My Lidl bargain!

I take my hat off to you, doing all that in this heat, My kitchen has the sun on it all day long so I cook as little as possible at the moment.

Thank you Rocketstop2.

I hope it’s a bit of Karma, we both try and do good things so this felt like a little reward.

There must have been 20 boxes and very little interest!

Sago

Today I called into Lidl for a few bits.

I noticed by the tills fruit and veg boxes at £2.00each.

As there were so many I decided to get 2!

I have already made 3 jars of a tomato and red pepper ketchup,
Friday I will make mango chutney, sauerkraut and apricot jam. there will be enough raspberries and strawberries for breakfast for 2/3 days with some pears.
The avocados should be ripe by the weekend so we can use the lime and left over tomatoes to make guacamole.
This just leaves me with lots of plums some red peppers and lettuce.

I feel like I have won the lottery!💃💃💃💃💃💃

Well done you, you got a lovely bargain, are using it wisely and it stops stuff being chucked away by Lidl.

Nothing rotting in the Lidl near (ish) to me.
I've always found their stuff pretty good.

Sorry, meant rotting fruit on shelf: peaches and similar . Typo before. Like their yoghurts and fresh bread. Not a great selection of vegetarian cold shelf and frozen foods.

We have two Lidls in our town . But the nearest town centre one doesn’t sell very fresh produce a lot of the time and it goes off quick. Only salad veg ok are usually tomatoes and cucumbers. Fruit has been my outing in the shelf some summers. Hate to think what they would sell off!
Other new store is better stocked.

That sounds brilliant, I love a bargain! Unfortunately I don't have a car, so I have my shopping delivered fortnightly from Sainsbury's or Ocado. There is a farm shop nearby, if you have a car that is, but nothing close enough to me and the buses are one an hour. No local market either. The nearest supermarket is a bus ride or 25 minutes walk and its Waitrose, so expensive, but I get a few bits in there if I've run out of something or fancy having a look round there, or to kill time waiting for the next bus, which is one an hour, and I often have to kill time. I'm suffering from moving three years ago from Essex to Berkshire and previously the buses were every 20 minutes and the shops 10 minutes walk away.

our local lidl used to have really good boxes when it was £1.50. Now they are £2 and the last few times the box ingredients don't add up to £2. - not even £1.50.

Primrose53

How do you know that a person is poor? My neighbour is loaded and owns 2.5 houses but dresses in old washed out clothes, has wild hair and looks like a bag lady. She is an absolute skinflint though and buys the cheapest of everything in tiny quantities. If anybody saw her in Lidl rooting through the cheap boxes you might wrongly assume she is poor.

Since I have never seen anyone take one of these boxes I have no idea how they dress.

Anyway isn't assuming someone who is poor will be dressed in rags, succumbing to a rather simplistic and insulting stereotype? Even people in good professional jobs with professional wardrobes to go with it, soon slip into penury after a few months without work, they will continue to wear the same clothes as they wore when they were affluent.

The fact that someone taking one of these boxes is dressed in a suit and tie does not mean that they are not struggling to manage on benefits.

They put them near the tills to make sure people don’t add or swap better stuff in from the fruit and veg aisle. They are good value and if our Lidl has them I would buy one - it lessens food waste.

Primrose53

How do you know that a person is poor? My neighbour is loaded and owns 2.5 houses but dresses in old washed out clothes, has wild hair and looks like a bag lady. She is an absolute skinflint though and buys the cheapest of everything in tiny quantities. If anybody saw her in Lidl rooting through the cheap boxes you might wrongly assume she is poor.

Exactly. And so what if she's 'comfortably off' anyway? She could be cooking for a soup kitchen, or might simply like a bargain, and attracting the better off, who are likely to spend more (or maybe not in your neighbour's case) will be in the interests of the store.

If the boxes were intended as charitable donations they could be made as such, but as it is, they are just 'end of line' type offers, and are available to any customer who wants them.

The idea of people wandering round supermarkets judging how well-off other customers might be has really irritated me for some reason, and I very rarely go in them - I shop online 😀

I’ve never seen them in our local Lidl either. Will have a closer look next time.

sassenach512

Our Lidl put them on the shelves where you pack your shopping ViceVersa a bit daft I think because you're on your way out by then and not inclined to go back around the shop with a box

Yes, I know that's where they put them (which I also find a bit odd), but I've still never seen one in my local Lidl. Maybe it depends when different stores put them out?

I have always thought that a bit strange too but I believe people have been known to add to them on the way round. There are always a few who cheat and spoil it for the rest. I think one per customer is fair.

Our Lidl put them on the shelves where you pack your shopping ViceVersa a bit daft I think because you're on your way out by then and not inclined to go back around the shop with a box

I've never seen the boxes in our most local Lidl - and I'm just back from there this morning, although I have seen the odd one or two when I've been in branches in the Edinburgh area.

I said that judging by appearances was irrelevant and, frankly, I find it abhorrent.
You replied
It’s relevant because somebody implied that people should not pick up more than one box of reduced fruit/veg and they should be left for poor people. Short of questioning them there is no way of knowing and none of us would presumably do that
Well obviously nobody is going to means test a bargain box! even thinking about it!
Are you proposing policing this?
My suggestion was one box per customer. Simples. Non judgemental, self regulating. If people choose to come moe than once it might indicate their need.

MawsRosie

Primrose53

How do you know that a person is poor? My neighbour is loaded and owns 2.5 houses but dresses in old washed out clothes, has wild hair and looks like a bag lady. She is an absolute skinflint though and buys the cheapest of everything in tiny quantities. If anybody saw her in Lidl rooting through the cheap boxes you might wrongly assume she is poor.

I really don’t see the relevance of this at all.
Of course we should not judge on appearances and I would not in any case presume to judge or otherwise, anybody rootling through the bargain boxes.
What a thought

It’s relevant because somebody implied that people should not pick up more than one box of reduced fruit/veg and they should be left for poor people. Short of questioning them there is no way of knowing and none of us would presumably do that.

Sago

Wow!

So our local garden centre is huge and has a wonderful free play area and a soft play for a nominal charge.

It is very much a family destination and free to get in.

It is walkable from our nearest market town and in a bus route.

These places are not the preserve of the wealthy.

My apologies Sago it was Monica who made the comment, suggesting that Garden Centres attracted the better off.
The quote facility can be misleading and perhaps I am easily confused

Primrose53

How do you know that a person is poor? My neighbour is loaded and owns 2.5 houses but dresses in old washed out clothes, has wild hair and looks like a bag lady. She is an absolute skinflint though and buys the cheapest of everything in tiny quantities. If anybody saw her in Lidl rooting through the cheap boxes you might wrongly assume she is poor.

I really don’t see the relevance of this at all.
Of course we should not judge on appearances and I would not in any case presume to judge or otherwise, anybody rootling through the bargain boxes.
What a thought

Wow!

So our local garden centre is huge and has a wonderful free play area and a soft play for a nominal charge.

It is very much a family destination and free to get in.

It is walkable from our nearest market town and in a bus route.

These places are not the preserve of the wealthy.

How do you know that a person is poor? My neighbour is loaded and owns 2.5 houses but dresses in old washed out clothes, has wild hair and looks like a bag lady. She is an absolute skinflint though and buys the cheapest of everything in tiny quantities. If anybody saw her in Lidl rooting through the cheap boxes you might wrongly assume she is poor.

Surely with the likes of bargain boxes a limit of one per customer would not be unreasonable? That way everybody gets a chance not only those with large car boots.

I think Sago may be on shaky ground with generalisations like poor people are less likely to go to garden centres however.

Sago

M0nica

I see those boxes in Lidl, but I have never bought one because we are comfortablly off and I feel I ought to leave them for families for whom these cut prices boxes are a godsend when they are struggling to manage on a small income.

However, if I saw them at a Garden Centre I would probably snap one up.

Presumably then poor people don’t go to garden centres.

I feel like I have had a ticking off.

No, why should anyone be ticking you of?

I think poor people are less likely to go to garden centres because they are usually in out of town locations that require customers to have a car to access them. They are generally expensive for everything including plants, so why visit if you have no spare money to spend?

petra

One problem for customers who really might need the boxes is that they don’t have transport. Catch 22 😥

Agreed. We've seen advice on here for those who are hard up to get boxes of fruit and veg from local markets in late afternoon, based on the fact that the advisor lived near one when her children were young, was available at that time of day and could, presumably, drive home with them in the boot, then convert them into 'nourishing soup'. Now the poor are supposed to buy bargain baskets that the 'comfortably off' generously leave for them in Lidl.

It's so short-sighted, and ignores the fact that many people in need of benefits are now working full-time, not everyone has a car, many HA or council estates are not in town centres where supermarkets are situated, and the attitude that they should be marked out by being the ones buying reduced items would further stigmatise them. In a food bank everyone there is struggling so nobody stands out, but at least in theory everyone in a supermarket is equal - if reduced items are supposedly for 'the poor', anyone buying them will be marked out as not 'comfortably off'.