly saves it, but seems to take cash out of his tin to buy packets of chocolate chip cookies from the local supermarket on the way to school - which get shared out. Others buy bags of cheap donuts to share, or cans of horrendous energy drinks.

But my DS has saved a significant sum towards something big he really wants.

I thought it was quite posh when I was young to buy a cream cake from the local bakery so that is what I did. I expect that half the time I didn't have enough money but the ladies who served me were quite indulgent.

I got £1 a week from my Grandparents when I was little, but that was upgraded to £5 a week when I went to secondary school.

Having said that, I was (and still am) useless at saving because if I wanted something bigger, like clothes or a computer game, rather than making me save up, doting Grandparents would usually either just buy it for me or subsidise what I did manage to save towards it! I was terribly spoilt XD

Going to be mean to my kids and make them earn their pocket money, and save up for things! It'll be character building! :P

I am ancient, so got 10p from one Gran and 25p from my Grandad. The other would give me 10p every Tuesday to put in my school bank book and bought me my Bunty comic.

My evil parent didn't give me pocket money and I remember saving, variously, for the Sindy doll I wanted ("waste of money, bit of plastic, and pah! to dolls' clothes, Marjorie up the street can knit you some!") and for some red scholls from Boots. (they cost £1)

Usually though, when not saving for something extremely important/essential (see above re: Sindy/Scholls) it was either pencil cases, or books. I distinctly remember having worked out one Friday that with my 35p I could get both an orange fluffy pencil case (it was the 70s, orange was big) and The Horse and his boy by CS Lewis. When me and my Grandad got to the shop, there had been a price rise.
Grandad subbed me so I got both.

I got 25p - it was a long time ago - and I remember buying some penny chews and Topper or Whizzer and Chips. My own children don't get any pocket money - I pretty much buy them what they want, within reason. However, they are starting to demand it! Their nan gives them 50p each a week which goes into a jar to spend on books when it mounts up.

I received 50p on a Saturday. The local newsagent used to do 10p mixes, and we spent ages choosing each week. Or a "quarter" or sweets, usually chocolate covered caramel balls.

I can remember saving for Xmas presents, from about November we used to save half of our pocket money each week for gifts, at that stage I received nearer to £2 though.

I used to get brownie magazine but my brother who was younger than me saved for weeks to buy me a strawberry shortcake doll for my birthday.
I've never forgotten it.

Sherbet fountains - wonderful!

Ooh a 20 mix up from pearl's shop, every Wednesday when I went to my grandma's after school! I loved the white mice. I used to get the amount of pocket money according to what age I was, eg £7 for a 7 year old. I plan to do the same as ds gets older!
mice

What about those of us who can remember when things were 6 d let along 5p ??

A shilling (a whole 5p ) could buy you a lot : a whole bag of loose sweeties and some licorice sherbert iirc

And I can remember when creme eggs first came out and they had a yolk and were a lot bigger

Used to get a pound from gran and think same from parents - was dying days of 1/2 p sweets, usually gummi bears, few Apple jacks and Fruit Salad, myabe a Highland toffee to bite and pull on and stretch till it snaps to a point. In summer those Mr Freeze pops the blue ones, (they would always go quickly!) I have recollections of either a copy of Action Force (GI JOE) in america, think I got the turtles comic, sometimes Commando.

When my DS is bit older will probably be very geeky and get the price of these items now and work it out!

I used to spend my pocket money cherries from the grocers on the way home from school [smug emoticon]

I.can remember going to the local shop where a favourite buy was Mojos which were little spearmint chews and were four for an old penny. They had them in a section of the counter mixed with some sort of fruity chews (which were ok) and blackjacks which I hated.so.i would pick out what I wanted.
Jamboree brand lucky bags were always tempting because there was a plastic toy in the bag. The sweets were foul but the toy was always tempting but often disappointing.
when I was older, polo mints were my sweet of choice.
I dont remember buying myself much chocolate. I think it was more than I had to spend and I associate it with being something my parents would buy for us.

I shouldnadd that ds doesn't buy sweets...he doesn't like them! He currently has £5 pocket money with which he likes to pick a comic or magazine, saving any change.

I bought space dust and chupa chups.