In case you needed any more reminding about just how expensive things are in the UK
It won’t have escaped your attention that the price of pretty much everything has soared as we live through a cost of living crisis.
One of the main ways you’ve probably noticed this is in your weekly food shop, with inflation causing prices of food in supermarkets to rise significantly.
Everyone’s looking for ways to save money, but here’s one you probably haven’t thought of: flying to Poland to do your food shop.
This is exactly what YouTubers Josh Pieters and Archie Manners did, to see if they could actually save money by flying across Europe for their groceries.
Poland is one of the cheapest countries to fly to from the UK, and the only supermarket chain that has stores in both nations is Lidl.
So, after choosing the destination and the supermarket, it was time to put the experiment to the test.
To work out if it was cheaper, the two mates purchased all 135 items from the government’s basket of goods. This is a list made up of everyday items which the government uses to calculate the cost of living.
The total cost of all these items in the British Lidl was £164.47.
After bagging RyanAir flights to Poznan for £47 and spending £8.55 on a bedsit, the lads bought the same list of items at a Lidl in Poland.
Here, the same shop came to just £96.75. So, even with the cost of flights and accommodation, the pair managed to save £67.72.
Speaking to the Sun about their unique cost of living experiment, Pieters said: “We were seeing how expensive everything has become in the UK.
“I went out the other day for a coffee and paid £4 for a flat white, which just seemed jaw-dropping to me.
“Archie had the idea of taking that crisis we are in and seeing how expensive everything is, combining the fact that in this weird world we live in, you can fly across Europe very cheap.
“It was just an experiment which turned out to be true by a factor of £11.
“Actually, the hardest part of it was making sure we got exactly the same products. Amazingly all but two made it back, including the eggs. Obviously we aren’t solving the cost of living crisis but we thought it was an excellent way to highlight how ludicrous things have gotten in an entertaining way.”
Former Tory Party activist Manners – who admits in the video that he’s never actually been to a Lidl before – said: “It’s obviously nuts and nobody would do it, but it’s proving the point.
“Things like olive oil over here are more expensive than petrol so I’m still using the bottle we brought back.”
Related links:
Tyson Fury reveals he gets stick for shopping in Aldi and Lidl
UK supermarket chain ditches self-checkout tills
