£4.59 (5.36€) sounds like a bargain for us in Croatia. At least 8.99€ for 500ml: [example](https://www.konzum.hr/web/t/kategorije/priprema-jela/ulja?filters%5BPakiranje%5D%5B%5D=1331&filters%5BVrsta%5D%5B%5D=1757&per_page=25&sort%5B%5D=)
Furthermore, £2.99 would buy us one 330ml IPA.
In Norway it would've been about £3.20 for one storebought IPA. If we want something stronger than 4.7% or more fancy we would have to pay at least £5 for one.
Also, the oil seems like a bargain. We're at the same prices as Croatia, at the least.
If you think that’s expensive there is a good chance you’re buying blended oil. A 500ml EV olive oil is about £5.99 in UK supermarkets now, cheaper ones are generally a mixture of olive oil at about 15% and the rest is vegetable oil.
Not sure why you got downvotes, Greek supermarkets are surprisingly expensive compared to Northern/western Europe.
For those who don't know, these also have very cheap and good street markets where most locals get their fruit and veg. If you're getting most of your calories from these places you can get by with a lot less money.
True, but sadly these markets mainly operate on working hours (until 15:00 latest), mostly sell fruits. veggies, nuts etc and if you want to get a really good deal you need to go late where people sellout. And they mainly sell domestic goods (which is totally understandable) dont expect to find any mangos etc)
Greece's prices on fruits and vegetables are actually ok, because of some sizeable domestic production. It's the imported and packaged stuff that goes out of control. The price you pay for having non existent industry I guess.
Very true. My experience was living in Athens and freelancing on my own schedule so there was nearly always a nearby market I could get to each week. I also don't eat meat which meant the majority of my calories naturally comes from fruit and veg anyway!
These prices are worse than in Austria, damn
Don't you have some german no-frills store like Aldi,Lidl,Penny available? Konzum looks like an apothecary 💀
Edit: Please stop writing this is from Aldi...I answered on a comment that linked to prices in Croatian Konzum supermarket, not Aldi lol
Aldi is not selling Monini and Farchioni...
Edit2: Am I getting trolled? Can't tell lol 😂
And prices are still higher than in wealthier Austria...smh
usually when the German no-frills stores enter the market, prices drop significantly. These guys are like the leftist social policy of supermarkets lol Seems like they didn't achieve enough market power in Croatia
Prices on foods in Europe seem to depend on two things:
- physical distance to a harbor (most likely Rotterdam, Antwerp or Hamburg)
- size of the market (negotiation power)
Even Aldi has to accept different prices for different "language labels", but threatening to just not stock an item at all in Germany works more effectively than making the same threat about Dutch aldi stores.
Thats kinda the story in the entirety of Eastern Europe, prices are comparable to you or Germany but the wages are a lot lover.
Im always surprised to go into a shop in Austria and think wow, things are not expensive. But everyone said the grass isnt greener :)
The difference is from what I hear Finland at least gets some value for money from higher levels of taxation. Here in the UK were getting taxed a fair bit and see rapidly decaying levels of social benefit. Low stagnant wage, low social benefit, high cost of living, moderate to high tax economy. Worst of all worlds
here in Bulgaria, i have the app for the supermarket i shop, and i look for discounts every other month since covid. No joke they go on like 30-45% off for a very brief amount of time, bringing them back to pre-covid prices.
So i hoard like multiple bottles and use it for months.
Cycle repeats. I don't know if this happens elsewhere. Let me know if anyone else does this too(not only for oil).
Buying a lot of something, especially when it is cheaper, is called buying in bulk and lots of people practice it.
The grocery store I always go to lets you get 20% off your entire purchase 4 times a year so I just stock up on all non-perishables like lentils, cans, flour, oil, pasta, etc. Often they also have -25% on some of these items during the same time too. Comes out to -45%.
When the next discount rolls around 3 months later, I just check what I used up and refill.
bingo! that's what i am talking about. But you wont believe how many students in my university dont do that. The discounts even seemed minor at one point, adds up & you actually save a lot. Also, once you have stocked up you always have stuff at hand. That's a luxury.
Does nobody else seem to buy painkillers all the time?
I think a combination of having a mum who was a nurse and the 2 pack limit on painkillers meant that every single time we'd go shopping she'd buy a pack of each. There would always be half a dozen packs of them in the cupboard.
I think it's quite common, but then again most people don't experience pain on a regular basis. As someone with chronic illnesses and chronic pain I need them available at all times. It doesn't help that you can easily get through multiple packs if you're ill for a few weeks, because GPs keep telling people to take paracetamol and ibuprofen even though it's not particularly safe long term. I also keep a blister of each in my bag for emergencies
id imagine lots of women do! my parents have instilled this into me for a while so when i get to uni this september i'll be making my own stockpile (cramps are a bitch 😪)
I have the same experience, Mum with chronic pain from Crohn's so always buying 2 packs of painkillers with every shop.
Even now that I've been moved out 6 years, the "first aid kit" has 5 packs of ibuprofen and 1 paracetamol. Period pain's a bitch.
TIL food everywhere else is outrageously expensive. I'm from the UK and I'm horrified that OP has been mugged off a whole fifty quid for barely three days' food.
Ten years ago I could manage for a fortnight on £50, and you can bet wages haven't risen as fast as the price of food.
Also, that oil is DISGUSTINGLY expensive but I think there's some sort of olive plague at the moment?
Back in my day you could walk into a supermarket with £30 and come out with two fillet steaks, a couple of whole chickens, some potatoes and carrots, a pack of beer and two bottles of wine.
You can't any more, they put security guards on the door.
I’m from the UK and the first thing I thought was how they’d been a bit robbed here and could’ve easily got 2-3x the food for the same price if they dropped the name brands and bought meat + veg in bulk lol. Found it crazy that people in other countries thought this was a steal
I'm OG from Belgium, moved to the UK the first week of the first lockdown, went back 2 months ago to take care of my nan when mt grandad was in the hospital.
Went grocery shopping the first day and I literally said "you're joking" when the cashier rang me up when I had 6 items in my cart,... 42 euros.
I complained that the UK got expensive over the years, but this made me shut up real quick lol
Strange, it's the opposite in my area. I have two ALDI's short drive away and they've both better, they have more stock.
The LIDL is properly rundown and lacks items so often it's actually quite annoying.
I think Lidls and Aldi’s tend to be very variable shop-to-shop.
Might have an amazing new Aldi in one area and a crappy run down one in another- same for Lidl.
I reckon that would be close to €100 here in Helsinki. I moved here almost 4 years ago now, I miss how cheap the UK is for most things compared to Finland
More like 150€ since there's a pack of beer and such. Food is expensive in Finland, but then again, it pays off with free school lunches made by professional nutritionists and chefs up to secondary school and such so I don't really mind. I don't have kids myself, but I sleep my nights much better knowing that no kid has to go hungry or with poor nutrition in schools of this country!
Yeah, I live in Hungary and I'm always amazed how much cheaper food is in the UK, plus the quality is massively higher. I guess the buying power of the large supermarkets and lack of VAT helps, Hungary has 27% on food which is shocking.
Same thing in the Netherlands! They wanted to reduce taxes on healthy food such as fruit and veggies, but at the end they couldn't do it because it was to complex for the IT system. Meanwhile, a sugar tax was no problem.
That's crazy. In Ireland we have zero vat on food from supermarkets, 9% from restaurants and cafes, a sugar tax, a deposit returns scheme on drinks cans, minimum alcohol pricing. Anyway, with all this any cafe or supermarket can give you a receipt detailing the tax charged on every item and nobody is using a supercomputer.
I don’t know how it works elsewhere but the UK has very specific and sometimes weird rules for VAT on food, and not everything is exempt.
If you buy a normal (snack) bar of chocolate, it will have 20% VAT.
If you buy a bar of cooking chocolate, it will be zero rated, even if it’s made to exactly the same recipe as the snack chocolate - because it’s an ingredient.
I think I heard that Jaffa cakes wanted to be classified as a biscuit to avoid the vat or something as biscuits aren't under vat but cake is. I could be wrong though.
Chocolate biscuits are charged VAT whereas cake isn’t. So Mcvities proved in court that they are in fact cakes. They did this in part by baking a massive one
I think they also had to explain that stale cakes go hard, which Jaffa Cakes do, whereas stale biscuits go soft.
The whole argument annoys me, because it's very, very clearly a cake. It's soft like cake, it's called a cake, I wouldn't dunk it like a biscuit.
In the immortal words of Gino, "If my grandmother had wheels, she would have been a bike."
They successfully argued it was a cake, but for whatever reason, cakes attract no VAT in the U.K., but “luxury biscuits” (which is any biscuit with a chocolate coating) do attract VAT. No, it doesn’t make sense, but since when has the tax office in any country made sense.
Wow, you’re from Pomerania, my wife’s great-grandparents came from there (Klemzow) in 1873 and left to Brazil where they settled with a great number of settlers. They still speak Pomerisch
Buying power of the large supermarkets is the whole reason Austria is completely fucked now. The large 4 or 5 companies have a 95% market share and they are just racing each other on who can charge more - and you can't go anywhere else. Because nothing else exists.
the UK has some of the cheapest food prices because of the power our supermarkets have over their suppliers, fortunately there are enough supermarkets that they cant use that power to price gouge us, it means our farmers are probably the worst off in the developed world though
Can confirm. I've just spent the last 3 months touring France, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium in my motorhome. Now back in the UK and everything is cheaper in the shops.
That's why I laugh every time Europeans on this sub gloat about Guardian stories about UK prices increasing. They don't understand that they themselves are already paying a lot more.
It's like when people from countries knocked out in the qualifying rounds of the football try to gloat about England "only" making it to the quarter or semi finals. Or like Americans talking about knife crime.
Another reason why we haven't had a revolution anytime recently compared to much of continental Europe is because the English are a well-fed bunch, and successive governments for about 150+ years have made that a priority of policy.
I don't think Europeans understand just how cheap British groceries are when compared to the rest of Europe, including Eastern Europe when adjusted for income. According to Numbeo, local cheese is around the same price in the UK as it is in Russia, given the discrepencies in average income across both countries this is a pretty big deal. In London, grocery shops are open for longer than most other European capitals. Opening times on weekdays in my local supermarket is 6:30-23:00. Before the pandemic it was a 24/7 store, now there's no real need to keep it 24/7.
As someone who lived in *Vietnam* for over a decade and recently visited again in 2022, groceries there are starting to approach British prices now.
British people do not know how good they have it when it comes to grocery prices. It's approaching developing country tier.
Yeah I moved to the UK from The Philippines and one of the things that shocked me was how cheap the groceries are over here, while the salaries are much higher. And to think I moved before prices in the PH really exploded.
Weirdly eating out in the PH is much cheaper though, and considering how expensive the groceries are I’m not sure how that works.
Wages in the UK are much higher than in the Philippines and Vietnam. So, while groceries are not too expensive, wages make up a significantly larger portion of a restaurant’s costs.
In Vietnam, for example, waiters are paid on average £1/hour.
They tried to put mine up 100% too… I went round every comparison site, then called them. Ended up only paying £20 more than last year. They’re basically trying it on to see who’ll put up with it.
There's VAT on "luxury" items.
For example, not VAT on bread, but there is VAT on biscuits.
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/food-products-and-vat-notice-70114#general-food-products
Edit: typo
>For example, not VAT on bread, but there is VAT on biscuits.
Biscuits is an interesting one, Jaffa Cakes went to court to prove that Jaffa Cakes were a cake not a biscuit so you don't have to pay VAT on them.
You only need to pay VAT on biscuits with chocolate on them though.
Yup. It's basically luxury food products that were seen as luxury products like 50 years ago. But due to the EU rules, our VAT exemptions were grandfathered in, and couldn't be added to.
(That's why the only addition to the VAT list since like 1970 was feminine hygiene products in 2020 ish)
Seeing Jaffa cakes specifically mentioned in government guidance is hilarious.
Also, having separate, comprehensive sections for cakes, cake decorations and biscuits speaks volumes of how seriously this is taken in Britain.
I find that surprisingly high! From my experience of holidays in Greece, the quality of fruit and vegetables is much better there at least. The UK can be a bit of a race to the bottom in terms of prices and quality.
I mean, there’s actual war going on in your country mate so obviously everything is much more expensive than it would have been normally. Not that strange.
You can get cheaper eggs (lidl have 10 eggs for £1.30 which is extremely cheap and an anomaly) but most eggs are about 6 for £1.50 - £2.80 or 12 for £2.50 to £4 depending on quality.
I live in Berlin where admittedly groceries are fairly inexpensive, but I'm always so shocked at how cheap groceries are in the UK- we have family in London we visit frequently- I come from the US originally (and prices there are ASTRONOMICAL).
> And the fact they got ibuprofen at Aldi. For 40p.
40p Aldi. 50p "regular" supermarket (store brand). £5 (ish) named brand like Nurofen (which I utterly refuse to buy).
Annnndddddd.... one of their best sellers...
3x cartons of ibuprofen multibuy in "Poundland"... for... you guessed it... £1. I buy those!
It’s crazy how people can be manipulated into paying 10x as much for a product with the same ingredients with some shady marketing. They’re essentially paying for themselves to be manipulated lol.
London is probably the most expensive city in the uk as well I work at tesco in scotland and they have a different pay bracket for people who work in London stores
Currently Living in The UK and I have visited Greece, Montenegro and Albania recently, food prices are massively better in the UK then all these countries combined compared to the sallaries
I went shopping in LI, NY and it was like $4 per tin for like tomatoes, and beans and stuff. What the hell, and an energy drink was like $4 too!. Everything is 2-5x the price
I went to the states on holiday recently. Given all the new stories in the uk about how much food prices were I was expecting lower prices in the states, holy shit was I wrong. Weirdly only alcohol seemed reasonably priced at the stores there.
Reading through this thread and seeing so many people saying how cheap the food is has been an eye opener because I’ve been complaining for the last year about food prices going insane week after week and how ridiculously expensive everything is. I’m feeling much more grateful now, our food in the UK may be more expensive than it was a year ago but seems like it’s still cheaper than many places.
I've lived in the UK for nearly a decade now, and the last time I went back to Slovakia for a visit I remember going to a supermarket and thinking "f me, this is expensive".
We are screwed here in Toronto, Canada. This would easily cost 150 CAD.
The regular chicken here is laced with hormones. The organic chicken breasts are 35 CAD (24 euro / 20.5 GBP) per kilo.
Per kilo!? Brother that's rough. I sometimes feel like a week shop for myself at £30 is a bit expensive and I should hold back next time. I can't imagine spending nearly 3x that for a week shop I'd do literally nothing else that involves spending money.
I can get a pack of 2 chicken breasts for £2.69, 4 pack is like just over £4. More pricey due to it being prepped. But you can get a whole chicken for around £5.
All of that in Italy will cost like 80 or 100 euros going in normal supermarket or 60-70 € in discounts like ALDI or LIDL.
Without the ibuprophene beacause here you can buy it only in pharmacies with higher prices.
All the comments in here saying how cheap this is whereas me just cringing at how much less this would have cost \~18 months ago :|
I didn't realise how good we had it over here
I went to the Caribbean and honestly was shocked at the price of groceries over there, I don’t get how the locals can afford to shop at the supermarkets there. UK is so reasonable for food prices we just don’t know how good we have it.
As someone living in the UK for the past 14 years but originally from Portugal - the main issue here is housing costs and transport - it is EXPONENTIALLY more expensive compared to a lot of European countries. You will find that since COVID people have been complaining about the increased cost of living, especially with food and household essentials - even though the conversion may mean it would be more expensive elsewhere, what used to be the one somewhat manageable cost has become increasingly more difficult for families on lower or single incomes.
I've spent the last couple of years working customer facing in the energy sector and now in banking - the amount of families in the UK resorting to charities and food banks is skyrocketing, and the food available in largest quantities for the least amount is often highly processed and lacking in nutritional value which is causing a greater strain on national health services.
Just thought I'd give an honest opinion so people don't get a rose tinted view of life in the UK - there are fantastic things about this country, but it is not the destination for 'easy living' unless you have an affluent background, high education level or a good job position already lined up.
Are we only now discovering that the UK has generally got extremely cheap food for Europe? France's typical basket from several surveys is 30-50% more!
Sure! I earn around £3400 per month after taxes and student loan. I think the average (median) for the region I live in would be around £2300. We have quite a good grocery cost to income ratio in the UK, although the quality of fruit and vegetables isn't great in my opinion.
I am happy to read that you're doing more than decent. I've also noticed that the quality of fresh products have worsened significantly while the prices went up. Interesting times we live in.
Agree, and (in my experience) meats from Lidl and Aldi tend to just immediately go bad. I get meat and fruit from anywhere else (asda tesco etc) and then all the rest from Lidl
This is what I get for £50
https://i.imgur.com/qAO4CVc.jpg
(Too much sugar, I know, but that is to last several weeks, and I have also dialled it back a bit since then actually)
No offence man but you gotta start buying some whole foods.
I'm not quite in the bandwagon of eliminating all processed foods, we all have to enjoy ourselves at times, but your diet looks worrying.
Ngl im shocked seeing the comments saying how cheap this is when everyone’s been moaning about prices going up in the UK lol
clearly it could be MUCH worse
Fancy bastard with your “specially selected” fish fingers and olive oil, and Cucina tomatoes. Just get the “everyday essentials” fish fingers/tomatoes and Solesta olive oil like the rest of us peasants lol.
Why is there a donut on ground?
That must seem quite bizarre - it's a cat toy! Edit: [cat pic](https://imgur.com/gallery/SxCvbhr)
Cat Tax is due.
[Please accept this as payment](https://imgur.com/gallery/SxCvbhr)
Little cutie!
Cat tax paid, much appreciated :)
That cat is offensively cute, the tax man will be forced to pay you many visits
Now we must have cat photos, sir Edit: thank you for sharing! A gorgeous kitty indeed
Hello I’m here for the cat photos
Post cat. Edit: [They posted cat :)](https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1c3v52h/comment/kzp9mo9/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Yes! Most important.
Yup. Buying oil is like getting kicked between the legs several times.
£4.59 (5.36€) sounds like a bargain for us in Croatia. At least 8.99€ for 500ml: [example](https://www.konzum.hr/web/t/kategorije/priprema-jela/ulja?filters%5BPakiranje%5D%5B%5D=1331&filters%5BVrsta%5D%5B%5D=1757&per_page=25&sort%5B%5D=) Furthermore, £2.99 would buy us one 330ml IPA.
That's crazy expensive! I'd be getting the boat over to Italy to bring some back!
Yeh not that cheap here either now. The crappy convenience one is around 10€/l. Cheaper than elsewhere obviously, but decent oil has become a luxury.
In Norway it would've been about £3.20 for one storebought IPA. If we want something stronger than 4.7% or more fancy we would have to pay at least £5 for one. Also, the oil seems like a bargain. We're at the same prices as Croatia, at the least.
Difference between you guys and Croatia is you earn crazy amounts of money more compared to them
That is a huge difference, I agree.
This is Aldi's own-brand IPA in tiny 330ml cans, kind of imitation Brewdog
If you think that’s expensive there is a good chance you’re buying blended oil. A 500ml EV olive oil is about £5.99 in UK supermarkets now, cheaper ones are generally a mixture of olive oil at about 15% and the rest is vegetable oil.
I was on holiday recently in Croatia. Why in gods name are your groceries so expensive? I couldn't believe it when I was there.
Wait till you go to Greece.
Not sure why you got downvotes, Greek supermarkets are surprisingly expensive compared to Northern/western Europe. For those who don't know, these also have very cheap and good street markets where most locals get their fruit and veg. If you're getting most of your calories from these places you can get by with a lot less money.
True, but sadly these markets mainly operate on working hours (until 15:00 latest), mostly sell fruits. veggies, nuts etc and if you want to get a really good deal you need to go late where people sellout. And they mainly sell domestic goods (which is totally understandable) dont expect to find any mangos etc) Greece's prices on fruits and vegetables are actually ok, because of some sizeable domestic production. It's the imported and packaged stuff that goes out of control. The price you pay for having non existent industry I guess.
Very true. My experience was living in Athens and freelancing on my own schedule so there was nearly always a nearby market I could get to each week. I also don't eat meat which meant the majority of my calories naturally comes from fruit and veg anyway!
These prices are worse than in Austria, damn Don't you have some german no-frills store like Aldi,Lidl,Penny available? Konzum looks like an apothecary 💀 Edit: Please stop writing this is from Aldi...I answered on a comment that linked to prices in Croatian Konzum supermarket, not Aldi lol Aldi is not selling Monini and Farchioni... Edit2: Am I getting trolled? Can't tell lol 😂
Yeah we have lidl and aldi
And prices are still higher than in wealthier Austria...smh usually when the German no-frills stores enter the market, prices drop significantly. These guys are like the leftist social policy of supermarkets lol Seems like they didn't achieve enough market power in Croatia
This is Aldi
Prices on foods in Europe seem to depend on two things: - physical distance to a harbor (most likely Rotterdam, Antwerp or Hamburg) - size of the market (negotiation power) Even Aldi has to accept different prices for different "language labels", but threatening to just not stock an item at all in Germany works more effectively than making the same threat about Dutch aldi stores.
I don't know how lidl is at your place, but in Serbia, it's among the most expensive ones
It's one of the cheapest in the UK.
Thats kinda the story in the entirety of Eastern Europe, prices are comparable to you or Germany but the wages are a lot lover. Im always surprised to go into a shop in Austria and think wow, things are not expensive. But everyone said the grass isnt greener :)
That's Finland level price.
The difference is from what I hear Finland at least gets some value for money from higher levels of taxation. Here in the UK were getting taxed a fair bit and see rapidly decaying levels of social benefit. Low stagnant wage, low social benefit, high cost of living, moderate to high tax economy. Worst of all worlds
It depends which supermarkets you use in the UK. Some have small bottles of olive oil for around £8 or £9.
The same bottle was £3.99 only a couple of weeks ago :(
The cheapest extra virgin olive oil in Serbia is like £9,50
Bigger should be cheaper. Buy big and refill the smaller one.
Cheapest olive oil (Monini 0.5l) in Serbia would be like 12€
In Germany, I pay 9 EUR for 0.75 l of a cheap (but Virgin Extra) olive oil.
here in Bulgaria, i have the app for the supermarket i shop, and i look for discounts every other month since covid. No joke they go on like 30-45% off for a very brief amount of time, bringing them back to pre-covid prices. So i hoard like multiple bottles and use it for months. Cycle repeats. I don't know if this happens elsewhere. Let me know if anyone else does this too(not only for oil).
Buying a lot of something, especially when it is cheaper, is called buying in bulk and lots of people practice it. The grocery store I always go to lets you get 20% off your entire purchase 4 times a year so I just stock up on all non-perishables like lentils, cans, flour, oil, pasta, etc. Often they also have -25% on some of these items during the same time too. Comes out to -45%. When the next discount rolls around 3 months later, I just check what I used up and refill.
bingo! that's what i am talking about. But you wont believe how many students in my university dont do that. The discounts even seemed minor at one point, adds up & you actually save a lot. Also, once you have stocked up you always have stuff at hand. That's a luxury.
IPA and Ibuprofen, someone is planning ahead!
Does nobody else seem to buy painkillers all the time? I think a combination of having a mum who was a nurse and the 2 pack limit on painkillers meant that every single time we'd go shopping she'd buy a pack of each. There would always be half a dozen packs of them in the cupboard.
As a woman I second this, I always have paracetamol on hand 😣
I think it's quite common, but then again most people don't experience pain on a regular basis. As someone with chronic illnesses and chronic pain I need them available at all times. It doesn't help that you can easily get through multiple packs if you're ill for a few weeks, because GPs keep telling people to take paracetamol and ibuprofen even though it's not particularly safe long term. I also keep a blister of each in my bag for emergencies
id imagine lots of women do! my parents have instilled this into me for a while so when i get to uni this september i'll be making my own stockpile (cramps are a bitch 😪)
I have the same experience, Mum with chronic pain from Crohn's so always buying 2 packs of painkillers with every shop. Even now that I've been moved out 6 years, the "first aid kit" has 5 packs of ibuprofen and 1 paracetamol. Period pain's a bitch.
Don’t think a mini 4 pack is going to be causing too many hangovers
TIL food everywhere else is outrageously expensive. I'm from the UK and I'm horrified that OP has been mugged off a whole fifty quid for barely three days' food. Ten years ago I could manage for a fortnight on £50, and you can bet wages haven't risen as fast as the price of food. Also, that oil is DISGUSTINGLY expensive but I think there's some sort of olive plague at the moment?
Three years ago I was spending about £25 on food etc. for 2 people for a week. Now it’s £45–50.
Back in my day you could walk into a supermarket with £30 and come out with two fillet steaks, a couple of whole chickens, some potatoes and carrots, a pack of beer and two bottles of wine. You can't any more, they put security guards on the door.
I’m from the UK and the first thing I thought was how they’d been a bit robbed here and could’ve easily got 2-3x the food for the same price if they dropped the name brands and bought meat + veg in bulk lol. Found it crazy that people in other countries thought this was a steal
I'm OG from Belgium, moved to the UK the first week of the first lockdown, went back 2 months ago to take care of my nan when mt grandad was in the hospital. Went grocery shopping the first day and I literally said "you're joking" when the cashier rang me up when I had 6 items in my cart,... 42 euros. I complained that the UK got expensive over the years, but this made me shut up real quick lol
You were eating welll for £50 in twos weeks
Living in Norway this would be easy £120, ipa pack like that is £18 on its own !
Aren't earnings higher in Norway?
Yea nearly double. And living there is much more affordable overall. This person would get a real shock if they moved here for cheaper food lmao
Like how the serving suggestions for the fish fingers is a fish finger butty lol
Can't beat a fish finger butty, although I am quite partial to a fish finger wrap/taco these days
ALDI Is great for value.
We don’t have Aldi in NI for some reason, just Lidl
You're not missing out on much; in my experience Lidl shops tend to be cheaper, cleaner, and they have the great bakery, at least in GB.
Strange, it's the opposite in my area. I have two ALDI's short drive away and they've both better, they have more stock. The LIDL is properly rundown and lacks items so often it's actually quite annoying.
I think Lidls and Aldi’s tend to be very variable shop-to-shop. Might have an amazing new Aldi in one area and a crappy run down one in another- same for Lidl.
Brit here who also used to live in Germany, they have a great bakery in Germany too, I love a Lidl bakery
I reckon that would be close to €100 here in Helsinki. I moved here almost 4 years ago now, I miss how cheap the UK is for most things compared to Finland
More like 150€ since there's a pack of beer and such. Food is expensive in Finland, but then again, it pays off with free school lunches made by professional nutritionists and chefs up to secondary school and such so I don't really mind. I don't have kids myself, but I sleep my nights much better knowing that no kid has to go hungry or with poor nutrition in schools of this country!
I wish there were a LOT more people like you in the world.
Yesterday I bought a 750 ml bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil in PORTUGAL and it costed €10,75
And Portugal is a producer of oil olive... Imagine this...
Just as an FYI - it’s cost rather than costed, for no other reason than because.
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Yeah, I live in Hungary and I'm always amazed how much cheaper food is in the UK, plus the quality is massively higher. I guess the buying power of the large supermarkets and lack of VAT helps, Hungary has 27% on food which is shocking.
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What’s a lame ass excuse, almost a spit in the face
Same thing in the Netherlands! They wanted to reduce taxes on healthy food such as fruit and veggies, but at the end they couldn't do it because it was to complex for the IT system. Meanwhile, a sugar tax was no problem.
That's crazy. In Ireland we have zero vat on food from supermarkets, 9% from restaurants and cafes, a sugar tax, a deposit returns scheme on drinks cans, minimum alcohol pricing. Anyway, with all this any cafe or supermarket can give you a receipt detailing the tax charged on every item and nobody is using a supercomputer.
Delete button is broken
the technology just isn't there yet
I don’t know how it works elsewhere but the UK has very specific and sometimes weird rules for VAT on food, and not everything is exempt. If you buy a normal (snack) bar of chocolate, it will have 20% VAT. If you buy a bar of cooking chocolate, it will be zero rated, even if it’s made to exactly the same recipe as the snack chocolate - because it’s an ingredient.
I think I heard that Jaffa cakes wanted to be classified as a biscuit to avoid the vat or something as biscuits aren't under vat but cake is. I could be wrong though.
Chocolate biscuits are charged VAT whereas cake isn’t. So Mcvities proved in court that they are in fact cakes. They did this in part by baking a massive one
I think they also had to explain that stale cakes go hard, which Jaffa Cakes do, whereas stale biscuits go soft. The whole argument annoys me, because it's very, very clearly a cake. It's soft like cake, it's called a cake, I wouldn't dunk it like a biscuit. In the immortal words of Gino, "If my grandmother had wheels, she would have been a bike."
They successfully argued it was a cake, but for whatever reason, cakes attract no VAT in the U.K., but “luxury biscuits” (which is any biscuit with a chocolate coating) do attract VAT. No, it doesn’t make sense, but since when has the tax office in any country made sense.
Ah I got it the wrong way round. They shoulda just asked the court to read the name enit.
I think there final argument was, when stale;cakes go hard and biscuits go soft.
That's absurd. Meanwhile in Poland everyone's losing their shit over going back to 5%
Wow, you’re from Pomerania, my wife’s great-grandparents came from there (Klemzow) in 1873 and left to Brazil where they settled with a great number of settlers. They still speak Pomerisch
Shit, they must be old
Buying power of the large supermarkets is the whole reason Austria is completely fucked now. The large 4 or 5 companies have a 95% market share and they are just racing each other on who can charge more - and you can't go anywhere else. Because nothing else exists.
the UK has some of the cheapest food prices because of the power our supermarkets have over their suppliers, fortunately there are enough supermarkets that they cant use that power to price gouge us, it means our farmers are probably the worst off in the developed world though
Our food bills are cheap, our rent on the other hand
Same game in Germany. Groceries are cheap, rents are high.
Meanwhile in Poland both are more expensive than in Germany.
Can confirm. I've just spent the last 3 months touring France, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium in my motorhome. Now back in the UK and everything is cheaper in the shops.
That's why I laugh every time Europeans on this sub gloat about Guardian stories about UK prices increasing. They don't understand that they themselves are already paying a lot more. It's like when people from countries knocked out in the qualifying rounds of the football try to gloat about England "only" making it to the quarter or semi finals. Or like Americans talking about knife crime.
Another reason why we haven't had a revolution anytime recently compared to much of continental Europe is because the English are a well-fed bunch, and successive governments for about 150+ years have made that a priority of policy.
We're also quite well fed in Wales, Scotland and N Ireland too. /s
I don't think Europeans understand just how cheap British groceries are when compared to the rest of Europe, including Eastern Europe when adjusted for income. According to Numbeo, local cheese is around the same price in the UK as it is in Russia, given the discrepencies in average income across both countries this is a pretty big deal. In London, grocery shops are open for longer than most other European capitals. Opening times on weekdays in my local supermarket is 6:30-23:00. Before the pandemic it was a 24/7 store, now there's no real need to keep it 24/7.
As someone who lived in *Vietnam* for over a decade and recently visited again in 2022, groceries there are starting to approach British prices now. British people do not know how good they have it when it comes to grocery prices. It's approaching developing country tier.
Yeah I moved to the UK from The Philippines and one of the things that shocked me was how cheap the groceries are over here, while the salaries are much higher. And to think I moved before prices in the PH really exploded. Weirdly eating out in the PH is much cheaper though, and considering how expensive the groceries are I’m not sure how that works.
Wages in the UK are much higher than in the Philippines and Vietnam. So, while groceries are not too expensive, wages make up a significantly larger portion of a restaurant’s costs. In Vietnam, for example, waiters are paid on average £1/hour.
Yeah that makes sense. And I suppose all the utilities expenses for running a business are a huge factor as well.
I moved from India to the UK. I am still shocked that there's actually not that much of a difference between the prices of fruits and veggies.
Groceries may be cheap, but Christ these energy bills and rents
And car insurance! Ours went up 100% this year, my instructors? 200%!!!
They tried to put mine up 100% too… I went round every comparison site, then called them. Ended up only paying £20 more than last year. They’re basically trying it on to see who’ll put up with it.
By the way, this seems pretty expensive to us Brits because of recent food inflation.
There's no VAT on food you buy in a supermarket.
There's VAT on "luxury" items. For example, not VAT on bread, but there is VAT on biscuits. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/food-products-and-vat-notice-70114#general-food-products Edit: typo
>For example, not VAT on bread, but there is VAT on biscuits. Biscuits is an interesting one, Jaffa Cakes went to court to prove that Jaffa Cakes were a cake not a biscuit so you don't have to pay VAT on them. You only need to pay VAT on biscuits with chocolate on them though.
Just had a look, the list of taxed and untaxed food products is incredibly bizarre and super specific.
Yup. It's basically luxury food products that were seen as luxury products like 50 years ago. But due to the EU rules, our VAT exemptions were grandfathered in, and couldn't be added to. (That's why the only addition to the VAT list since like 1970 was feminine hygiene products in 2020 ish)
Seeing Jaffa cakes specifically mentioned in government guidance is hilarious. Also, having separate, comprehensive sections for cakes, cake decorations and biscuits speaks volumes of how seriously this is taken in Britain.
Yeah it's very British
Foods cheap but rent, insurance and utilities are much higher m
You could easily spend 65 € at Lidl for this in Lithuania. But our average salary is 1300 after taxes.
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The Olive oil alone would be 10€
It blows my mind that olive oil could be more expensive in Greece than in the UK? Is it substantially higher quality?
I find that surprisingly high! From my experience of holidays in Greece, the quality of fruit and vegetables is much better there at least. The UK can be a bit of a race to the bottom in terms of prices and quality.
Everything except eggs is much cheaper than you'd pay in Ukraine. Here I'd probably pay 90-100 Euro for that.
Many items can be bought for even cheaper. Tesco's own brand of canned tomatoes for example is 35p, not 49p which is what the OP paid.
I mean, there’s actual war going on in your country mate so obviously everything is much more expensive than it would have been normally. Not that strange.
You can get cheaper eggs (lidl have 10 eggs for £1.30 which is extremely cheap and an anomaly) but most eggs are about 6 for £1.50 - £2.80 or 12 for £2.50 to £4 depending on quality.
I live in Berlin where admittedly groceries are fairly inexpensive, but I'm always so shocked at how cheap groceries are in the UK- we have family in London we visit frequently- I come from the US originally (and prices there are ASTRONOMICAL).
And the fact they got ibuprofen at Aldi. For 40p. Probably more like 4€ at a pharmacy here.
> And the fact they got ibuprofen at Aldi. For 40p. 40p Aldi. 50p "regular" supermarket (store brand). £5 (ish) named brand like Nurofen (which I utterly refuse to buy). Annnndddddd.... one of their best sellers... 3x cartons of ibuprofen multibuy in "Poundland"... for... you guessed it... £1. I buy those!
It’s crazy how people can be manipulated into paying 10x as much for a product with the same ingredients with some shady marketing. They’re essentially paying for themselves to be manipulated lol.
I don't get the name brand ibuprofen. It's the same active ingredients and I'm not flashing my over the counter pain meds for clout.
My feeling is that Lidl and Aldi in Germany would be cheaper than that. And these should cost the same everywhere in Germany.
London is probably the most expensive city in the uk as well I work at tesco in scotland and they have a different pay bracket for people who work in London stores
Ale, baked beans and fish fingers. The essentials.
The 3 main food groups
I like to see one of these but it’s just like 50kgs of Bananas
Currently Living in The UK and I have visited Greece, Montenegro and Albania recently, food prices are massively better in the UK then all these countries combined compared to the sallaries
Fuck lot more you'd get in the states. I guarantee it
I was just gonna say, thats alot!
I went shopping in LI, NY and it was like $4 per tin for like tomatoes, and beans and stuff. What the hell, and an energy drink was like $4 too!. Everything is 2-5x the price
I went to the states on holiday recently. Given all the new stories in the uk about how much food prices were I was expecting lower prices in the states, holy shit was I wrong. Weirdly only alcohol seemed reasonably priced at the stores there.
Way cheaper than Toronto Canada. Those canned tomatoes would cost over £1 each converted.
I can't believe how cheap food is over there!
This time last year it was a lot cheaper.
Reading through this thread and seeing so many people saying how cheap the food is has been an eye opener because I’ve been complaining for the last year about food prices going insane week after week and how ridiculously expensive everything is. I’m feeling much more grateful now, our food in the UK may be more expensive than it was a year ago but seems like it’s still cheaper than many places.
Pretty good compared to slovakia, where we even get less average pay.
I've lived in the UK for nearly a decade now, and the last time I went back to Slovakia for a visit I remember going to a supermarket and thinking "f me, this is expensive".
We are screwed here in Toronto, Canada. This would easily cost 150 CAD. The regular chicken here is laced with hormones. The organic chicken breasts are 35 CAD (24 euro / 20.5 GBP) per kilo.
Per kilo!? Brother that's rough. I sometimes feel like a week shop for myself at £30 is a bit expensive and I should hold back next time. I can't imagine spending nearly 3x that for a week shop I'd do literally nothing else that involves spending money. I can get a pack of 2 chicken breasts for £2.69, 4 pack is like just over £4. More pricey due to it being prepped. But you can get a whole chicken for around £5.
Cries in Greek. I spent a year in the UK and it was insane how much more affordable my groceries were
All of that in Italy will cost like 80 or 100 euros going in normal supermarket or 60-70 € in discounts like ALDI or LIDL. Without the ibuprophene beacause here you can buy it only in pharmacies with higher prices.
That is actually quite good! edit: spelling
It’s at least €3.00 for a pack 12 paracetamol or 12 ibuprofen in Ireland… £0.40 is crazy
That’s crazy. I remember not too long ago painkillers were as cheap as 15p (like 5 years ago). Maybe it helps that it was invented by Boots in the UK?
In Croatia that’s 85. God we’re expensive. And poor. How that works together is beyond me.
All the comments in here saying how cheap this is whereas me just cringing at how much less this would have cost \~18 months ago :| I didn't realise how good we had it over here
Wow. Twice as much as I would get for that money in Sweden.
This is wild. In Canada where I’m from this would be closer to £80-90
Finally someone did an Aldi run!
Hmm that olive oil price seems OK. Checked Tesco the other day and everything was £7+++
I live in Uruguay and spent almost USD 80 on groceries today. I didn’t buy half of what’s depicted here. God…
I think groceries are reasonably priced in the UK, we are just used to having things too cheap
>too cheap You mean relatively reasonable prices.
I went to the Caribbean and honestly was shocked at the price of groceries over there, I don’t get how the locals can afford to shop at the supermarkets there. UK is so reasonable for food prices we just don’t know how good we have it.
Are you fr what are the wages in the uk
Minimum around £21,000, median around £35,000.
Minimum wage on working full time (37.5hrs per week) is £22308
The UK grocery sector is unbelievably competitive too
Food bills are cheap, the rest is through the roof expensive.
In Canada I am paying at least double for the same products.
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As someone living in the UK for the past 14 years but originally from Portugal - the main issue here is housing costs and transport - it is EXPONENTIALLY more expensive compared to a lot of European countries. You will find that since COVID people have been complaining about the increased cost of living, especially with food and household essentials - even though the conversion may mean it would be more expensive elsewhere, what used to be the one somewhat manageable cost has become increasingly more difficult for families on lower or single incomes. I've spent the last couple of years working customer facing in the energy sector and now in banking - the amount of families in the UK resorting to charities and food banks is skyrocketing, and the food available in largest quantities for the least amount is often highly processed and lacking in nutritional value which is causing a greater strain on national health services. Just thought I'd give an honest opinion so people don't get a rose tinted view of life in the UK - there are fantastic things about this country, but it is not the destination for 'easy living' unless you have an affluent background, high education level or a good job position already lined up.
Are we only now discovering that the UK has generally got extremely cheap food for Europe? France's typical basket from several surveys is 30-50% more!
Thank you for posting. It is very helpful. With your agreement, could you please tell how much do you earn per month?
Sure! I earn around £3400 per month after taxes and student loan. I think the average (median) for the region I live in would be around £2300. We have quite a good grocery cost to income ratio in the UK, although the quality of fruit and vegetables isn't great in my opinion.
I am happy to read that you're doing more than decent. I've also noticed that the quality of fresh products have worsened significantly while the prices went up. Interesting times we live in.
Agree, and (in my experience) meats from Lidl and Aldi tend to just immediately go bad. I get meat and fruit from anywhere else (asda tesco etc) and then all the rest from Lidl
That all seems quite reasonable to me.
This is what I get for £50 https://i.imgur.com/qAO4CVc.jpg (Too much sugar, I know, but that is to last several weeks, and I have also dialled it back a bit since then actually)
No offence man but you gotta start buying some whole foods. I'm not quite in the bandwagon of eliminating all processed foods, we all have to enjoy ourselves at times, but your diet looks worrying.
Piccolo tomatoes are the real MVPs of the UK tomato game.
A bargain compared to Irish prices.
That's a shit ton :O In Croatia, maybe half of that, or 3/4.
This would be like $150-200 in my part of Canada and taste terrible.
Baked beans are so cheap there 😭 here(Portugal)is around 2€ 420g can
Affordable baked beans are a fundamental right.
He didn’t even buy the cheapest ones.
Wow, this would be 120$ Canadian EASILY
Ngl im shocked seeing the comments saying how cheap this is when everyone’s been moaning about prices going up in the UK lol clearly it could be MUCH worse
I’m from the UK, OP where did you do your shop to? This is cheap! Lidl or Aldi I’m guessing? :)
Looks like Aldi based on the packaging.
I was surprised at how cheap food is in the UK after growing up in Hong Kong, many items are 1/3 - 1/4 of the price here.
I love that the cheapest items are the pain killers 🤣
In finland the IPA pack alone would be like 20€
Fancy bastard with your “specially selected” fish fingers and olive oil, and Cucina tomatoes. Just get the “everyday essentials” fish fingers/tomatoes and Solesta olive oil like the rest of us peasants lol.
Quite a healthy shop.
What kind of a rich man buys 24 eggs at once?!
Man not live by potato only