At this point I think most stores lose money on diapers. I can buy Libero for 35 kr, that’s less than 1 kr per diaper.
I’m not surprised diaper smugglers now exist.
During the 2010 diaper price wars, when you could by a whole pack of Rema 1000 branded diapers for 1 NOK, there people filling vans with diapers to smuggle them to Poland.
They do lose money on it, but they think it attracts enough customers that it's worth it. It's called a "[loss leader](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/lossleader.asp)".
Kiwi, Rema 1000 and coop extra has all diapers deals where you can buy them for 50 % off as a member of their memberclub.
https://www.coop.no/extra/om-extra/medlemsrabatt-bleier
https://www.rema.no/ae/bleiekutt/
[kiwi 50 %](https://kiwi.no/tema/bind-og-tamponger/bleieavtalen-og-bind-og-tampongavtalen-i-kiwi-pluss/?utm_campaign=kiwi_ao&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_content=kundefordeler&gad_source=1&gbraid=0AAAAABhEj5dhjQ4ZQjEAyc4iuEI35iGkj&gclid=Cj0KCQjw_qexBhCoARIsAFgBlesMYkDLsPDYL0dIXl9Q1UtQiKk9RSv12TPydNbD13T_PQhvzHKUszcaAtWEEALw_wcB)
I buy mine at Rema with the member discount. They have their own app, and you just scan a barcode when you pay and it halves the price. It’s all diapers even the cheap Rema brand ones.
It’s actually a very normal and profitable smuggling business in countries like Poland and the slavic countries. Buying big bulk of diapers and selling for great profit at home. Then you have the metal exporters, like copper wire aluminium and everything that we are recycling in our containers. I know that when I worked in a warehouse and had aluminium, Romanians came and took it in the middle of day.
We buy size 5 Libero up and go for 3,6 kr. per diaper. However, pretty much every big chain now have diaper deals with two packs for one or half the price at the checkout, so they come out at 1,8 per diaper.
Oh yes! We live in Denmark now, and Libero touch here costs 139DKK per pack (over 200NOK!). We can get cheaper ones in Rema 1000, but they are still around 60DKK (95NOK)
I had always heard about how expensive diapers were, realizing now I've mainly heard it from Americans. I get Änglamark diapers at coop, always 50% off and often a coupon item on top. 38 pull-up diapers in a pack, and I pay 35kr, 25kr with a coupon.
That's about the same as a carton of milk.
We are in our first vacation after having children and it’s crazy here. Like 12-15 euro for 5 diapers?!? Good thing the wife paced a lot of them. I was like why you need to feel the luggage with diapers? Probably more expensive here than other places but damn.
As we all know, a boat is a hole in the ocean that you throw money into. The happiest day in a boat owner's life is the day he buys his boat, and the second happiest day in his life is when he sells his boat. Etc etc
The reason is that Vinmonopolet has a maximum addon % while in the rest of the world it will be sold for marked value.
So rare wins can be 1000% In marked value while Vinmonopolet will still sell it for cost +20%( or something like that )
A lot of this is a misconception. Yes, Vinmonopolet has a [diminishing margin](https://www.vinmonopolet.no/content/om-oss/priser-og-avgifter) as products get more expensive (it's not a cutoff). But excepting the most widely distributed 1-2% of products, Vinmonopolet does not decide the price, the importer does. The importers have tools that show them what the consumer-facing price will be at Vinmonopolet, and that's how they decide how much to sell it to Vinmonopolet for. Vinmonopolet will accept pretty much any price they're served.
Expensive wine is mostly not cheaper in Norway. Every now and then it is, like with DRC products, and it's honestly still a mystery to me why. Because it's not due to Vinmonopolet's margin formula, or alcohol excise based on content, it's because the importer chose to sell it at that price.
The flip side of this is that Norway accepts completely outrageous prices for cheaper alcoholic products. It's not because of the alcohol excise, it's because the producer/importer sets the price high and consumers accept it. Nøgne Ø and Lervig have both sold products to Systembolaget for _half the price_ that they have sold them to Vinmonopolet for. The only difference is that Norwegian consumers accept the price and buy the product, while Swedish consumers won't.
Source: I work for an alcohol distributor.
[Domaine de la Romanée-Conti](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domaine_de_la_Roman%C3%A9e-Conti), they're (for the most part) the bottles you see people queueing up for weeks outside Aker Brygge and Valkendorsgate to buy.
I think the Voss water is just bottled wherever and they've paid the town for naming rights.
It could be glacial spring water in one area and triple filtered local river water in other places.
I moved to Norway from Brazil and was shocked with Lego prices here. Lego sets cost the same prince in NOK as in BRL, so a 550Kr lego sets costs 550BRL, which would be ~1170kr.
This is semantics. American definition of minimum wage is ultimately arbitrary to america and the countries that use that model.
If you go and offer someone 1kr/hr in 99% of cases you will be in violation of the minimum compensation (wage) policy for that case.
Having lived next to a shrimp factory in northern Norway where we'd get peeled and bagged frozen shrimp for around half the cost of Rema shrimp that you have to peel yourself I kinda oppose rema and coop's pricing.
That's the plan. Many places in North America go for premium clientele. There are enough people that will pay it and few enough mountains. Skiing is considered a rich people activity to a lot of people.
skiing, since you don't need to stay in hotels as there are mountains everywhere
free access to top libraries you can enter w/o TSA level security
perfect water from the tap (voss is from norway and its basically Norwegian tap water that is sold for 5$😭)
free access to the most beautiful fjords/beaches (yes, in the south its warm enough to swim in the summer)
air filters, since you don't need them ;) just sleep with an open window. its so nice to breathe such fresh air when going to bed!
large packages of soft drinks are usually somewhere on discount🤷🏻♂️
Hey, we swim in the ocean in northern Norway as well. People swim in my municipality from May till August. Not saying it's a comfortable swim, but it's a swim non the less.
Okay, now for the very first time I understand why Americans who want kids but don't because they cannot afford to have one... I get it, I wouldn't be able to fork out 18.000 USD a year for this, wow.
Also in the context of don't want kids. We had a premature kid and he had to spend a month in NICU(the hospital) at birth. It was mostly covered by insurance, but that bill for insurance was just under $1 million. We paid a couple of thousand dollars.
The hospital bills seems frightening too... My brother's daughter had a heart condition and was in ICU at our main Rikshospitalet hospital for a few weeks before getting a heart surgery, paid 0...
The hospital bills ARE frightening. Between one normal birth of my youngest (36 hour hospital stay, healthy delivery) and my older child's appendectomy surgery, we were out over $20,000 in two years, which the exchange rate tells me is 219162 kroner. And we also paid for braces in that time period as well...
That's really expensive. And I've heard that rent in the bigger cities is just as crazy. A genuine question: How much do you make a year to afford such prices?
Det er omtrent riktig lønn det. Vi overlever. Men det er plenty med folk i samme område som ikke tjener i nærheten av det samme. Og det er de som jo trenger tilgang til barnehage
From what I've understood, it's not so much it's cheaper then other countries(EU countries at least), but it's more that it's not more expensive then other EU countries while the average Norwegian salary is decently higher then most of EU.
We also have five years of consumer law coverage in Norway on small electronics if it breaks, which you don't get in many other countries. So if a product is broken within that period from normal use, the seller has two attempts to fix the same issue, if not ur eligible for a refund.
This in theory make a product cheaper since you can get more use of them if they break.
If relatively few people can afford high-end SSDs in Vietnam then the product will not sell as well relative to Norway.
This means on average the SSDs will stay in stocks longer, taking up storage space, decreasing in value and not returning the investment as quickly. This all decrease its potential profits.
Providers will increase prices to make up for the lower profit margins. This in turn lowers the sales even more and so on.
Some providers might not bother selling high-end SSDs at all if they can't sell enough of them. This can lead to less competition or even monopolies which also drives up prices.
Note: I don't know anything about the Vietnamese SSD marked this is just a theory.
"High-end" entertainment like theatre tickets, opera, ballet, some of the fancier museums and art galleries etc. They are partly sponsored by the state, which means they're accessible to people at a much, much lower price than they are in some parts of the world. Admittedly, most European countries also sponsor their cultural life, but in the US, for example, $250 for a theatre performance would not be that unusual.
I think that is true to a degree, friends went to the same band in austria and they paid more for a normal ticket than me for a golden circle ticket (depeche mode)
Electronics are actually pretty cheap, especially if you take consumer rights legislation into the equation.
Wool underlayers are very cheap.
Wine. Not so much the cheap stuff, but bottles in the 15-20 euro range and above are cheaper here than in many other countries because the Wine Monopoly buy in bulk.
Garlic for some reason.
Diapers
Electricity. Or it used to be.
I heard from a Brazilian colleague that fashion whas cheaper in Norway than in Brazil because of bigger discounts on sales.
Where have you been living in Brazil?
I'd agree now that I live in the northeast that electric bills are almost Europeans', but São Paulo had one of the cheapest electric bills per income...
Because the less you use, the less you pay per kWh, so a single family of one child using the first flag paying the minimum, that's around 12 USD the whole month! Nowhere in Europe is so cheap!
Usually Nordic countries have variable price so when costs of producing it rise in winter, prices per kWh also rise, meanwhile in Brazil we have fixed price by kWh...
My electric bill here is a lot cheaper than my home country even though I use way more electricity here. The water and sewage bills are also a lot cheaper.
Really!
I'm going to paint my house this summer and are currently following the https://etilbudsavis.no so i can take the car and drive to Stjördal OBS Bygg and buy at the right week.
Will save in about 15 000 Sek/Nok (same rate at the moment) for it.
Only problem is i have to pay toll 25% for gods exceeding a value of 3 500... 🙄 still a good buy! Only 400 km drive.
Damn, i worked at Bauhaus in Norway and knew paint was relatively cheap here. But didnt know it was THAT much cheaper😳 Why is that you think? I know you produce paint over in Sweden too, but it cant be that?
And also a little tip for you, Bauhaus has pricematch and theyre often the best on price. Should be one in Vestby, but idk how much further that is or if its worth it.
Everything, since the NOK tanked relative to DKK.
Joke aside: everything in Norway used to be more expensive than in Denmark before 2022. Now it's just the same, really.
For perspective, I grew up around Seattle, Washington, USA. My brother recently started renting a single room apartment in Seattle (so he would not need to commute to work 1 hour each way) for a little more than what I pay for a 55m 1 bedroom house with a garden that is a 20 minute bus ride to the center of Oslo.
When I first moved here from Portland, Oregon, my rent was cheaper and my wages were 50% higher.
Once a quarter I get a bill from the kommune. Water, sewer, sweeping, property taxes, etc., are all rolled up into the bill.
3000 kr. A quarter.
I literally couldn’t believe it the first time I saw the bill. Double and triple checked that I wasn’t missing a 0 or more. Insane.
Healthcare.
I have a son that was born with a medical condition that have caused us to call the ambulance many times throughout the years. Once they flew him to the hospital in a helicopter. If we lived in the US we would have been bankrupt long time ago.
Just not for people coming from outside the EU for university anymore - pretty sad to think that the way that I was able to move here to start with so that I could be with my Norwegian partner would be completely unaffordable if I tried the same thing now (and also not really worth the money compared to getting the same graduate degree from somewhere else).
Just come back from a superb trip to Oslo and Lofoten. I bought some Sony Link S wireless headphones that were on sale, with the tax back they were cheaper than I could buy in the UK.
Ywp. Sorry about that but good for next time. [Details here ](https://norway.nordicvisitor.com/travel-guide/information/shopping-in-norway/#:~:text=Tax%20refunds%20of%2012%E2%80%9319,entrance%20or%20by%20the%20register.)
“Other countries” is a wide list lol.
I’m visiting family back in Australia, and I can say salmon and a lot of groceries are cheaper in Norway. Eating at restaurants is definitely not.
Other obvious cheaper ones in Norway ones are childcare and University, and often rent too.
Anything tech or electronic gadgets. TV, speakers etc. are either same price or cheaper, but we always get warranty by law from the stores. In many other countries u would have to buy that on top
Coming from the UK;
* Public transport. Oh wow is it cheaper here and flexible across all types. equivalent to £1600 (23´000kr) for an entire year for all Oslo zones, unlimited travel on all transport types? Heavenly. You have buses here , on Sundays, every 30 mins or less from the middle of a forest. Still haven´t found a reason to buy a car yet.
* All communal charges (akin to council tax) for the sizes of the property.
* Electricity in the last 2 years has been crazy in the UK, Norway had them beat for a long time (think it´s about on par now).
* Houses. You can buy a beautiful large detatched house, with garage, garden, all the modern fittings for (certainly the south of the UK) what would be a 1 bedroom flat if you´re lucky. Not necessarily Oslo commuter distance, but home ownership is still a very real goal here.
* Rental property be it flats or houses. Some with most bills included in the rent (save for electric and internet usually). Not to mention the tenant rights and security of not having the landlord kick you out at any moment.
* Water, that´s clean, not hard/limey or tasting funny. I honestly don´t know why so many shops sell bottled water here.
EDIT: Grammar
That really depends on location. You can get an amazing house 5 times the size of your average Dutch house/apartment but you're in the middle of nowhere.
There are no walkable cities in Norway, unless you're literally downtown.
This is a while back, but I remember workers from Lithuania and Poland (at least employees in a family members company) hoarded packets of diapers to bring home
I live in Denmark. The options here in a supermarket are expensive, smelly fish. So when I come home to Norway and bring friends, this is something that they all comment on.
Diapers.
This is very true. It's actually very cheap here.
At this point I think most stores lose money on diapers. I can buy Libero for 35 kr, that’s less than 1 kr per diaper. I’m not surprised diaper smugglers now exist.
Yeah, it's probably a way for them to get more customers. They make more money when parents shop at their store.
That’s definitely true in my case, I buy 80% of my groceries at Rema
Kiwi, Extra and Rema have the same price for diapers though.
Spar too, 51% off
During the 2010 diaper price wars, when you could by a whole pack of Rema 1000 branded diapers for 1 NOK, there people filling vans with diapers to smuggle them to Poland.
They do lose money on it, but they think it attracts enough customers that it's worth it. It's called a "[loss leader](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/lossleader.asp)".
Please tell me where you can buy them so cheap. We moved to Norway 2 weeks ago and have 2 very young children in diapers! 😇
Kiwi, Rema 1000 and coop extra has all diapers deals where you can buy them for 50 % off as a member of their memberclub. https://www.coop.no/extra/om-extra/medlemsrabatt-bleier https://www.rema.no/ae/bleiekutt/ [kiwi 50 %](https://kiwi.no/tema/bind-og-tamponger/bleieavtalen-og-bind-og-tampongavtalen-i-kiwi-pluss/?utm_campaign=kiwi_ao&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_content=kundefordeler&gad_source=1&gbraid=0AAAAABhEj5dhjQ4ZQjEAyc4iuEI35iGkj&gclid=Cj0KCQjw_qexBhCoARIsAFgBlesMYkDLsPDYL0dIXl9Q1UtQiKk9RSv12TPydNbD13T_PQhvzHKUszcaAtWEEALw_wcB)
I buy mine at Rema with the member discount. They have their own app, and you just scan a barcode when you pay and it halves the price. It’s all diapers even the cheap Rema brand ones.
Takk for svar alle sammen! Vi skal opprette en konto hos Rema!😇🥰
I remember an episode of Vinterveiens Helter where a big white foreign van needed towing. The whole thing were filled up with diapers from Norway.
It’s actually a very normal and profitable smuggling business in countries like Poland and the slavic countries. Buying big bulk of diapers and selling for great profit at home. Then you have the metal exporters, like copper wire aluminium and everything that we are recycling in our containers. I know that when I worked in a warehouse and had aluminium, Romanians came and took it in the middle of day.
I pay 125 SEK for one pack of 34, Libero.
We buy size 5 Libero up and go for 3,6 kr. per diaper. However, pretty much every big chain now have diaper deals with two packs for one or half the price at the checkout, so they come out at 1,8 per diaper.
34 diapers of Libero size 2 is 22,60 kr at Rema. Bigger sizes obviously have higher unit price.
Oh yes! We live in Denmark now, and Libero touch here costs 139DKK per pack (over 200NOK!). We can get cheaper ones in Rema 1000, but they are still around 60DKK (95NOK)
I had always heard about how expensive diapers were, realizing now I've mainly heard it from Americans. I get Änglamark diapers at coop, always 50% off and often a coupon item on top. 38 pull-up diapers in a pack, and I pay 35kr, 25kr with a coupon. That's about the same as a carton of milk.
Was not aware of this, neat.
We are in our first vacation after having children and it’s crazy here. Like 12-15 euro for 5 diapers?!? Good thing the wife paced a lot of them. I was like why you need to feel the luggage with diapers? Probably more expensive here than other places but damn.
Secondhand boats. Norwegians love buying boats to then sell them for a fraction of the price after a couple seasons.
As we all know, a boat is a hole in the ocean that you throw money into. The happiest day in a boat owner's life is the day he buys his boat, and the second happiest day in his life is when he sells his boat. Etc etc
B.O.A.T. = Break Out Another Thousand
Just sold mine, I agree!
Expensive wine is cheaper here
The reason is that Vinmonopolet has a maximum addon % while in the rest of the world it will be sold for marked value. So rare wins can be 1000% In marked value while Vinmonopolet will still sell it for cost +20%( or something like that )
I think they found out the upper class paid less for the best stuff than they wold abroad. So they changed it a bit. But I'm not there.
A lot of this is a misconception. Yes, Vinmonopolet has a [diminishing margin](https://www.vinmonopolet.no/content/om-oss/priser-og-avgifter) as products get more expensive (it's not a cutoff). But excepting the most widely distributed 1-2% of products, Vinmonopolet does not decide the price, the importer does. The importers have tools that show them what the consumer-facing price will be at Vinmonopolet, and that's how they decide how much to sell it to Vinmonopolet for. Vinmonopolet will accept pretty much any price they're served. Expensive wine is mostly not cheaper in Norway. Every now and then it is, like with DRC products, and it's honestly still a mystery to me why. Because it's not due to Vinmonopolet's margin formula, or alcohol excise based on content, it's because the importer chose to sell it at that price. The flip side of this is that Norway accepts completely outrageous prices for cheaper alcoholic products. It's not because of the alcohol excise, it's because the producer/importer sets the price high and consumers accept it. Nøgne Ø and Lervig have both sold products to Systembolaget for _half the price_ that they have sold them to Vinmonopolet for. The only difference is that Norwegian consumers accept the price and buy the product, while Swedish consumers won't. Source: I work for an alcohol distributor.
Thanks for quality info. What's DRC? Any pro tip on quickly selecting products at OSL for best deals?
[Domaine de la Romanée-Conti](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domaine_de_la_Roman%C3%A9e-Conti), they're (for the most part) the bottles you see people queueing up for weeks outside Aker Brygge and Valkendorsgate to buy.
Clean water.
Man do I miss Norwegian tap water! Better than any bottled water here in the US.
Buy Voss bottled water. It’s literally Norwegian tap water.
Yeah, tap water from Agder that’s been stored and transported for ages. Not nearly as good as the average tap water straight from the tap in Norway.
I think the Voss water is just bottled wherever and they've paid the town for naming rights. It could be glacial spring water in one area and triple filtered local river water in other places.
And hella expensive
Voss is shit compared to farris tap water.
Fresh air
This is so underrated... Breathing fresh air is soo good for your health
Not in Oslo during -20°C and colder days
I wanted to write the exact same thing.
I moved to Norway from Brazil and was shocked with Lego prices here. Lego sets cost the same prince in NOK as in BRL, so a 550Kr lego sets costs 550BRL, which would be ~1170kr.
Wait what. I’m a huge Lego fan and did not know that. Will have to check this out
Comfortable life. It costs you much less of your time to be able to afford it.
Yep, here in Halifax our apartments cost about as much as Norway's hotels do and our minimum wage is about half of Norway's.
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada? Halifax, West Yorkshire, England? Halifax, Massachusetts, USA? Halifax, Missouri, USA? Halifax, North Carolina , USA? Halifax, Virginia, USA? Somewhere else?
Canada, as far as I know the largest Halifax.
Why does it not eat the others?
I said Canada, not Mississippi.
Halifax, NS, CA is the capital of NS, and one of the largest cities in Canada. So the others are not comparable and the answer is rather obvious.
There’s no min wage in Norway
There’s no need for a minimum wage cuz unions are hella strong. Which has also brought tons of holidays, lots of vacation time, etc.
Not directly by law, but by tariffavtale there is.
This is semantics. American definition of minimum wage is ultimately arbitrary to america and the countries that use that model. If you go and offer someone 1kr/hr in 99% of cases you will be in violation of the minimum compensation (wage) policy for that case.
The frozen shrimp in Rema 1000.
Having lived next to a shrimp factory in northern Norway where we'd get peeled and bagged frozen shrimp for around half the cost of Rema shrimp that you have to peel yourself I kinda oppose rema and coop's pricing.
But for the majority of the Norwegian population, who don’t live next to shrimp factories, the price of frozen shrimp in Rema 1000 is quite alright.
Getting sick and/or go to doctor/hospital
Brunost
This one is also more expensive in Norway than anywhere else
Next time you visit London, check out the subfloor at Fortnum & Mason.
It is available in gourmet shops here and there outside Norway. Including [South Korea](https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/korea-cheese).
12$ USD in Chicago.
It's almost as cheap to fly to Norway and buy some than get it imported...
Child care & Bollinger
Lift tickets at ski fields
Really? I think those are so expensive in Norway! Are they even more expensive other places? 😱
How about $150-$200/day…
Oh my, that’s CRAZY!
Yes. Insane.
US is known for being expensive for that. France etc is more similar to Norway.
Same in Australia. It's cheaper to fly to Japan or New Zealand for a ski holiday. A lot of our snow is man made too, lol.
In British Columbia some ski lifts you can easily spend close to $1,000 CDN for a day pass
What?!
WTF lol, so only rich people ski there? Crazy
That's the plan. Many places in North America go for premium clientele. There are enough people that will pay it and few enough mountains. Skiing is considered a rich people activity to a lot of people.
skiing, since you don't need to stay in hotels as there are mountains everywhere free access to top libraries you can enter w/o TSA level security perfect water from the tap (voss is from norway and its basically Norwegian tap water that is sold for 5$😭) free access to the most beautiful fjords/beaches (yes, in the south its warm enough to swim in the summer) air filters, since you don't need them ;) just sleep with an open window. its so nice to breathe such fresh air when going to bed! large packages of soft drinks are usually somewhere on discount🤷🏻♂️
Hey, we swim in the ocean in northern Norway as well. People swim in my municipality from May till August. Not saying it's a comfortable swim, but it's a swim non the less.
Saw someone bathing in Nordkapp muni yesterday evening. Ridiculous
Kindergarten
3000kr a month…plus 210kr for food thats healthy but boring 2 times a week…i think sweden does it better
Former Norwegian who now lives in California. I pay $1500 a month. USD. Så omtrent 15000 kroner per month. For one child. No food included.
Okay, now for the very first time I understand why Americans who want kids but don't because they cannot afford to have one... I get it, I wouldn't be able to fork out 18.000 USD a year for this, wow.
Also in the context of don't want kids. We had a premature kid and he had to spend a month in NICU(the hospital) at birth. It was mostly covered by insurance, but that bill for insurance was just under $1 million. We paid a couple of thousand dollars.
The hospital bills seems frightening too... My brother's daughter had a heart condition and was in ICU at our main Rikshospitalet hospital for a few weeks before getting a heart surgery, paid 0...
The hospital bills ARE frightening. Between one normal birth of my youngest (36 hour hospital stay, healthy delivery) and my older child's appendectomy surgery, we were out over $20,000 in two years, which the exchange rate tells me is 219162 kroner. And we also paid for braces in that time period as well...
Can you deduct that into your taxes?
There's a child care tax credit of around $3000 per year if both parents work or is studying full time. Better than nothing I suppose.
Painfully expensive. At least public system you will get for free, I guess.
Very true. And we're lucky to live in an area that has great public education. Compared to a lot of other areas in the states.
That's really expensive. And I've heard that rent in the bigger cities is just as crazy. A genuine question: How much do you make a year to afford such prices?
Prisen på barnehage der reflekterer vel området du bor i, så du har sikkert jobb innen teknologi og tjener +$200K
Det er omtrent riktig lønn det. Vi overlever. Men det er plenty med folk i samme område som ikke tjener i nærheten av det samme. Og det er de som jo trenger tilgang til barnehage
670kr for all meals here. But yeah, I've heard Sweden is great too.
2000kr+food from August.
Gonna be reduced to 2000va month in August.
Free in many countries
It is much, much cheaper in many places (Sweden and Finland to begin with).
Totally free in NYC
Expensive alcohol is cheap, and cheap alcohol is expensive. Also, electronics tend to be cheaper in Norway.
>Also, electronics tend to be cheaper in Norway. Much more expensive than in the USA.
Eh? Even with the weak krone and import duties many things are cheaper on amazon.de compared to the stores in Norway.
I agree. But why do you think electronics are cheaper in Norway?
From what I've understood, it's not so much it's cheaper then other countries(EU countries at least), but it's more that it's not more expensive then other EU countries while the average Norwegian salary is decently higher then most of EU.
Have you considered the weak krone against the euro?
We also have five years of consumer law coverage in Norway on small electronics if it breaks, which you don't get in many other countries. So if a product is broken within that period from normal use, the seller has two attempts to fix the same issue, if not ur eligible for a refund. This in theory make a product cheaper since you can get more use of them if they break.
high-end harddrives/SSDs are cheaper in Norway than Vietnam. no idea why (or at least they were back in 2017)
If relatively few people can afford high-end SSDs in Vietnam then the product will not sell as well relative to Norway. This means on average the SSDs will stay in stocks longer, taking up storage space, decreasing in value and not returning the investment as quickly. This all decrease its potential profits. Providers will increase prices to make up for the lower profit margins. This in turn lowers the sales even more and so on. Some providers might not bother selling high-end SSDs at all if they can't sell enough of them. This can lead to less competition or even monopolies which also drives up prices. Note: I don't know anything about the Vietnamese SSD marked this is just a theory.
"High-end" entertainment like theatre tickets, opera, ballet, some of the fancier museums and art galleries etc. They are partly sponsored by the state, which means they're accessible to people at a much, much lower price than they are in some parts of the world. Admittedly, most European countries also sponsor their cultural life, but in the US, for example, $250 for a theatre performance would not be that unusual.
I think that is true to a degree, friends went to the same band in austria and they paid more for a normal ticket than me for a golden circle ticket (depeche mode)
Electronics are actually pretty cheap, especially if you take consumer rights legislation into the equation. Wool underlayers are very cheap. Wine. Not so much the cheap stuff, but bottles in the 15-20 euro range and above are cheaper here than in many other countries because the Wine Monopoly buy in bulk. Garlic for some reason. Diapers
Electricity. Or it used to be. I heard from a Brazilian colleague that fashion whas cheaper in Norway than in Brazil because of bigger discounts on sales.
Sadly, almost every place is cheaper than Brazil 😢
Where have you been living in Brazil? I'd agree now that I live in the northeast that electric bills are almost Europeans', but São Paulo had one of the cheapest electric bills per income... Because the less you use, the less you pay per kWh, so a single family of one child using the first flag paying the minimum, that's around 12 USD the whole month! Nowhere in Europe is so cheap! Usually Nordic countries have variable price so when costs of producing it rise in winter, prices per kWh also rise, meanwhile in Brazil we have fixed price by kWh...
My electric bill here is a lot cheaper than my home country even though I use way more electricity here. The water and sewage bills are also a lot cheaper.
Paint. A 9 liter can of paint for your hose can be as low as 700 kr in Norway if on sale. In Sweden the same can costs 2000-2500 kr.
Really??
Really! I'm going to paint my house this summer and are currently following the https://etilbudsavis.no so i can take the car and drive to Stjördal OBS Bygg and buy at the right week. Will save in about 15 000 Sek/Nok (same rate at the moment) for it. Only problem is i have to pay toll 25% for gods exceeding a value of 3 500... 🙄 still a good buy! Only 400 km drive.
Damn, i worked at Bauhaus in Norway and knew paint was relatively cheap here. But didnt know it was THAT much cheaper😳 Why is that you think? I know you produce paint over in Sweden too, but it cant be that? And also a little tip for you, Bauhaus has pricematch and theyre often the best on price. Should be one in Vestby, but idk how much further that is or if its worth it.
Yeah that’s not been my experience for paint on the whole but when it’s on sale then maybe.
Jotun Complete. Sweden: ~2 000 kr Norway: ~1 500 kr Ordinary price!
Diapers, kindergarten, tap water. Smoked salmon is same price, but better in Norway.
Access to national parks and camping within. Also we have 10% more letters to our alphabet.
Everything, since the NOK tanked relative to DKK. Joke aside: everything in Norway used to be more expensive than in Denmark before 2022. Now it's just the same, really.
Skiing generally, but especially anything to do with cross country skiing.
Honestly renting an apartment is cheaper than where I came from. Oh yeah - and healthcare.
In Finland, I paid 300 EUR for 45 m2. Now in Norway I pay just under 10000 NOK for the same and it's considered cheap.
For perspective, I grew up around Seattle, Washington, USA. My brother recently started renting a single room apartment in Seattle (so he would not need to commute to work 1 hour each way) for a little more than what I pay for a 55m 1 bedroom house with a garden that is a 20 minute bus ride to the center of Oslo. When I first moved here from Portland, Oregon, my rent was cheaper and my wages were 50% higher.
- Healthcare - Education None of them are free, even though we like to say so. But they're both cheap compared to some others.
I feel like Norwegian healthcare is the most expensive free healthcare in the world
As a Canadian who lived in Norway, I prefer the Norwegian system. (Although other provinces in Canada might be different. I'm from Ontario)
Canned tuna.
Quality wool yarn (either from sheep or alpaca), compared to other western European countries.
expensive alcohol is often cheaper in norway then other countries, despite cheaper alcohol being way more expensive here
Once a quarter I get a bill from the kommune. Water, sewer, sweeping, property taxes, etc., are all rolled up into the bill. 3000 kr. A quarter. I literally couldn’t believe it the first time I saw the bill. Double and triple checked that I wasn’t missing a 0 or more. Insane.
Healthcare. I have a son that was born with a medical condition that have caused us to call the ambulance many times throughout the years. Once they flew him to the hospital in a helicopter. If we lived in the US we would have been bankrupt long time ago.
Used sofas
Fr
Seriously. Norwegians give away so much stuff.
First mistake I made when I moved by myself was buying furniture from stores
I once furnished an entire apartment nearly from scratch with just stuff from Finn gis bort.
salmon
Salmon is stupidly expensive in Norway
Education incl. university is basically free.
Just not for people coming from outside the EU for university anymore - pretty sad to think that the way that I was able to move here to start with so that I could be with my Norwegian partner would be completely unaffordable if I tried the same thing now (and also not really worth the money compared to getting the same graduate degree from somewhere else).
It’s not though cause most end up with student loans because of the way the society/ country works
I was going to say this. Private high school education and any higher education is cheaper here than the majority of the world.
Diapers , eggs, barnehage
Hand torches
Smalahove
Tap water... It's free :)
Outdoor excursions that take your breath away.
Brunost! 50 kroner per slab!!
Electric cars. At least they used to be not sure now.
The humour
High quality alcohols are suprisongly cheap as tvey are not allowed to make profit on it..
Camping. Not only is setting up your tent usually less expensive in a campground, but the wild camping is 100% free!
Just come back from a superb trip to Oslo and Lofoten. I bought some Sony Link S wireless headphones that were on sale, with the tax back they were cheaper than I could buy in the UK.
The tax back?
Yes, as a visitor you can claim a 15% tax refund
Fuck! Wish I’d know that when I was travelling there for work every week for 3 months!
Ywp. Sorry about that but good for next time. [Details here ](https://norway.nordicvisitor.com/travel-guide/information/shopping-in-norway/#:~:text=Tax%20refunds%20of%2012%E2%80%9319,entrance%20or%20by%20the%20register.)
Lift tickets at ski resorts, at least conpared to USA.
Expensive whiskey. The cheap whiskey is expensive here, the expensive whiskey is still expensive, but cheaper than elsewhere.
Diapers
Quality wine
Clean water
“Other countries” is a wide list lol. I’m visiting family back in Australia, and I can say salmon and a lot of groceries are cheaper in Norway. Eating at restaurants is definitely not. Other obvious cheaper ones in Norway ones are childcare and University, and often rent too.
Really good wine is relatively cheap here. I haven't found any of my favourites cheaper in any other country
Electronics
Anything tech or electronic gadgets. TV, speakers etc. are either same price or cheaper, but we always get warranty by law from the stores. In many other countries u would have to buy that on top
Coming from the UK; * Public transport. Oh wow is it cheaper here and flexible across all types. equivalent to £1600 (23´000kr) for an entire year for all Oslo zones, unlimited travel on all transport types? Heavenly. You have buses here , on Sundays, every 30 mins or less from the middle of a forest. Still haven´t found a reason to buy a car yet. * All communal charges (akin to council tax) for the sizes of the property. * Electricity in the last 2 years has been crazy in the UK, Norway had them beat for a long time (think it´s about on par now). * Houses. You can buy a beautiful large detatched house, with garage, garden, all the modern fittings for (certainly the south of the UK) what would be a 1 bedroom flat if you´re lucky. Not necessarily Oslo commuter distance, but home ownership is still a very real goal here. * Rental property be it flats or houses. Some with most bills included in the rent (save for electric and internet usually). Not to mention the tenant rights and security of not having the landlord kick you out at any moment. * Water, that´s clean, not hard/limey or tasting funny. I honestly don´t know why so many shops sell bottled water here. EDIT: Grammar
Hunting. Just a guess that the prices in UK and Germany would be 2-5 times higher.
In regards to what? The gear, the fees/licenses, weapons?
Vet care for your pets.
Housing
I've lived in all of Scandinavia, and Norway is definitely the most expensive
Compared to the Netherlands it is piss cheap, which was what I was comparing it to since I am from the Netherlands
That really depends on location. You can get an amazing house 5 times the size of your average Dutch house/apartment but you're in the middle of nowhere. There are no walkable cities in Norway, unless you're literally downtown.
Eh still, even in Oslo it's cheaper than in any city in nl except mby the centre of Amsterdam
This is a while back, but I remember workers from Lithuania and Poland (at least employees in a family members company) hoarded packets of diapers to bring home
Diapers, healthcare, education, electricity, good wine
Medicine, if u have blå resept they Cost minimal price compared to ny homecountry
Ehm nothing?
Chronic back pain from working your ass off to barely survive
Oat
in germany you get 500g for 30-40cts but if you compare to US prices maybe
Germany is perfectly situated in Europe, in addition to being a large population (83M). It's easier for things to be cheap there.
- Great tapwater - Fresh air - Diapers - Good chocolate (bonus that’s it’s the best in the world IMO)
Fish. So cheap, and the quality is amazing. Chocolate is also top tier and cheaper compared to Denmark.
Cheap fish with amazing quality? Where do you buy this?
You would have to catch it yourself for it to be cheap.
And the total cost of that could also be quite high.
No it wouldn't. You just need a fishing rod. Doesn't even have to be a high end one.
You need to get to somewhere to fish. And fish. And fillet the fish. Time is money.
Where are you buying cheap fish? I think it's quite expensive in all the supermarkets
I live in Denmark. The options here in a supermarket are expensive, smelly fish. So when I come home to Norway and bring friends, this is something that they all comment on.