Supermarket price tags could be causing shoppers to spend more. A report by The Sunday Times found labels across hundreds of products at Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda and Morrisons lacked clarity causing confusion.
The survey found cases where buying in bulk is a false economy, with smaller pack sizes costing less per unit than bigger or family-size packs. Furthermore, it is far from the case that buying fresh produce loose is cheaper due to the amount of variations between products and stores.
The research found that it was often difficult to compare prices when packaged produce gave a per unit price but the loose produce gave a per kilo price. Other labelling could be confusing with oils priced per 100ml and others priced per litre in Morrisons.
Dozens of loose and packed fruit and vegetables were compared. In nearly a third of cases, packaged produce was cheaper, including peppers in Tesco, limes in Asda and apples in Sainsbury’s.
Across the four stores, loose produce was cheaper half the time. However, in one of the stores visited – Asda in Stamford Hill, London – there were no weighing scales, making it almost impossible to accurately compare.
In Tesco, Granny Smith apples were 37 per cent cheaper in plastic packs of five, and onions were 6 per cent more expensive in 1kg bags. The biggest single variation was in Sainsbury’s, where onions were 68 per cent cheaper loose than in packets of three,
In Asda, limes were cheaper packed but peppers cost less if bought loose. The only store that was consistent was Morrisons, where it was always cheaper to buy loose produce.
Morrisons declined to comment, while Tesco and Sainsbury’s said packaged products often had a different specification to loose products. Asda said that the Stamford Hill store was one of its smaller ones, which is why there were no scales available.
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