How much should a single person spend on a food a week?

[Windra 10]

My partner and I spend between £80-100 per week, but we don't eat out we take lunches to work.

 

Most of the cost is vegetables and lean meat or fish, we eat 5-10 fruit/veg/salad items a day and that all adds up. We have cut down by about £10 a week by not buying chicken very much now and I eat alot of veggie meals.

 

When I was a student I could live off of about £25 a week eating lots of bread,pasta and cheap foods like chips and sausages but in no way was that healthy.

 

I'm not sure in the present day its possible to eat healthily and on fresh produce from the supermarket on a reasonable budget!

[Cyclone 10]

If you know what you are doing £7 a week is easy! …. £7 a week keep me at just over 13 and half stone. …. God £40 a week…. I could feed a family of 6 on that if you know what you are doing. P.S sorry … just want to say am not fat… am 6,2 and great build.! Its all about putting the right **** into your body

 

---------- Post added 14-11-2013 at 01:59 ----------

 

 

Mr hover, just to let you know pedanted is not a word

 

Yes, it's a neologism.

 

---------- Post added 20-11-2013 at 07:36 ----------

 

Well, maybe you should have exercised your brain and performed some simple, elementary arithmetic then you wouldn't find it 'staggering'.

 

Kitchen/cleaning products:

Clothes detergents and conditioner: £5/mnth

Washing-up liquid: £1/mnth (this is a somewhat conservative figure, and based on one bottle a month bought on offer)

Kitchen roll: £2/mnth

Wipes: £2/mnth

Other: £1/mnth (bleach etc)

Dishwasher powder: £2/mnth

What are you doing with all this stuff, poring it down the drain?

You use a bottle of washing up liquid, and £2 worth of dish washing powder a month.

 

Sanitary and medication:

Shower gel: £2/mnth

Toothpaste: £2/mnth

Mouthwash: £1.5/mnth

Floss: £0.50/mnth

Hair: £2/mnth (and this is just the cheap stuff for me, the wife uses stupidly expensive stuff from the hairdressers)

Toilet roll: £5/mnth

Painkillers: £2/mnth

Indigestion tablets: £4/mnth

Eating the toothpaste I assume?

 

For non-food items we are already upto £32/mnth, or just over £1/day.

 

Then we have booze at 3-4 bottles of wine a week, call it £20/wk or £86.67 a month or £2.79 a day.

So this should actually be taken out of the figures.

 

This leaves us with £9-£12/day between us or £4.50 to £6 each.

Using yesterday as an example:

Weekday Breakfast (cereal): £0.20 each (weekend breakfast is more because bacon)

Lunch (ham, cheese and pickle sandwich, yoghurt and banana): £2 each

Tea (home made chicken pie and veg): £2 each

Pudding (strawberries and cream): £0.5 each (and that's conservative, probably more like £1 each given the price of strawberries)

Other misc: £0.2 each

Total: £4.90 each, so already overspend on the lower end of the scale (£400/mnth), and dipping into the excess of a £500/mnth spend which should really be going on more elaborate meals for the weekend..

 

jb

 

Based on your figures, it's impossible for someone on the average income to actually afford to eat.

[Doom 10]

The Mrs and myself put £25 each into our weekly shop at Morrisons.

 

I do buy the odd curry for myself and the milk is delivered separately, so I'd guess it's about £60 in total, but that does also include cleaning products, toilet rolls and the various other things people buy from supermarkets.

 

They were talking on Radio Sheffield this morning about a new super cheap supermarket/shop opening in Goldthorpe shortly. I guess it's a bit like the Company Shop in Tankersley, where they get stuff discarded by the other supermarkets cheap and sell it on for a lot less than the original asking price.

 

Toby Foster was questioning someone from a money lending shop across the road about this and she said in a lot of cases the reason they couldn't afford food was because their income had gone on alcohol and gambling.

 

Now I'm not being funny, but if people are getting cheap food not because they don't have the funds to buy from supermarkets, but because they're gambling/boozing away their dole then that's not on.

 

We often hear that the austerity measures are responsible for people needing food banks, but I do wonder how many of them can still afford cigarettes, booze, gambling before they spend their money on food.

 

By the way that's not to say some people aren't struggling, because I've no doubt they are, but I bet there's plenty of cases where they bring it on themselves and then expect society to help them out.

 

Regards

 

Doom

[barleycorn 10]

What are you doing with all this stuff, poring it down the drain?

They are cleaning products so yes, ultimately that is where they are going

You use a bottle of washing up liquid, and £2 worth of dish washing powder a month.

Well yes. I like to eat off clean plates, drink from clean cups and cook in clean pans.

Eating the toothpaste I assume?

A small amount does get swallowed but generally that's not its purpose. Yet again you haven't bothered to do the maths.

On average 1.15ml of toothpaste is used per brush so out of a 100ml tube you will get approx 84 uses. At 2-3 brushes a day for two people that's approx 150 uses per month, so around two tubes of toothpaste. So around £2.00. What do you do? Brush your teeth with coal dust?

http://www.colgatesensitiveprorelief.com.sg/faq

So this should actually be taken out of the figures.

Why, if you look back at my original post which you found 'staggering' I quite clearly wrote:

We spend somewhere in the region of £400 to £500 a month, for two of us, but that does include cleaning products, sanitary stuff etc and booze.

Based on your figures, it's impossible for someone on the average income to actually afford to eat.

Really? Average income is £26K. That's a take home pay of ~£1700/mnth. Making reasonable deductions for rent etc just for a single person living alone:

Rent/Mortgage: £600

Gas/Electricity: £110

Council tax: £100

Water: £15

TV Licence: £12

Travel: £200

Total: £1037

Leaving £640 to spend on food/booze. Remember my breakdown was for a couple so even taking the top end that's only £250/mnth leaving ~£400/mnth to blow on whatever they like.

 

jb

[Cyclone 10]

I still find it staggering. You spend a fortune on food, booze and cleaning products and are trying very hard to justify it because I've said that I think it's a large amount.

 

You seem quite upset by the fact that I think you spend a lot, I don't know why that is, but it's really not necessary.

 

If you compare yourself with everyone else that has posted though, you seem to be spending over twice as much.

 

I just did a quick check to be sure that I wasn't fooling myself, the last full month (ie Oct), my joint account says that I spent £215 in supermarkets, that's for a couple of course. Which is about what I expected since the budget is supposed to be £200.

 

So it would be possible on an average income, although I suspect that you've missed out a lot of payments that many people have to make.

How about on minimum wage, or for a family with a single income? Do they starve?

Edited November 20, 2013 by Cyclone

[Doom 10]

If you compare yourself with everyone else that has posted though, you seem to be spending over twice as much.

 

That's probably why they need to spend £4/month on indigestion tablets.

 

Regards

 

Doom

[barleycorn 10]

I still find it staggering. You spend a fortune on food, booze and cleaning products and are trying very hard to justify it because I've said that I think it's a large amount.

I haven't attempted to justify anything. I have simply provided a couple of sample breakdowns of costs.

You seem quite upset by the fact that I think you spend a lot, I don't know why that is, but it's really not necessary.

You'll have to point of the parts of my posts where I have expressed upset. I'm quite happy with the amount I spend, if I wasn't I'd spend less.

If you compare yourself with everyone else that has posted though, you seem to be spending over twice as much.

.

I think not.

My partner and I spend between £80-100 per week, but we don't eat out we take lunches to work.

 

Most of the cost is vegetables and lean meat or fish, we eat 5-10 fruit/veg/salad items a day and that all adds up. We have cut down by about £10 a week by not buying chicken very much now and I eat alot of veggie meals.

And that's not evening mentioning booze.

So it would be possible on an average income, although I suspect that you've missed out a lot of payments that many people have to make.

How about on minimum wage, or for a family with a single income? Do they starve?

Where did I say that it couldn't be done cheaper?

 

jb

 

---------- Post added 20-11-2013 at 11:49 ----------

 

That's probably why they need to spend £4/month on indigestion tablets.

 

Regards

 

Doom

 

The wife is pregnant and has had more or less constant indigestion for the last several months. I also suffer from a gastro-oesophageal reflux disorder.

 

jb

[Doom 10]

The wife is pregnant and has had more or less constant indigestion for the last several months. I also suffer from a gastro-oesophageal reflux disorder.

 

jb

 

So your wife is eating for two? - That explains the large food bills...Peanut butter and marmite on toast.

 

Regards

 

Doom

[Cyclone 10]

The tone of your responses appears to be defensive and upset. That's just how they come across. I didn't suggest that you were upset with the amount you spend.

 

You dispute that you are spending twice what most people do?

[barleycorn 10]

The tone of your responses appears to be defensive and upset. That's just how they come across. I didn't suggest that you were upset with the amount you spend.

 

You dispute that you are spending twice what most people do?

 

I have no idea what most people spend. Do you?

 

jb

[Agent Orange 11]

When I lived alone I used to spend around £25-30 per week on food. I used to bulk cook and I believe that was the key to keeping the costs down.

[foxforcefive 10]

I used to spend about £150 per week for me and 2 kids - this was about 3 years ago.

 

Now, I wouldn't like to guess, cos there are 5 of us and I don't do all the shopping, nor is it done all in one go.

 

I would probably cry if I totted it all up cos I could probably buy more shoes if I budgeted properly