Supermarkets discussion

[Peter Mugridge]

Could you not just do a bigger shop less often ( obviously not for the perishables bit ) so as to take advantage of the discount anyway?

 

[SteveM70]

If you ignore them for a while they generally come back with a better set of offers

 

[jon81uk]

Just received a Nectar mailing with money-off tokens for the next few weeks. The ones just finished were for £9.00 off a £60.00 total shop at Sainsburys, but the new ones are for £9.00 off a £80.00 total shop.

Those vouchers are to try and tempt you into spending a little bit more, so if you are already spending £60 often, now they want to get you to spend £80. Drop down to a £40 spend for a few months and you might get the £60 threashold spend voucher again.

 

[Hadders]

Just received a Nectar mailing with money-off tokens for the next few weeks. The ones just finished were for £9.00 off a £60.00 total shop at Sainsburys, but the new ones are for £9.00 off a £80.00 total shop.

Since I live on my own and use one voucher per month, why should I need to spend an extra £20.00? The vouchers were all fed into my cross-cut shredder.

The idea of these sort of offers is to get you to spend more. There’s no point in giving someone who usually spends £60 a discount.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Those vouchers are to try and tempt you into spending a little bit more, so if you are already spending £60 often, now they want to get you to spend £80. Drop down to a £40 spend for a few months and you might get the £60 threashold spend voucher again.

As I said in my posting, I live on my own and have only ever used one voucher in any month.

 

[johnnychips]

Nectar points are useless. I’ve had the app for about six months and been doing occasional shops in Sainsbury’s of up to £10 about three times a week and accrued a grand total of £3.33 in credit.

However, there are sometimes great bargains to be had for Nectar users. I had to do some baking and Stork margarine was 40p off; apples £1.20 not £1.70 and several similar things that I was going to buy anyway, but they were cheaper.

 

[Bald Rick]

Nectar points are useless. I’ve had the app for about six months and been doing occasional shops in Sainsbury’s of up to £10 about three times a week and accrued a grand total of £3.33 in credit.

well you’re not spending much. I’ve got about £200 worth.

 

[Hadders]

Nectar points are useless. I’ve had the app for about six months and been doing occasional shops in Sainsbury’s of up to £10 about three times a week and accrued a grand total of £3.33 in credit.

However, there are sometimes great bargains to be had for Nectar users. I had to do some baking and Stork margarine was 40p off; apples £1.20 not £1.70 and several similar things that I was going to buy anyway, but they were cheaper.

The way to accrue Nectar points is to use the personalised Nectar bonus points that appear in your app every week, they're usually for items you buy regularly. Save the offers when they appear in the app and you'll collect the bonus points if you buy the item.

I collect between 500 and 1,000 points every week doing this.

well you’re not spending much. I’ve got about £200 worth.

A pifling £200.... I converted all my Nectar points to Avios in an offer they ran a couple of weeks ago where there was a 25% uplift in the normal conversion rate. I had sufficient Avios for 2 reward flights to Johannesburg.

 

[Bald Rick]

A pifling £200.... I converted all my Nectar points to Avios in an offer they ran a couple of weeks ago where there was a 25% uplift in the normal conversion rate. I had sufficient Avios for 2 reward flights to Johannesburg.

I should have said, that £200 is after Mrs BR has had an Argos-fest

 

[ABB125]

I collect between 500 and 1,000 points every week doing this.

How do you manage that? I generally can't get more than around 200 bonus points in a given week, due to either not needing/wanting stuff that's offered, or many of the offers only being for 10 points or something

 

[ChrisC]

How do you manage that? I generally can't get more than around 200 bonus points in a given week, due to either not needing/wanting stuff that's offered, or many of the offers only being for 10 points or something

I’ve found that when they are mainly only giving me offers of 10 points on items I don’t shop at Sainsbury’s for a good few weeks and the offers begin to improve. The points offers are all for things that I buy regularly and I can easily get elsewhere. After about 2 months of not shopping at Sainsbury‘s my weekly offers have risen to amounts of up to 80 points on many items. Over the years I’ve found that there are a number of ways that you can play the system to get better offers.

 

[Hadders]

How do you manage that? I generally can't get more than around 200 bonus points in a given week, due to either not needing/wanting stuff that's offered, or many of the offers only being for 10 points or something

20 Bonus Nectar offers landed in my app this morning, if I were to buy all 20 I’d get 940 points.

I won’t need to buy all of them but I’ll probably buy enough of them to get 700-800 points.

The offers are personalised, generally own brand items that I’ve bought on the past.

 

[ABB125]

I’ve found that when they are mainly only giving me offers of 10 points on items I don’t shop at Sainsbury’s for a good few weeks and the offers begin to improve. The points offers are all for things that I buy regularly and I can easily get elsewhere. After about 2 months of not shopping at Sainsbury‘s my weekly offers have risen to amounts of up to 80 points on many items. Over the years I’ve found that there are a number of ways that you can play the system to get better offers.

I do play the system to an extent, but I could probably do better!

20 Bonus Nectar offers landed in my app this morning, if I were to buy all 20 I’d get 940 points.

I won’t need to buy all of them but I’ll probably buy enough of them to get 700-800 points.

The offers are personalised, generally own brand items that I’ve bought on the past.

I've just had a look, I have around 500 bonus points available, but around half are things I'm not interested in (which are there because occasionally my Nectar account is used when my parents buy things from Sainsbury's. The downside of occasionally getting extra points for shopping that isn't mine!).

The downside of using the bonus points is that I then don't get any "thanks for shopping, tap here to see if you've won any bonus points" extra points (which are an almost certainty, ranging from 5 to 40 extra points each time I buy under ~£12 worth of stuff). I do try to, several times a week, buy one or two items from a more convenient Sainsbury's Local, just to get these extra bonus points! Only items which are on offer and/or are no more expensive than the bigger shop.

 

[johnnychips]

I have noted your tips with interest!

 

[miklcct]

Could you not just do a bigger shop less often ( obviously not for the perishables bit ) so as to take advantage of the discount anyway?

I have just received a coupon at Sainsbury's but unfortunately I made a big shop recently at Tesco a while ago already and making up the £30 in non-perishables is too much for my cupboard, and the specific non-perishable no-frill Aldi-match item I needed to buy was out of stock when I attempted to make up the account and I eventually ended up leaving the shop with £20

If your bill is £5 short the weight to make them up in spaghetti is about 10 kg. If you want to make them up in shampoo, shower gel and toothpaste, it will last years.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

I have just received a coupon at Sainsbury's but unfortunately I made a big shop recently at Tesco a while ago already and making up the £30 in non-perishables is too much for my cupboard, and the specific non-perishable no-frill Aldi-match item I needed to buy was out of stock when I attempted to make up the account and I eventually ended up leaving the shop with £20

If your bill is £5 short the weight to make them up in spaghetti is about 10 kg. If you want to make them up in shampoo, shower gel and toothpaste, it will last years.

If you just need £5 to trigger a big discount, get something like a steak or a large bar of chocolate? Neither weigh a lot, or take up much space, and are likely to be consumed rather quickly.

I've become quite adept at playing the Tesco voucher and double points system... then again, most of the time I'm feeding five so I can easily arrange the timing of my big shops ( roughly once a month, around £300(!) a time ) and smaller top up shops in between so that I get double points on my bigger shops.

 

[miklcct]

If you just need £5 to trigger a big discount, get something like a steak or a large bar of chocolate? Neither weigh a lot, or take up much space, and are likely to be consumed rather quickly.

I've become quite adept at playing the Tesco voucher and double points system... then again, most of the time I'm feeding five so I can easily arrange the timing of my big shops ( roughly once a month, around £300(!) a time ) and smaller top up shops in between so that I get double points on my bigger shops.

I don't eat chocolate. Steak is something perishable and if I do a large shop in a supermarket it already comes with a week worth of perishables worth about £15 to £20.

The only supermarket within walking distance in my home is a Sainsbury's however I still need to make some effort to get to £30, especially that my refrigerator doesn't even have a freezer @#*& so I can't store frozen stir frys or pizzas.

 

[Peter Sarf]

As I said in my posting, I live on my own and have only ever used one voucher in any month.

Play the system.

Ideally have tow favoured supermarket chains - one Sainsbury the other Tescos (for example). Switch from one to the other when the offers get poor. Then switch back when they tempt you. It depends how accessible alternative chains are.

Nectar points are useless. I’ve had the app for about six months and been doing occasional shops in Sainsbury’s of up to £10 about three times a week and accrued a grand total of £3.33 in credit.

However, there are sometimes great bargains to be had for Nectar users. I had to do some baking and Stork margarine was 40p off; apples £1.20 not £1.70 and several similar things that I was going to buy anyway, but they were cheaper.

But always be aware that a fantastic reduction for Necter or Tesco club card can just mean the price is brought back down to a more normal price. Some items have an exorbitant standard price.

I have seen the same with buy one get one free where Tesco had what I wanted on a buy one get one free offer but were within 1p of twice the price of the same item at Morrisons.

Most of my vouchers for Morrisons are useless because they do not apply to already reduced items. I like to peruse the near dated items as these can be 75% off !. We go quite regularly on foot so buy little and often on near dated perishables.

For beer (ale) Morrisons come up trumps at £1 per bottle periodically - long dated so I stock up (and hide them from others). Even Morrisons' standard prices on ale make the competition not worth checking.

 

[jon81uk]

But always be aware that a fantastic reduction for Necter or Tesco club card can just mean the price is brought back down to a more normal price. Some items have an exorbitant standard price.

Also a lot of the offers are cyclical and they will go from the offer price and back to full price every two or three months. This was true before the supermarkets made the offers for loyalty card holders only.

For example the New Covent Garden soups are currrently £1.25 in Sainsbury's down from £2. This offer happens every few months at both Tesco and Sainsbury's.
Ginsters pasty is often £1.25 down from £2 and then next month it will be the Ginsters slices at £1.25, then back to the pasty being on offer, they just seem to alternate different items being on offer.

 

[317 forever]

You have to be careful with some of the offers on the Nectar app as it can become quite addictive (I suppose that’s the point of it, to get you to spend more money), but as long as you’re clever and only buy things with long / no expiry dates, it should still work in your favour. Sometimes you just need to stop buying things and the vouchers stop after a couple of weeks. Back in 2022 I was getting offers almost every week for 4 pack of baked beans that made them almost half price. In the end I just had to stop buying them because I had so many in and despite not having bought any in over two years I’m now down to my final single tin in the cupboard!

That happens to me sometimes. I might get extra points of Carbonara sauce having just had some, but not feel like any more so soon after.

Or, because I bought tea bags I get points off tea bags soon after - long before I would even have used many that I had just purchased.

 

[david1212]

That happens to me sometimes. I might get extra points of Carbonara sauce having just had some, but not feel like any more so soon after.

Or, because I bought tea bags I get points off tea bags soon after - long before I would even have used many that I had just purchased.

If the monitoring of purchases was smarter instead of giving points soon after a purchase they would do it slightly ahead of the next likely purchase so you buy from that store rather than another who might have a better price or offer.

 

[Baxenden Bank]

If the monitoring of purchases was smarter instead of giving points soon after a purchase they would do it slightly ahead of the next likely purchase so you buy from that store rather than another who might have a better price or offer.

Given the data collected through loyalty cards, they really ought to be able to work out how long it takes each individual customer to get through a box of 210 teabags or bottle of shampoo. Then tailor offers accordingly. As you say, just when the customer is running out and about to buy another. What is the point of collecting all that data otherwise?

Using Sainsbury's / Nectar I bought an XL box of washing powder, it will last four or five months. When did I get the discount, the next time I did a Sainsbury's shop.

 

[Mojo]

Given the data collected through loyalty cards, they really ought to be able to work out how long it takes each individual customer to get through a box of 210 teabags or bottle of shampoo. Then tailor offers accordingly. As you say, just when the customer is running out and about to buy another. What is the point of collecting all that data otherwise?

Using Sainsbury's / Nectar I bought an XL box of washing powder, it will last four or five months. When did I get the discount, the next time I did a Sainsbury's shop.

Being cynical, surely the objective is to get customers to purchase things they don’t need, and to get people to pay as much as possible for things that they do.

 

[SteveM70]

Given the data collected through loyalty cards, they really ought to be able to work out how long it takes each individual customer to get through a box of 210 teabags or bottle of shampoo. Then tailor offers accordingly. As you say, just when the customer is running out and about to buy another. What is the point of collecting all that data otherwise?

Using Sainsbury's / Nectar I bought an XL box of washing powder, it will last four or five months. When did I get the discount, the next time I did a Sainsbury's shop.

That's possibly true for things that the average person only ever uses one of, like washing powder, but the majority of things they promote and that you use are doing so in competition with others, and they want their stuff to be a bigger share of your consumption.

And yes, that can mean shifted purchases from other products of theirs to the promoted one, but there are often supplier funding deals in play too

 

[317 forever]

If the monitoring of purchases was smarter instead of giving points soon after a purchase they would do it slightly ahead of the next likely purchase so you buy from that store rather than another who might have a better price or offer.

I welcome your understanding here.

Something else we may need to watch out for. There can be prices advertised at the shelf as discounted for Nectar card holders. The Carbonara example came up today. I saw it discounted for Nectar card holders today so purchased it there and then. I knew I would consume it before the use-by date. Had I waited until I was promised extra Nectar points on it, I might have missed the passing Nectar card discount, making it less cost effective even allowing for bonus Nectar points.

 

[Mojo]

Just had a thought earlier. A Sainsbury’s branch I regularly use is having a refurbishment so they have removed the scales that you use with Smartshop. The way to scan items that aren’t accepted on the scanners, is to download your shop and then scan them. But by that point you would know if you have been selected for a check. So surely if people go around deliberately not scanning items so they can steal them - people would point out at this stage to the checkout staff that they wouldn’t scan - thus defeating the point?

 

[Bald Rick]

Just had a thought earlier. A Sainsbury’s branch I regularly use is having a refurbishment so they have removed the scales that you use with Smartshop. The way to scan items that aren’t accepted on the scanners, is to download your shop and then scan them. But by that point you would know if you have been selected for a check. So surely if people go around deliberately not scanning items so they can steal them - people would point out at this stage to the checkout staff that they wouldn’t scan - thus defeating the point?

I have had that happen, but in different circumstances.

For some reason the barcode printed for Broccoli will rarely scan on my phone (it works with every other fruit and veg I have to self weigh), and I have to scan it at the till. Having being pulled up twice now on the checks for other matters (both unintentional errors, one my fault, one not), I am currently on the naughty step and get checked about every 2/3 shops. Last time I was called for a check I told the guy straight away that I needed to scan the Broccoli as it wouldn’t work, and he gave me a knowing look and waved his hand in a gesture that I took to mean “our fault, you keep it”.

 

[ABB125]

Sainsbury's seem to have fixed their reduced item barcode problem. I didn't have any issues earlier this week.
I did notice one item where the reduced barcode had been stuck on without covering the normal one - presumably someone who just forgot that the problem was fixed?

 

[takno]

Sainsbury's seem to have fixed their reduced item barcode problem. I didn't have any issues earlier this week.
I did notice one item where the reduced barcode had been stuck on without covering the normal one - presumably someone who just forgot that the problem was fixed?

I was told they'd just reenabled the barcodes for items where the reduced price was over a pound, so potentially not everything.

In terms of not covering the original barcode, my local Sainsbury's has always been awful at that anyway, like possibly the manager doing the training couldn't understand that they needed to cover it vertically rather than horizontally

 

[lookapigeon]

Just had a thought earlier. A Sainsbury’s branch I regularly use is having a refurbishment so they have removed the scales that you use with Smartshop. The way to scan items that aren’t accepted on the scanners, is to download your shop and then scan them. But by that point you would know if you have been selected for a check. So surely if people go around deliberately not scanning items so they can steal them - people would point out at this stage to the checkout staff that they wouldn’t scan - thus defeating the point?

Probably because the label printer is always knackered - I have rarely seen one working properly that hasn't been broke by shoppers or staff and is jammed.

It also does beg the question of how hard is it for people to just WAIT for the label to come out and once it has stopped printing, remove it, it won't get jammed then. But most people try and pull it off as it is printing, thus meaning the machine gets jammed.