National Average weekly shopping bill

PennyGSD

Anyone know if the prices being quoted on Eat Well for Less include household goods such as washing powder, loo roll, shampoo, painkillers etc or is it just food & non-alcoholic drink?

I've slipped out of a number of old style ways recently, although still consider myself a fairly frugal shopper, and I've been keeping track of how much we spend on different things for a few weeks.

Depending on the answer to my first paragraph, we're either a bit over the national average or considerably over it!

june89

I can't remember exactly what figure they quote, but the stats issued by the ONS are for food and non-alcoholic drink only. I've never seen them look at non-food items (come to think of it, pretty sure the "real" weekly shops on there are only ever food only) on EWFL so I'd say that is the figure they're using.

It's around £60/week for all UK households, but this obviously changes depending on family size and income. More here if you're interested.

freezspirit

Depending where you look for the average weekly spend I've found it varies between £70 - £480.

PennyGSD

june89 wrote: »

I can't remember exactly what figure they quote, but the stats issued by the ONS are for food and non-alcoholic drink only. I've never seen them look at non-food items (come to think of it, pretty sure the "real" weekly shops on there are only ever food only) on EWFL so I'd say that is the figure they're using.

It's around £60/week for all UK households, but this obviously changes depending on family size and income. More here if you're interested.

Cool. We're only a bit over then. Thank you. And you're right - I suppose it makes sense for it to refer to food only on an EAT well for less programme. It's not LIVE well for less afterall.

PennyGSD

freezspirit wrote: »

Depending where you look for the average weekly spend I've found it varies between £70 - £480.

Hey - £480???? We're only slightly over then


Joke!

moneyistooshorttomention

That weekly spending per household doesnt seem to be broken down anywhere into average cost per person. So I dont find it at all helpful for comparison purposes - as households vary in size so much and obviously a noticeable number of households will include one or more children (ie not eating an adult size amount of food).

It would be more helpful if they said the cost per adult and cost per child each.

For reference - I probably spend around £30-£35 per week and that is for food and drink only. That is with starting to get a noticeable amount of food from the garden on the one hand, but deciding to buy what I want (as I'm not going to economise on food any longer at my age - ie 60s).

[Deleted User]

I budget on £60.00 per month roughly for myself for food etc .I eat out twice a week at least so really only have 5 dinners 7 lunches and 7 breakfasts to make.I can manage reasonably well on this amount and often have a small amount left over which goes into my holiday tin.My freezer is packed out with stuff I have made myself and I never eat take-aways as I can make them better and cheaper myself.I'm not keen on supermarkets ready meals as my bulk cooking gives me more than enough extra meals in the freezer I spent about a third on fruit and veg and like to eat stuff in season if possibleAt the moment I have a triffid like rhubarb crown that is giving me a good crop and I do nothing to it, just let it grow my DGS and I forage from blackberries in season and my friend has a great apple tree that I get usually a couple of carrier bags full which get stewed in honey and when cold frozen for use in the winter Its surprising how well you can eat for very little if you menu plan and use what you have more inventively.Y/S stuff go without saying are a must.I am away next week on my holidays and I have three quarters of a celery left in the fridge that will be turned into soup on Saturday morning and bagged up to be frozen when cold.Nothing goes to waste in my house.To me throwing food away is tantamount to throwing hard cash away, why would you do it ? Harder I suppose if you have a family ,especially if they are fussy.I was brought up with the maxim 'eat it or go without' and there are very few things I won't eat.I don't buy or eat crisps or snacks as I feel they have very little nutritional value and are just overpriced potato's To me a potato is part of a meal, not something to eat on the run.I treat my budget and food cupboards as I would a business and they have to work for me properly and I want to get the best value for my cash as I would for anything else :0

june89

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

That weekly spending per household doesnt seem to be broken down anywhere into average cost per person. So I dont find it at all helpful for comparison purposes - as households vary in size so much and obviously a noticeable number of households will include one or more children (ie not eating an adult size amount of food).

It would be more helpful if they said the cost per adult and cost per child each.

For reference - I probably spend around £30-£35 per week and that is for food and drink only. That is with starting to get a noticeable amount of food from the garden on the one hand, but deciding to buy what I want (as I'm not going to economise on food any longer at my age - ie 60s).

If you go to the view all data option, one of the links there (Table A23) does break it down. For simplicity, adults seem to come in at around £30/week each and each child adds £10/week. Interestingly, retired adults (not on the state pension) are slightly higher than those still working.

moneyistooshorttomention

Ah - I missed that bit. Will go back for another looksee.

Personally - I'm not surprised that retired adults would spend more than other adults. More home "entertaining" possibly (ie feeding friends meals)? Food having higher priority than it does to working age people?

EDIT; Found it. So (in 2014 figures) it's £28.20 for those on State pension each, £32.30 for those retired people not on State pension, £29.40 for working age people.

So that would be £34.88 for a retired (non State pension) person now if one assumes costs being 8% higher to allow for it being 2 years later I guess. So I'm "bang on the money" then at my £30-£35 per week. Out of interest then I shall mentally "allocate" £35 per week to my food and see how it matches to what I actually spend - I guess getting some food from the garden on the one hand v. maybe eating one meal out per week on average should be about "even stevens".