How I saved €125 off my weekly food shopping bill for a family of six

THERE are times in life when you learn something so gob-smackingly shocking, your jaw drops to the floor.

That sums up my reaction this week when I carried out a shopping challenge at a supermarket: To fill a trolley with own-brand goods only where possible, then fill another with their branded equivalents - and then work out the difference in my pocket.

Reader - prepare for your jaw to fall, because, in my usual weekly shop for a family of six people, I found that I saved €125.82.

Yes, you read that right.

My own-brand-only shop came to €102.02, while the brand-only one cost €227.84. For virtually the same range of items... fruit, veg, food, toiletries, etc.

At a time when consumers are tightening their belts at a rate of knots and preparing for a grim winter of sky-high fuel bills and soaring costs elsewhere, it’s an eye-catching figure.

Extrapolate that across a month, and you get a saving of more than €500 - over the course of a year, you are looking at the bones of €6,000.

I accepted this consumer challenge from SuperValu and went along to their Quish’s store in the West End Shopping Centre, Ballincollig.

There, I did my normal weekly family shop, minus a number of items deemed out of bounds - alcohol, cigarettes, newspapers, magazines, lottery tickets, and electrical goods and appliances.

To all intents and purposes, it was the usual shop I do every week, but while I chose own-brand items for my trolley, a member of staff shadowed me and selected branded ones only for theirs.

In instances where an own- brand version was not available, the same product was put in both trolleys.

The two trolleys were then put through the till to demonstrate the price difference... and the own-brand option was well over half price. Remarkable.

The final price for both trolleys was lower once I had used up a €10 off voucher - the type of loyalty offer done by many of the major supermarkets.

This brought the final figure for my trolley to just €92.

At this juncture, I can hear a few murmurings of objection from some readers.

Yes, but aren’t own-brand products often a pale imitation of their big brand rivals? Does the breakfast cereal taste as nice? Do the dishwasher tablets do as good a job?

Some consumers will believe cheaper is inferior, but there will also be many cases where the consumer will try the own-brand version and feel it is as good, or even better, than its more expensive rival.

The big lesson is surely that there are significant savings to be made out there, if people choose to try some of the own-brand makes.

Maybe not a saving of €125, but €100? €75? €50? Not to be sniffed at, eh?

To some, that may well mean compromising on their tried and trusted favourites - but to others there may not be any compromise involved at all. A person can strike their own balance between what they perceive to be quality and value - and in any case, choice and competition are good for keeping prices low.

In these straitened times, the balancing act between quality and value has been tilted towards the budget-conscious end. SuperValu have recorded an increase of 45% in own-brand sales in recent times - a figure that is probably matched by its rivals with their own-brand options.

The supermarkets have responded to this eye for value by increasing their own-brand ranges - Supervalu now has more than 5,000 - and adding in extra coupon savings and other money-off deals.

Although we all do a weekly grocery shop of some kind, I appreciate that we all have our own systems, methods, habits, idiosyncracies, and prejudices, so here’s how it works in our house.

I usually shop at Dunnes in Macroom on a weekday, using their own loyalty system, offering €10 when you spend €50. I shop for a family of six, and my bill usually comes to around €150-180.

As that figure suggests, I currently don’t tend to buy too many own-brand products, but I do keep an eye out for discounts and two-for-one offers, etc, on just about everything.

So, the bottom line is important to me, but so is the quality of some of the goods - plus, like many households we have our fair share of picky young refuseniks when it comes to food!

As for my own experience if own-brand goods, I am usually happy to buy their biscuits and snacks, for instance, but would usually baulk at own-brand cereals. Is that down to the power of the big brand advertising, or the fact me and the kids have tried own-brand versions and found them wanting? Perhaps a bit of both.

Plus, you will invariably find a large brand cereal maker is offering a discount on some make or size, so you feel you are buying the best AND saving money. However, compared to the own-brand option, you probably aren’t saving as much money as you could!

I will now be testing the own-brand options I purchased in the coming days and seeing how family members react. Will the supermarket chocolate spread be as good as Nutella? Will the washing powder do as good a job as the branded one? Will there be negative comments about the new loo paper? Will the cats turn up their noses when they find their food isn’t the usual cat’s whiskers?

If only half the own-brand products make the cut, that’s still a small fortune saved.

You’d want to be off your trolley not to try it.