To buy or not to buy, because it’s Christmas?

Supermarkets are cashing in on Christmas. So many of us at Christmas like to indulge in a few treats, why not? It’s Christmas, the one time of the year when an entire box of Quality Street can go in a day and no one seems to care. But that little bit of extra indulgence can end up costing us a fair few pennies.

It’s easily done, you’re walking round the supermarket with the Christmas music playing and thinking of all the lovely treats you will get Christmas day, when you spot a lovely looking Christmas hamper for sale, the beautifully presented box, lined with straw nestles the expensive looking crackers and chutneys, mince pies and maybe even a Christmas cake.

Beware though, if you price the items individually you will often find that what you paying for is the basket. Try looking at the items as if they were in your trolley, would you really think they were that much of a bargain if it wasn’t for the nice box?

But we do this on any amount of Christmas items, the port and cheese sets are exactly the same. With good quality port going on sale this time of year, half price at about £7 and the addition of a nice bit of blue cheese from the deli counter might bump that up to about £10, and yet half size bottles of port and cheese are being sold for that, meaning you get half as much port for the same amount of money. It might be just me but given the choice I would rather have the extra port than the fancy box.

There is always the temptation at Christmas to spend extra money with the excuse in our head “well it’s Christmas” and for some of us the expectation of what we should be doing outweighs what we actually want to do. Sprouts are a classic example. The nation seems to be split into those who would eat them all year round, and those who only eat them at Christmas… WHY? If you don’t like sprouts, don’t buy them. Why waste your money on something that you don’t like and then force yourself to eat them “because it’s Christmas?” Save the pennies and the unfortunate side effects of eating them and leave them off your shopping list if you don’t like them. The same for the Christmas pudding or mince pies, nobody likes them in our house so I don’t buy them and was surprised when I was accused of being a bah humbug last year when they did not go in the trollies, I asked my husband if he was going to eat them knowing full well he hates both and got the same response, “not really but it’s Christmas”.

Exactly Christmas is a time for slightly over indulging in the things you like, not force feeding yourself stuff because you think that’s what makes it Christmassy.

So this year, don’t be drawn in by the fancy packets or the fact its got a picture of holly on the front, if you don’t like it leave it on the shelf and go get something you will enjoy, like another tub of those roses, the last one seems to have disappeared.

By The Coupon Detective