Where should I get ******** if not in the supermarket??

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Where should I get ******** if not in the supermarket??
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Downsizer Forum Index -> Seasonal and Frugal Shopping

Do you use a supermarket?

Regularly for most things I can't produce myself

20%

[ 14 ]

Regularly for some things but not everything

60%

[ 42 ]

For topups only and the odd thing I can't get anywhere else

15%

[ 11 ]

Never ever ever ever for anything - evil places they are

[ 2 ]

Total Votes : 69

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Penny Outskirts

Joined: 18 Sep 2005
Posts: 23385
Location: Planet, not on the....

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 09 9:49 pm Post subject:
Shipton Mill are not that far away either. I've thought so often about using Suma. They will supply me as I'm far enough out of town. I must look at them again. Perhaps we South Glos/Wilts persons could think again about a bulk buy?

lettucewoman

Joined: 26 Sep 2006
Posts: 7834
Location: Tiptoe in the Forest!!

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 09 10:12 pm Post subject:

y'see, there are two reasons why we cant buy in bulk...one is that we rarely have �2/300 to spend in one lump...at the moment we are living on �80 a week and the business bank account is just about coping with the utilities bills and DD's...

....and the other is that we live in a park home, and there really isn't anywhere to store anything, much less large bags of flour, rice etc...

So bang goes that idea

AnnaD

Joined: 12 Jun 2007
Posts: 2777
Location: Edinburgh

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 09 10:19 pm Post subject:
We rarely need to go to a supermarket because we can get pretty much everything we need from https://damhead.co.uk/ There is the odd occasion where we'll forget to order something or there is a really good offer at the supermarket, but generally we do our best to avoid them.

wellington womble

Joined: 08 Nov 2004
Posts: 15051
Location: East Midlands

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 09 10:58 pm Post subject:

We used to have the most fantastic organic box scheme that sold everything that I could ever need (except, for some reason tonic water and yeast) Sadly, the owners retired and the business shut down (they claim it's only coincidence when we moved to a mile away from their base.

Now I use a much newer box scheme, which is not so focused on organic, but more interested in ethical and local. This is great, but not so comprehensive. I think they deserve support, though, or they won't get bigger. I always email and tell them I want something if they don't stock it, otherwise how are they to know what's in demand?!

I buy household goods, dried and tinned goods from costco (which is just another kind of supermarket, really) but fairly reasonable for most stuff, meat in bulk from local farms and the box scheme have taken over all the weekly stuff, like local milk, cheese, chicken, veg, eggs and bacon - stuff that would be a real pain to schlepp round individual farms each week, or to a different farmers market each week, which are 25 miles from work, and always on week days! Flour comes from Wessex (who are brilliant) I'm fortunate to have some flexibility in my day (I work partly in the community) and can usually arrange to call into a small town for bits and pieces like batteries, a clothes brush, firelighters, frozen chips and kidney beans (the current list, in case you think we live on kidney beans and ships) the key is to be organised and not run out, otherwise you will need to make special trips for things and end up in the supermarket because it's open and you can park fast.

we're good for storage these days, but in our last house various trays of tins lived under the bed, flour in the spare room, lightbulbs in the porch and various bits and pieces in the space around the bath!

If you don't count costco (and I really must find a proper wholefood wholesaler - what should I look in yellow pages for, d'you suppose?) then I can't think of much I do go to supermakets for these days. Budgens is our local one, and is quite good, so I generally go there for sausage casserole mix (himself's favourite) local lamb (to support demand for it) and anything special or seasonal like seville oranges or christmas cake ingridients. Waitrose for lazy chilli (can never seem to grow enough) and fever tree tonic (tonic again!)

Helen_A

Joined: 26 Jan 2005
Posts: 1548
Location: MK, Bucks.

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 09 11:14 pm Post subject:

As you are in 'the west' the people you could talk to wrt big ordering are Essential Trading in Bristol ( www.essential-trading.coop ). Similar to Rainbow (but been around a lot longer) and used to dealing with buying groups and the like (although they technically only sell to trade, but a lot of people selling through Country Markets and the like accross the west country use them as well and they also supply https://www.keynshamfood.coop.datacomms.biz/ which is the sort of thing you could look into for your area), plus they too have a smaller order if you are going to cash and carry it.

They are very nice

Mrs Fiddlesticks

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 10460

Posted: Mon Jan 26, 09 7:48 am Post subject:

lettucewoman wrote:

if you could buy just a few things in bulk it would in the long run save you money I'm sure.

Space wise a 5kg bag of rice or oats is about the size of a cushion so will easily tuck under a spare bed. A 10kg bag of flour is pillow sized at a guess- it fits quite well in to one of those plastic storage crates (which keeps the mess to a minimum).

Bugs and WW are right about being able to tuck things in odd corners like cans of oil or loo roll.

I'd not write off bulk buying as a whole as splitting an order with someone else to get around the minimum order quantity and so that you're not overwhelmed with stuff to find space for, mightstill be an option

nats

Joined: 12 Jun 2007
Posts: 2374
Location: Swindon but not a Swindonian

Posted: Mon Jan 26, 09 6:36 pm Post subject:
Does anyone know if Suma or Infinity will supply people living in Swindon itself??

Mrs Fiddlesticks

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 10460

Posted: Mon Jan 26, 09 6:49 pm Post subject:

nats wrote:

Does anyone know if Suma or Infinity will supply people living in Swindon itself??

you'd have to ask them. You might be out of Infinity's area - I think I'm just about on the edge but do ask

Brownbear

Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 14929
Location: South West

Posted: Mon May 04, 09 6:47 pm Post subject:
Find your local Indian/Pakistani run food shop. If they haven't got it they'll get it. Also a great place for fags, lottery cards, industrial cider (makes great paint stripper) and really rubbish girlie mags full of old photos taken in the 1970s.

lorna

Joined: 09 Apr 2009
Posts: 3

Posted: Tue May 05, 09 5:20 pm Post subject:
Were do you live are there no other shops besides sainsburys? I live ina town so its easy for me to shop around but i do prefer the little shops to the supermarkets,theres a deli world just opened up and he sells large packets of spices for indian and chinese food and alot cheaper than the market in the high street,have you anywere like this? lorna.

Effie

Joined: 16 Nov 2008
Posts: 1087

Posted: Tue May 05, 09 5:39 pm Post subject:

lettucewoman wrote:

I don't think you're that far from me are you? I shall be moving from the teeny flat to an actual house. Not having looked *in* it yet, I don't know the inner dimensions but there is a large cupboard in the porch which shrieks to me as potential flour/rice/tin store. I need to do a large order of stuff when I move as I've deliberately run down stocks of everything. If you want portions of sack/packs of stuff let me know and you can just take a managable amount of my larger ones. I'm sure it'd still work out cheaper than buying things in smaller sizes?

ninat

Joined: 01 Feb 2009
Posts: 606
Location: Scotland

Posted: Sat Aug 01, 09 3:22 pm Post subject:
We have this. https://www.highlandwholefoods.co.uk/index.asp?pageid=86083 Their own band cereal is fantastic. I haven't been that often but I need to go and check them out again.

Silas

Joined: 29 Oct 2004
Posts: 6848
Location: Staffordshire

Posted: Sat Aug 01, 09 3:30 pm Post subject:
You're all bleedin' mad. Supermarkets are great!

frewen

Joined: 08 Sep 2005
Posts: 11405

Posted: Sat Aug 01, 09 3:31 pm Post subject:
Oh you are a card!

AnnaC

Joined: 01 Aug 2010
Posts: 10
Location: Newbury

Posted: Tue Aug 03, 10 6:00 pm Post subject:

I love Wessex Mills flour (and am lucky to live a 10 minute drive from Wantage), I just wish that they're mill shop was open on a Saturday. I can only buy flour there when my mum comes down to see me, as I send her there while I'm stuck at work. It is also sold in some of the local deli's but at quite a mark up.

I do miss the variety of goods I could easily get my hands on in Edinburgh (particularly spices), but at the same time we're spoiled for local produce around here in West Berkshire.

I do feel that the farmer's market here could be bigger considering the local population, but then this area is also served by a variety of planet-sized supermarkets.

So yes...Wessex Mill flour....makes for tasty bread. I made a beautiful apple and cinnamon loaf from their flour. I sulked for days as my dog also agreed that it was good and ate the lot when my back was turned.

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