Lidl > Waitrose -All your Shopper are belong to us

[Top_gun]

That's because you haven't offered any, you have just given an opinion, which is perfectly valid. But as its a subjective opinion that is based on your taste buds, its not really worth comment.

No it's not just a personal opinion as the information comes from trade magazines and press releases. You only believe it's an opinion because you didn't have the prerequisite knowledge in the first place.

SeriousSam's comment about the same mfr making own brand products to different recipes for different companies is well known and has featured on several documentaries about food production.

That is what we've been saying all along. Keep up. What you haven't fully accepted, and this is very old information, is that the premium own brand supermarkets are regarded as better quality than some of the leading brands.

[peterb]

No it's not just a personal opinion as the information comes from trade magazines and press releases. You only believe it's an opinion because you didn't have the prerequisite knowledge in the first place.

I treat Press Releases with some sceptiicism as they are almost invariably part of a PR or product advertising campaign. If they are released by the mfr or retailer, they are hardly an impartial source. Similar considerations apply to trade magazines which are not written with the consumer in mind.

What you haven't fully accepted, and this is very old information, is that the premium own brand supermarkets are regarded as better quality than some of the leading brands.

Ah, So you now regard SeriousSam's comments as valid? I fully accept that you think that some supermarket brands are 'better' - but as you haven't defined 'better' it is pretty meaningless. You might mean better value for money - ie cheaper for the same taste. You might think better taste - regardless of price (where taste is very subjective).

There certainly have been trials where a panel of consumers in double blind trials have preferred the taste of a supermarket own brandproduct - and those particular products may represent better value for maney - but it doesnt mean that all own brand products from a given supermarket are better for all people.

I certainly buy some own brand products when - after trying them - they offer a better (usually in terms of value for money) experience. In practice probably 75% of my weekly shop is supermarket own brand.

So I'm not exactly sure what your point is. Yes - some people may find some supermarket own brand products superior to well known branded products - hardly a revelation, more a statement of the blindingly obvious. But I certainly don't need a press release or a trade magazine to validate or justify my choice.

[Top_gun]

I treat Press Releases with some sceptiicism as they are almost invariably part of a PR or product advertising campaign. If they are released by the mfr or retailer, they are hardly an impartial source. Similar considerations apply to trade magazines which are not written with the consumer in mind.

Ah, So you now regard SeriousSam's comments as valid? I fully accept that you think that some supermarket brands are 'better' - but as you haven't defined 'better' it is pretty meaningless. You might mean better value for money - ie cheaper for the same taste. You might think better taste - regardless of price (where taste is very subjective).

There certainly have been trials where a panel of consumers in double blind trials have preferred the taste of a supermarket own brandproduct - and those particular products may represent better value for maney - but it doesnt mean that all own brand products from a given supermarket are better for all people.

I certainly buy some own brand products when - after trying them - they offer a better (usually in terms of value for money) experience. In practice probably 75% of my weekly shop is supermarket own brand.

So I'm not exactly sure what your point is. Yes - some people may find some supermarket own brand products superior to well known branded products - hardly a revelation, more a statement of the blindingly obvious. But I certainly don't need a press release or a trade magazine to validate or justify my choice.

I'm sorry if your knowledge is not up to date. I think I'm going to end it here and use my time productively by engaging with people who truly understands food and very passionate about it. Thank you very much.

PS amazingly, the thread size has doubled in the space of 24hours. I wonder why?

[peterb]

I'm sorry if your knowledge is not up to date. I think I'm going to end it here and use my time productively by engaging with people who truly understands food and very passionate about it. Thank you very much.

PS amazingly, the thread size has doubled in the space of 24hours. I wonder why?

Yes, probably best if you bow out now . But it was kind of you to condescend to help 'educate' us.

[Saracen]

I remember having a conversation with a fashion stylist who said 90 per cent of people are not very good at shopping after being a model for one of her students.

I also had a few issues with work colleagues asking where I buy my clothes from. My standard answer is from the shops but they got really agitated. The most fun came when I ramped up my spending on new clothes and saw my work colleagues' mouth foaming up each time I wore something new. I was also shocked when a woman stamped her stilettos into my shiny new trainers. So I guess watching other people's envy is confirmation that I'm a good shopper.

Still, it quite easy to slander someone as delusional on the internet and most people are willing to accept it on hearsay but honestly to describe me as delusional doesn't reflect me as a person in the real world.



This sounds like a clear case of confirmation bias to me after reading your post. It'll be interesting to see how you would get on during a blind test where you won't be able to see the branding to affect your judgement.

Years ago, I remember a shop called CM stores on the Kings Road in London who marked up their clothing by 100% and got away with it by convincing people they were paying for quality. So a t-shirt with a price tag of £80 would go for £160 in CM stores. I guess CM stores took advantage of their customer's confirmation bias. The same principal applies to M&S/Waitrose, people see the high prices, nice packaging and they immediately think they're paying for quality without knowing you can get exactly the same product cheaper somewhere else.

I've always bought stuff based on quality rather than brand name over long period of time. And I guess everything you buy is based on branding for example your Le Creuset dish even though there are better products out there.

Re: your taste in clothes .... erm, okay, whatever. Personally, I don't give a flying fig for fashion and avoid fashion brands on principle. I don't understand people (not suggesting it's you) thst spend £100 on a pair a fashion jeans when £5 in Asda gets some tgat do the same job.

BUT .... for those that do want £100 jeans, if that's what floats their boat, well .... it's their money to spend as they wish. If they feel better in expensive utility wear pretending to be fashion, then they do.

As for calling you delusional, I didn't. But it's okay for you to refer to, first, quote me, then refer to Waitrose shoppers as delusional, or snobs, or both, but slander when I throw exactlt the same "delusional" reference back at you, pre-faced by exactly the same "perhaps" that you used.


As for confirmation bias, that's rubbish. I have bought, for example, a given type of tinned tomato for years, not least because going back, there was only a limited range of options. Then, as an experiment, I tried a different type when they were on offer. The difference in taste was an eye-opener.

Similarly, marmalade .... there are dozens of variations and the one I like is what Mum used to make. I didn't say it was better, healthier or whatever, just that I like it. And that Wilkins and Sons product comes clost, by miles, to anything I've tried. On the other hand, the one I like is specifically "Tiptree Orange", but W& Sons make several other marmalades, which range from okay, to .... well, I tried one version once and threw the rest in the rubbish.

Oh, and I wasn't in Waitrose when I first got that Marmalade, and Waitrose don't do the tomatoes I really like, and so far, I haven't found them in ANY high street supermarket. Waitrose do do an acceptable second best though, that being Cirio peeled Italian plum tomatoes, which I get in whatever shop I happen to be in when there's an offer. For the convenience reasons stated earlier, that is most often Waitrose. Buying them in one of the periodic offers means they're actually slightly cheaper than Waitrose own brand. I could
try those own-brand ones, but at around 45p a tin, which does the wife and I two dwys worth of sauce, it works out at about 11p per person per meal, and any potential savings are so small that I don't care.


Blind taste tests? Okay, tell me how that's practical? Buy a jar of 20 different marmalades, make 20 slices of toast, get someone to spread 20 different marmalades without me knowing? And afterwards, what am I supposed to do with the other 19 jars? And what if the best flavour, for me, was in one of the several dozen ai didn't try? Do I have to blind test every marmalade available?

Or do I just accept that having been using various brands for sbout 30 years, the moment I tried Tiptree Orange I knew it was the best I'd had and I don't want anything else .... until/unless W&Sons mess with the recipe and lose the consistency. And that's branding .... I know what to expect.

....

I've always bought stuff based on quality rather than brand name over long period of time. And I guess everything you buy is based on branding for example your Le Creuset dish even though there are better products out there.

And here you go again, coming VERY close to getting yourself banned, and given yoyr history, next time it WILL be

.....

I've always bought stuff based on quality rather than brand name over long period of time. And I guess everything you buy is based on branding for example your Le Creuset dish even though there are better products out there.

Oh for pities sake. You can't help yoursrlf, can you? Or can you really jusf not see why you keep getting banned?

You buy "quality" but I'm an idiot that buys brands? You "guess"?

How dare you guess?

How do you know there's better out there? Do you have a selection of Le Creuset? In which case, were you buying quality or brand when you bought them?

For your information, I've bought pots rsnging from cheap, because I couldn't afford anything else at the time, through midrange, to high-end. Currently, my selection jncludes, yes, several LeCreuset pans, but there's also Tefal, Anolon, John Lewis .... oh, and a £15 no-name stock pot I got in Sainsburys last week, because I won't use it often and it's not worth paying £150 fir a peemium name.

But why buy Le Creuset at all? Several reasons ....

- many of those cheaper pans, including Tefal, don't last, in my experience.
- temperature hsndling, especially on non-stick.
- a lifetime warranty

Better products out there? Really? How do you know? Have you tested them all? Again, you bought LeCreuset, then?

I don't know if LeCreuset are the best. If you'd remembered some of the threads about pans, you'd know I'd ASKED about alterntives, including, for example, ceramic pans.

What I have found, based on my own exoerience, us that LeCreusef are good. Why did I buy in the first place? Because I did my research, read what I could find, and asked around of everybody ranging from on here, to a two-star Michelin chef if my acquaintance.

The result? As ever, I got differing opinions, presumably because people have different experiences, and perhaps different prejudices. But sooner or later, I had to pick something, and it was Le-C. Why? If the several makes it could gave been, it satisfied the sbove criteria, and the final puzzle piece was availability - I happen to live within striking distance of several stockists, including John Lewis whose cystomer service I rate very highly, and a LeCreuset shop, where I could inspect the range.

So did I buy on brand? Hell, no. I bought, in the first instance, on as thorough a job of research as I could, given that having tried cheaper pans that haven't lasted, this time I wanted qualuty pans that hopefully would. And, so far, I have no reason to be disappointed.

However, if you know of "better out there", at the same or preferably lower price, do tell, and I'll consider it next time I replace one of those cheaper pans, because what I value us exactly quality, even if it comes at a price, and certainly not brand. However, as with marmalade and tinned tomatoss, having found a brand of pot I'm happy with, I'll stick with it until given good reason to try something else.

See, one if my motivations is an easy life. I could get really anal about researching, in this case, pans and spend ages working on it. And do the same with everything I buy. We just bought a new lawnmower, and electric (battery) brushcutter/strimmer. The wife and I looked at all sorts, borrowed a couple from friends but eventually, we big the bullet and bought, because life's too short to spend too long researching garden tools .... or pots and pans.

So, pans .... what's "better", and based on what evidence?

[Saracen]

....

You might mean better value for money - ie cheaper for the same taste. You might think better taste - regardless of price (where taste is very subjective).

There certainly have been trials where a panel of consumers in double blind trials have preferred the taste of a supermarket own brandproduct - and those particular products may represent better value for maney - but it doesnt mean that all own brand products from a given supermarket are better for all people.

I certainly buy some own brand products when - after trying them - they offer a better (usually in terms of value for money) experience. In practice probably 75% of my weekly shop is supermarket own brand.

Exactly.

I saw a TV taste test on jams, and Asda won over half a dozen others. So .... I bought a jar of it. And, for good measure, a jar if Waitrose own-brand. For both, I got strawberry and raspberry, that being what we normally have. There was minimal price difference, each jar being about 70p.

My conclusion was that my usual £2 jar was better, but not by vdry much at all, and certsinly not three times the price worth of better. Also, the Asda was very minimally nicer than the Waitrose, but not by enough to care, and probably not enough to be able to tell which was which unless doing a side-by-side comparison.

So we buy the Waitrose one now. It's 70p (ish) not £2, and we csn get it with the rest of yhe shopping without having to go ckeaf across town, in the car, to Asda for the sake of about 5p.


My personal definition of "better" is a bit fluid, but is getting the right product for me at the right price.

Sometimes, quality is worth paying for. Food is a superb example, though it might be on the basis of taste, or of knowing what's in it. Or, both.

Another good sxample is shoes. As anyone that spends lots of time on their feet will know, comfortable, well-made supporting shoes make the world of difference.

But others will decide better or worse using their own value set.

[Zak33]

/tannoy voice

"Spillage in Aisle 4...repeat Spillage in Aisle 4
Staff code red
repeat Staff code red

Thank you"

[MLyons]

I'll leave this here

[Ttaskmaster]

No it's not just a personal opinion as the information comes from trade magazines and press releases. You only believe it's an opinion because you didn't have the prerequisite knowledge in the first place.

Being part of a large industry involving numerous companies worldwide and seeing both their and our own press releases and trade magazine articles, so knowing full well what the complete story is (I'm even cited in some of these, myself), I can tell you quite authoritatively that the vast majority of it is complete BS!!
It is just companies waving their willies around, going "look what we've done", while embellishing everything to the nines - They even got my job title so wrong, people thought I'd changed roles and moved up three levels!

What you haven't fully accepted, and this is very old information, is that the premium own brand supermarkets are regarded as better quality than some of the leading brands.

Can be... Can be better.
The one thing Tesco does well is vension sausages, better than all the other brands they stock and better than other own label ones, including Waitrose's... But that's the only thing I can think of and Waitrose also stock some brands that are better still, while none beat any of our local butchers' versions.

And no-one... but NO-ONE... makes a jaffa cake better than McVitties!!

[big_hairy_rob]

Exactly.
My personal definition of "better" is a bit fluid, but is getting the right product for me at the right price.

Can I just suggest amending that to "getting the right product, at the right price, right now"; as this signifies changing recipes, ingredient 'quality' (and taste buds) over time...

[big_hairy_rob]

And no-one... but NO-ONE... makes a jaffa cake better than McVitties!!

Sorry to say, but I had some from a local farmers market that were substantially superior (ignoring the substantial price difference)! However, against similar brands (supermarket etc.) then yes, you're probably right.

[shaithis]

Must say, based on this and a chat with my Mum last night, I popped into my local Aldi on the way home.....while the lack of choice was expected, what I did buy was a total bargain.....Angus ribeyes at £3-something, Nescafe Cappacinos for 59p (for when I haven't got my coffee machine at hand!), 500g minced beef for £2....

I ate one of the ribeyes last night and it was very nice, certainly well worth what I paid for it and then some.....

[Ttaskmaster]

Sorry to say, but I had some from a local farmers market that were substantially superior (ignoring the substantial price difference)!

Substantiation of argument required... send me some!!

I do find McV's JCs tend to be on insane offers, like a pack of 24 or even 48 for less money than 12 of any other brand.

[Zak33]

like your style people

thread utterly back on track

[adidan]

We've, for some reason, had a load of Waitrose vouchers so have shopped a bit there recently.

Honestly the fruit and veg has been some of the best we've had for ages, tried some of the farms that deliver boxes round here but they've been awful in comparison.

[peterb]

Waitrose own some farms in Hampshire so they grow some of their own produce. That, coupled wth a good distribution system means freshness.

Its worth remembering that John Lewis group (which owns Waitrose) is owned by the employees - they are all effectively shareholders, so it is quite an ethical business model.

https://www.theguardian.com/business...-model-lessons