Shopping IN France

westwardbymanier

just wondered if any members do their regular monthly grocery shop in France? And if so are their many bargains to be found? Apart from alcohol.

bagpuss

Don't do a regular monthly shop but bargains to be had are:

Washing powder/tablet
Fabric softener
Water softening tablets (big savings on these)
Foil
Chocolate
Jam

Then there is the obvious things like cheese, pate and any other French specialities - for instance Croque Monsiers (sandwichs with ham and cheese in that you grill and are to die for!)

Cookware and chain bargains

If you are going to Cite Europe make time to go and look around the other shops for other things too - a brillant programme on BBC1 in the mornings a few weeks ago was called Foreign Exchange and although I was a bit of a cynic about what they bought they really did get bargains! I would not have though of buying electrical items but of course if you get an adaptor then there is no reason at all why they shouldn't work in the UK!

Hope some of this helps!

Bagpuss

crossleydd42

This website - http://www.theotherside.co.uk/tm-heritage/shop.htm - may give you a feel for things. I do recall that detergents are much cheaper in France, partly because of the enormous packets they come in! I find it cheaper to go to Lidl/Aldi in France for cheap shopping, especially wine.

RogerPJ

bagpuss wrote:

Don't do a regular monthly shop but bargains to be had are:

Washing powder/tablet
Fabric softener
Water softening tablets (big savings on these)
Foil
Chocolate
Jam

Then there is the obvious things like cheese, pate and any other French specialities - for instance Croque Monsiers (sandwichs with ham and cheese in that you grill and are to die for!)

Cookware and chain bargains

If you are going to Cite Europe make time to go and look around the other shops for other things too - a brillant programme on BBC1 in the mornings a few weeks ago was called Foreign Exchange and although I was a bit of a cynic about what they bought they really did get bargains! I would not have though of buying electrical items but of course if you get an adaptor then there is no reason at all why they shouldn't work in the UK!

Hope some of this helps!

Bagpuss

Add Olive Oil (1/3 cheaper), childrens clothes (half price, prettier and better quality) and pushchairs/toys to the list. We bought a pushchair for £20 from Lille and the same one was £49.99 in England. Jam is less than 1/2 price of UK and tastes much nicer! Anything made by Tefal, Le Creuset or Pyrex will be much cheaper as they are often made in France. I bought a set of kitchen utensils made by Tefal for £5 and they were £20 in England!

Fruit is also much cheaper and better quality.

Sarahsaver

i would buy chocolate, ground coffee, olives, olive oil and red wine vinegar, salami/saucisson sec and tinned chestnuts. But I would buy them anyway LOL life's little essentials!

se999

Hi,

We've found FNAC very good for prices for computer add on's, you can price up online at http://www.fnac.com/ before you go.

For electrical goods DARTY is the biggest store we've found,
http://www.darty.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/DartyHomepageView?storeId=10001

Sorry websites are in French

For French language books if you want to improve your french, you can order online at https://www.amazon.fr, it's normally cheaper to buy online and pay postage to UK than to buy the UK premium price for foreign language books.

To be honest, since the Euro I think prices have evened out a bit between UK & France, in France & Germany consumer orgs said there were major increases. So depending on the exchange rate you get some things can be a lot dearer here now than the UK, or maybe I've not found the right places yet

Edit - forgot for vegetarians the major chains do a far better/cheaper ranges of tinned beans in a bigger range of sizes!!

Rave

When we go on booze cruises I tend to just grab the stuff that can't easily be had in England, or the stuff that really is much cheaper/better quality over there- that means mustard, mustard mayonnaise, fruit syrops, vichy mints for us. I find that nowadays most day-to-day groceries can be had just as cheaply from Aldi/Lidl- salami and continental cheese, for example.

The Carrefour in Cite Europe has an amazing meat and fish section and a lot of it is very cheap, but we don't have a particularly good cool bag. I'd want one of those refrigerated ones that runs from the lighter socket really- and while I love the merguez sausages, I worry whether the beef is the 'fed on sewage' type:rolleyes:.

Must admit I hadn't paid attention to the price of Tefal stuff, and wherever I got it Le Crueset is always going to be far too expensive for us. I thought their prices for motor oil (like Mobil 1) looked pretty competitive though.......

bagpuss

crossleydd42 wrote:

This website - http://www.theotherside.co.uk/tm-heritage/shop.htm - may give you a feel for things. I do recall that detergents are much cheaper in France, partly because of the enormous packets they come in! I find it cheaper to go to Lidl/Aldi in France for cheap shopping, especially wine.

Take care when using this site as I noticed that the details for the Christmas Markets were for 2002 (!) so perhaps not quite up to date!


Anyone got any recommendations on wher to eat, particularly for the Calais area please?

windym_2

Anything for the car....we had car serviced at about half the price, windscreen wipers and bulbs (Volvo's go through them I don't know), childrens bits and bobs especially baby items - all things nursery. Lots of DIY although you have to make sure taps etc come up to our sizings. Diesel is heaps cheaper - so go over with an empty tank. We do large hypermarkets in Brest (from Plymouth-Roscoff) like L'E.clerc - which is great for just about everything. I don't think it's so much the pricing but the quality is always better for a similar or cheaper price. I am off next Friday, for two weeks golfing holiday in the Dordogne (courtesy 100% of Tesco Clubcard)! I shall be stocking up on the obvious - wine, cheese, biscuits, chocolate.............perhaps I should look at the price of scales?

Sarahsaver

Rave wrote:

The Carrefour in Cite Europe has an amazing meat and fish section and a lot of it is very cheap, but we don't have a particularly good cool bag. I'd want one of those refrigerated ones that runs from the lighter socket really- and while I love the merguez sausages, I worry whether the beef is the 'fed on sewage' type:rolleyes:.

You really trust british beef more than French? :rolleyes:

spalding

Fill your car up petrol or diesel ca often save the cost of the ferry over there depending on your car size,
Also found cite europe good for pet carriers well over half the price here and much better which I had picked up a few more on my last trip!!