The cost of living crisis has sent prices spiralling, with many people cutting back on essentials to save money and pay skyrocketing energy and food bills.
In response, many supermarkets and other retailers have put special measures in place to help customers.
Here, Which? rounds up the types of offers you can find, and where you’ll find them, to help you save as much as you can at this difficult time.
Free and cheap meals
While ‘Kids eat free’ schemes weren't created as a direct response to the current crisis, some shops have expanded, tweaked or highlighted their children’s meal offers in light of it.
Currently, you can find meal discounts at the following supermarkets:
- Asda has been running a 'kids eat for £1' offer that has no requirement to buy an adult meal at the same time. Those aged over 60 can also enjoy soup, a roll, and unlimited tea and coffee for £1 in any of its 205 cafés throughout December.
- Morrisons has a permanent 'kids eat free' offer for every adult meal purchased over £4.49.
- Sainsbury’s has ‘feed your family for a fiver’ advice, which provides customers with cheap meal ideas.
- Waitrose has reintroduced its popular hot drink offer in partnership with Caffè Nero for members of its myWaitrose loyalty scheme (which is free to join) – just remember to bring your own cup to avoid being charged for a reusable one. You'll be able to get a free Americano, cappuccino, latte or tea. You need to make a purchase, but there is no minimum spend to get the free drink. myWaitrose members who download the Caffè Nero app can also get 25% off Caffè Nero's seasonal menus, a free Barista Coffee at Caffè Nero branches when you link your myWaitrose card and make a purchase, and offers every month (such as a free seasonal mince pie this December when you buy a barista-made drink).
- Tesco: Kids eat free with any purchase of fresh fruit by an adult, which means you can get a meal for as little as 60p. You must be a Tesco Clubcard holder and the scheme will run from Boxing Day until 6 January.
Find out more: which shop offers the cheapest meal
Listen: the Which? Money Podcast talks about how to save on food shopping.
Targeted discounts and vouchers
You might start to see targeted discounts from supermarkets, to provide help to certain groups of customers who need it more than others.
In Iceland, over-60s can get 10% off their shop on Tuesdays. Iceland also offered £30 vouchers to people receiving Pension Credit earlier this year.
Since October, Sainsbury's has been topping up the government-funded NHS Healthy Start scheme by £2. The NHS scheme encourages a healthy diet for pregnant women, babies and young children under the age of four from low-income households.
Eligible customers in England who use a Healthy Start card when shopping at Sainsbury’s will automatically receive a printed coupon worth £2 to use towards fresh, frozen and tinned fruit and vegetables during their next shop. In November, Sainsbury's announced it will extend the Healthy Start coupon to Wales and Northern Ireland until 11 April 2023.
In addition, Sainsbury's has invested £550m in keeping its prices low over the next two years, £15m of which has been set aside specifically go towards fighting rising costs.
These are the only targeted discounts we know about so far, but we’ll update this story if we hear of any others.
- Find out more: which was the cheapest supermarket in September?
Christmas discounts
As we approach the festive season, some supermarkets have announced sales and bonus points on their loyalty schemes for Christmas.
For example, Tesco’s Clubcard Christmas Savers Scheme offers a bonus voucher of up to £12 when you use your vouchers towards your big Christmas shop.
But if you’re one of four million Clubcard users who opts to use the Clubcard app on your smart phone, you’ll get personalised coupons for bonus points or extra discounts every two weeks, rather than every six. Tesco is testing this shake-up to the Clubcard scheme over Christmas and beyond.
At Morrisons, members of the My Morrisons loyalty scheme can take advantage of its new feature, with offers and discounts for certain items in-store and online. It's also relaunched its Christmas Collector scheme. Eligible app customers will be invited to take part, where they can receive a money-off voucher if they have met the criteria and shopped at Morrisons during four of the five weeks leading up to Christmas. You'll be able to spend your bonus voucher from 12 December until 3 January 2023.
Customers who don't use the app and prefer to use their physical loyalty card, will be able to redeem four weekly coupons from 14 November. Those who collect all four can also receive a bonus money-off voucher.
Meanwhile, other stores have made changes to their returns policies for Christmas. For example, John Lewis customers will have until 28 January 2023 to exchange or return unwanted gifts, and that includes items purchased now as customers look to spread the cost of Christmas.
New or expanded value ranges
In the wake of food writer and activist Jack Monroe’s campaigning, many supermarkets announced they had expanded (or, in some cases, re-expanded) their value ranges to give low-income customers more options.
Iceland launched a Value Essentials budget range that includes everyday items such as bread, milk and fruit, as well as meal staples, while Waitrose told us its Waitrose Essentials range is the most extensive value range of any UK supermarket.
However, Which? research in November has found the price of supermarket own-brand and budget ranges have shot up on average by 18% year on year, compared to around 13% for premium own-brand ranges and 12% for branded foods.
That said, these budget lines still tend to be cheaper than branded and unbranded food and drink, so Which? believes supermarkets should do more to ensure they are widely available throughout all branches – including in smaller convenience stores.
Due to increased demand, budget own-label groceries might be more likely to sell out at the moment. We found that value products were out of stock on three times as many days from December 2021 to February 2022 than two years previously.
- Find out more: what's happening to supermarket food prices?
Price locks on essential items
With inflation getting out of hand, customers will be relieved to hear that some retailers are locking down prices on specific products for the foreseeable future.
- Boots says it will keep more than 1,500 products ‘affordable’.
- Currys locked down prices for several electrical items, promising RRPs lower than in 2021.
- Iceland has promised to keep more than 60 essential items at £1 until the end of the year.
- Morrisons has cut and frozen the prices of over 150 essentials until the end of the year, and cut the prices on an additional 50 Christmas products.
- Superdrug has frozen prices on more than 5,000 own-label and branded everyday items.
- Tesco has locked the prices on thousands of items in its Low Everyday Prices range until 2023.
Find out more: best deals in the winter sales revealed
Interest-free food loans
Iceland has launched an interest-free loan scheme to help families pay for groceries over the school holidays.
Iceland Food Club allows customers on a low income to apply for a pre-loaded card of between £25 and £100 (up from £75 when it first launched), with repayments set at £10 a week. However, it's important to understand that there are risks associated with taking out credit, so you should make sure you understand how repayments work.
Tips on cooking
Iceland has also introduced new energy-saving cooking guidance on packaging from September in a joint partnership with energy firm Utilita.
Utilita's Shop Smart, Cook Savvy research claims households can save £287 by using more energy-efficient appliances, with air fryers, microwaves and slow cookers revealed as the most efficient.
What else are shops doing to help with the cost of living?
There’s more going on behind the scenes. Supermarkets are donating money and food to charities to help people who are the worst off through the crisis.
Lidl’s Good to Give trustmark highlights long-life items with nutritional benefits that can be donated to food banks. It also has a scheme it's running in partnership with Neighbourly, called Feed it Back, through which all its stores are connected with local charities, food banks, community cafès, and soup kitchens, where its surplus food is used.
Lidl customers can drop off new toys and games in its shops too, which will be collected by local charities participating in its Feed it Back initiative. To further support this, Lidl has committed £250k for charities during the 2022 festive period – including a £125k donation to the toy bank scheme.
But with inflation at a record high and energy bills expected to rise even further, you might still be struggling to buy what you need.
If you need help with food and essentials, you can search for your local food bank on the Trussel Trust website. You can contact food banks directly, or you can be referred to one by Citizens Advice, Jobcentre Plus, a social worker, a medical professional or your local authority.
Your local council might be able to help in other ways, through small loans or food vouchers.
You can read all our cost of living tips and advice for more help and guidance from our experts.
Which? calls on supermarkets to do more
Which? has launched an Affordable Food For All campaign after it found millions of families are skipping meals to survive the cost of living crisis.
In an innovative new study, undertaken with researchers from the Consumer Data Research Centre at the University of Leeds, we've identified 50 of the most at-risk areas for finding affordable food in the UK.
We're calling on supermarkets to commit to clear pricing, better access to budget ranges that enable healthy choices and more offers for those who need them most.
Do you want to see supermarkets take action? Sign the petition.
This article has been updated since it was first published. The last update was on 22 December.
source https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/what-supermarkets-and-shops-are-doing-to-help-with-the-cost-of-living-aNpUU5E5AbYr