Using local shops - A departure from using Supermarkets
Discussion
We've decided that using the local supermarket, in this case, Tesco (other supermarkets are available) is costing us a surprising amount and the quality isn't all that great, so we've stopped using Tesco for anything fresh. As a result, we've realised that we're saving about £20 a week and the quality is far superior.
Oddly enough, though, the local market isn't the cheapest place to get fruit and veg - the local butcher is. The market had tomatoes at £1.50 a pound, whereas the butcher had them for 70p a pound. Not to mention that the butcher had some nicer looking fruit and veg and it's convenient to buy meat and veg in the same place.
We've tried a number of butchers and the quality varies massively - The mince from the one we mostly use is far superior than that of another I had to use at the weekend. Chicken is a lot cheaper too - Chicken thighs (large, skinned, boned or skinned and boned - 30p each).
Our local butcher is also great to chat to to discuss what to do with certain cuts, etc - They did me some steaks a few weeks ago and did a small cut for my 2 year old and didn't charge me for it.
Recently we had a leaflet shoved through the doof for fruit and veg from someone in the village - tried it out and for £9 I got a very large box (one of those BIG apple boxes) of fruit and veg, the quality of which is very good (apart from the pears, but I'll make those in to a crumble tonight).
The only downside so far is the convenience angle - I do the Tesco shop online and it's quite handy to click and it's delivered.
If we can stick with this, what I think I'll do is forgo the online shop (saving on the £5-6 a week) and use a supermarket that's convenient (in this case, Asda as it's on the way home from work so there's no real extra transport costs involved).
Quite a long thread here that probably doesn't say very much, but I think that using local suppliers is something we should all at least try - not because supermarkets are evil (well....), but the small local suppliers are often cheaper and better than supermarkets.
I hope this doesn't come off as being on a soapbox, but the experience of using local suppliers is pretty good and wasn't as difficult as it was the last time we tried it (we'd just had a baby and convenience was pretty important that point).
However, I do, of course, know that living in Lincolnshire means that there are more farmers around and not everyone has this luxury...
ETA: I've tried my local fishmonger and I'm not overly thrilled with their produce so I might try elsewhere or, as I'm not a million miles from Grimsby, try there...
Oddly enough, though, the local market isn't the cheapest place to get fruit and veg - the local butcher is. The market had tomatoes at £1.50 a pound, whereas the butcher had them for 70p a pound. Not to mention that the butcher had some nicer looking fruit and veg and it's convenient to buy meat and veg in the same place.
We've tried a number of butchers and the quality varies massively - The mince from the one we mostly use is far superior than that of another I had to use at the weekend. Chicken is a lot cheaper too - Chicken thighs (large, skinned, boned or skinned and boned - 30p each).
Our local butcher is also great to chat to to discuss what to do with certain cuts, etc - They did me some steaks a few weeks ago and did a small cut for my 2 year old and didn't charge me for it.
Recently we had a leaflet shoved through the doof for fruit and veg from someone in the village - tried it out and for £9 I got a very large box (one of those BIG apple boxes) of fruit and veg, the quality of which is very good (apart from the pears, but I'll make those in to a crumble tonight).
The only downside so far is the convenience angle - I do the Tesco shop online and it's quite handy to click and it's delivered.
If we can stick with this, what I think I'll do is forgo the online shop (saving on the £5-6 a week) and use a supermarket that's convenient (in this case, Asda as it's on the way home from work so there's no real extra transport costs involved).
Quite a long thread here that probably doesn't say very much, but I think that using local suppliers is something we should all at least try - not because supermarkets are evil (well....), but the small local suppliers are often cheaper and better than supermarkets.
I hope this doesn't come off as being on a soapbox, but the experience of using local suppliers is pretty good and wasn't as difficult as it was the last time we tried it (we'd just had a baby and convenience was pretty important that point).
However, I do, of course, know that living in Lincolnshire means that there are more farmers around and not everyone has this luxury...
ETA: I've tried my local fishmonger and I'm not overly thrilled with their produce so I might try elsewhere or, as I'm not a million miles from Grimsby, try there...
Edited by james_tigerwoods on Monday 13th September 10:12
we're fortunate in that we live in the Vale of Evesham.
We do about £50 a week in tescos on normal stuff, then meat from a local farmer who has a shop (more a shed really) and we're totally spoilt for Veg, we get it from any number of market gardeners, or out of our greenhouse. Can't beat putting £1 in a tin and coming away with a bag of mixed peppers that were grown 30 yards away.
We were buying lamb shanks for £2 each from the farmer, and it was his lamb that he had sent to the abattoir himself.
None of this 'food miles' for us.
We do about £50 a week in tescos on normal stuff, then meat from a local farmer who has a shop (more a shed really) and we're totally spoilt for Veg, we get it from any number of market gardeners, or out of our greenhouse. Can't beat putting £1 in a tin and coming away with a bag of mixed peppers that were grown 30 yards away.
We were buying lamb shanks for £2 each from the farmer, and it was his lamb that he had sent to the abattoir himself.
None of this 'food miles' for us.
Edited by davethebunny on Monday 13th September 11:21
We do try where possible to buy from local butchers and greengrocers. In fact, I take my son with me into town every Saturday morning to get all the bits we need. He loves it as the greengrocer always lets him have a small bag of grapes - anything to keep them happy.
I think it's pretty important to educate kids from an early age that shopping doesn't simply have to be about a dull soulless walk around the local tescasdburysons.
That said, we do shop in Tesco far more often than I'd really like as the convenience just makes it too simple. This is usually just for the general stuff like washing powder, nappies, KY jelly etc.
I think it's pretty important to educate kids from an early age that shopping doesn't simply have to be about a dull soulless walk around the local tescasdburysons.
That said, we do shop in Tesco far more often than I'd really like as the convenience just makes it too simple. This is usually just for the general stuff like washing powder, nappies, KY jelly etc.
james_tigerwoods said:
We've decided that using the local supermarket, in this case, Tesco (other supermarkets are available) is costing us a surprising amount and the quality isn't all that great, so we've stopped using Tesco for anything fresh. As a result, we've realised that we're saving about £20 a week and the quality is far superior.
Oddly enough, though, the local market isn't the cheapest place to get fruit and veg - the local butcher is. The market had tomatoes at £1.50 a pound, whereas the butcher had them for 70p a pound. Not to mention that the butcher had some nicer looking fruit and veg and it's convenient to buy meat and veg in the same place.
We've tried a number of butchers and the quality varies massively - The mince from the one we mostly use is far superior than that of another I had to use at the weekend. Chicken is a lot cheaper too - Chicken thighs (large, skinned, boned or skinned and boned - 30p each).
Our local butcher is also great to chat to to discuss what to do with certain cuts, etc - They did me some steaks a few weeks ago and did a small cut for my 2 year old and didn't charge me for it.
Recently we had a leaflet shoved through the doof for fruit and veg from someone in the village - tried it out and for £9 I got a very large box (one of those BIG apple boxes) of fruit and veg, the quality of which is very good (apart from the pears, but I'll make those in to a crumble tonight).
The only downside so far is the convenience angle - I do the Tesco shop online and it's quite handy to click and it's delivered.
All very nice if you have the time , Convenience rules these days, sadly , you know i don't even know where my nearest butcher's is
If we can stick with this, what I think I'll do is forgo the online shop (saving on the £5-6 a week) and use a supermarket that's convenient (in this case, Asda as it's on the way home from work so there's no real extra transport costs involved).
Quite a long thread here that probably doesn't say very much, but I think that using local suppliers is something we should all at least try - not because supermarkets are evil (well....), but the small local suppliers are often cheaper and better than supermarkets.
I hope this doesn't come off as being on a soapbox, but the experience of using local suppliers is pretty good and wasn't as difficult as it was the last time we tried it (we'd just had a baby and convenience was pretty important that point).
However, I do, of course, know that living in Lincolnshire means that there are more farmers around and not everyone has this luxury...
ETA: I've tried my local fishmonger and I'm not overly thrilled with their produce so I might try elsewhere or, as I'm not a million miles from Grimsby, try there...
Oddly enough, though, the local market isn't the cheapest place to get fruit and veg - the local butcher is. The market had tomatoes at £1.50 a pound, whereas the butcher had them for 70p a pound. Not to mention that the butcher had some nicer looking fruit and veg and it's convenient to buy meat and veg in the same place.
We've tried a number of butchers and the quality varies massively - The mince from the one we mostly use is far superior than that of another I had to use at the weekend. Chicken is a lot cheaper too - Chicken thighs (large, skinned, boned or skinned and boned - 30p each).
Our local butcher is also great to chat to to discuss what to do with certain cuts, etc - They did me some steaks a few weeks ago and did a small cut for my 2 year old and didn't charge me for it.
Recently we had a leaflet shoved through the doof for fruit and veg from someone in the village - tried it out and for £9 I got a very large box (one of those BIG apple boxes) of fruit and veg, the quality of which is very good (apart from the pears, but I'll make those in to a crumble tonight).
The only downside so far is the convenience angle - I do the Tesco shop online and it's quite handy to click and it's delivered.
All very nice if you have the time , Convenience rules these days, sadly , you know i don't even know where my nearest butcher's is
If we can stick with this, what I think I'll do is forgo the online shop (saving on the £5-6 a week) and use a supermarket that's convenient (in this case, Asda as it's on the way home from work so there's no real extra transport costs involved).
Quite a long thread here that probably doesn't say very much, but I think that using local suppliers is something we should all at least try - not because supermarkets are evil (well....), but the small local suppliers are often cheaper and better than supermarkets.
I hope this doesn't come off as being on a soapbox, but the experience of using local suppliers is pretty good and wasn't as difficult as it was the last time we tried it (we'd just had a baby and convenience was pretty important that point).
However, I do, of course, know that living in Lincolnshire means that there are more farmers around and not everyone has this luxury...
ETA: I've tried my local fishmonger and I'm not overly thrilled with their produce so I might try elsewhere or, as I'm not a million miles from Grimsby, try there...
Edited by james_tigerwoods on Monday 13th September 10:12
webbyst said:
Quote in there somewhere - Hopefully just this:
All very nice if you have the time , Convenience rules these days, sadly , you know i don't even know where my nearest butcher's is
I hope that's your responseAll very nice if you have the time , Convenience rules these days, sadly , you know i don't even know where my nearest butcher's is
That's the problem - finding that time. We try to fit it in to what we do on a Saturday, or at least drive by a butcher (which is what we ended up doing on Saturday).
I didn't know where mine was either initially, but a drive in to the local town has turned up three - I also stumbled across one in the village one up from us - and another in another small town/big village near us.
They're worth finding even if you don't use them that often.
The danger is that they vanish all together and that would be sad.
When the Tesco in Reading received zero out of five during a food hygiene check we stopped going there (along with the fact they are trying to achieve retail dominance in Reading).
We'd already used the local butchers (Jennings in central Caversham) for sausages and special occasions, but when we started using them for everything we also found their meat was vastly superior and cheaper too.
Sadly we then moved from Reading, but Mrs Puggit does still return on occasions.
We'd already used the local butchers (Jennings in central Caversham) for sausages and special occasions, but when we started using them for everything we also found their meat was vastly superior and cheaper too.
Sadly we then moved from Reading, but Mrs Puggit does still return on occasions.
We found a curious advantage to mince from the local buther. Whilst pound-for-pound it was pretty much the same price as Sainsburys, the ability to order any weight we wanted is great.
I think the Sainsburys packs are 500g which, works out well for Spag bol for two people. However, by ordering 400g from the butchers, we've saved money and not really noticed the difference in portion size.
OK, its a very small saving but the quality seems a lot better.
Their faggots are very good too.
I think the Sainsburys packs are 500g which, works out well for Spag bol for two people. However, by ordering 400g from the butchers, we've saved money and not really noticed the difference in portion size.
OK, its a very small saving but the quality seems a lot better.
Their faggots are very good too.
Plotloss said:
Best thing about mince from a butcher is that you can get proper mince, not this extra lean s
t that morons with no tastebuds buy from supermarkets.
You should be able to see white chunks of fat in mince, it's where the flavour is.
Aye. Fatty mince makes far tastier burgers too.t that morons with no tastebuds buy from supermarkets.You should be able to see white chunks of fat in mince, it's where the flavour is.
Huntsman said:
james_tigerwoods said:
(apart from the pears, but I'll make those in to a crumble tonight).
Oh, lovely, what time should I pop round?
I may pop out to the local market (if it's open, if I can find it and if I don't get mugged - I am in Rotherham just now as opposed to my own local town) and get some Blackberries too.
Ooo, and double cream. I think I may make some up in some of the ramekins I've got too for people at work...
I've got a ton of apples too (about a dozen came with the fruit and veg box) - apple, pear and blackberry crumble.... MMmmmmmm....
Wadeski said:
I really dont understand who local shops are aimed at. These days, with both men and women working, nobody i know gets home before 7pm. When everything is shut. Its teh same with banks. Who are they aiming to satisfy, unemployed and retired people?
They have it right in France - open until at least 7pm in the main.Wadeski said:
I really dont understand who local shops are aimed at. These days, with both men and women working, nobody i know gets home before 7pm. When everything is shut. Its teh same with banks. Who are they aiming to satisfy, unemployed and retired people?
A local shop will be aimed at those in its locality - a "local shop for local people" if you will. Not everyone in the town will work away - some will be able to pass the butcher in the daytime (lunchtime, etc).They'll do less trade in the week, but bear in mind that plenty of people work shifts that will enable them to call in - or retired people - people that don't work but have a partner that does - retired people - people on their days off, etc.
escargot said:
Wadeski said:
I really dont understand who local shops are aimed at. These days, with both men and women working, nobody i know gets home before 7pm. When everything is shut. Its teh same with banks. Who are they aiming to satisfy, unemployed and retired people?
They have it right in France - open until at least 7pm in the main.
james_tigerwoods said:
Wadeski said:
I really dont understand who local shops are aimed at. These days, with both men and women working, nobody i know gets home before 7pm. When everything is shut. Its teh same with banks. Who are they aiming to satisfy, unemployed and retired people?
A local shop will be aimed at those in its locality - a "local shop for local people" if you will. Not everyone in the town will work away - some will be able to pass the butcher in the daytime (lunchtime, etc).They'll do less trade in the week, but bear in mind that plenty of people work shifts that will enable them to call in - or retired people - people that don't work but have a partner that does - retired people - people on their days off, etc.
I completely agree with you that the local shops are great, and on the occasions I can I shop there always! However, the convenience of Tescos etc. really is clear.
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