When will something give? We all have households to run.” The cost of gas, electric, breathing – everything has gone up. Of course, as Nixon says: “It’s not just food. ![]() The receipt reveal has become a grimly unpredictable game, since inflation has been repricing foodstuffs at the fastest rate since 1977 and in lurid proportions, particularly for lower-priced items such as pasta, tea and bread. You’ll hear a soundtrack of trolley rattles and packaging rustling off the shelves as someone you’ll never meet explains they’re not buying gravy this week (there’s some in the freezer), and they won’t be picking up bread because they’re gluten-free and Pete who does eat bread is on a work trip. With these shoppers, you watch as they pick out a weekly food shop, formulating a guess for the receipt reveal at the end. “Come shopping with me at Lidl.” “Realistic food haul from Aldi.” “£58 shop at M&S.” “FarmFoods underrated gems.” The scroll goes deep into the massive digital gumbo of TikTok, where the simple act of spending and saving money at the supermarket has dug a deep content stream – in global lifetime counts, #shopwithme has amassed 3.9bn views and #costofliving 1.5bn views, according to figures from TikTok, which is owned by the ByteDance company, headquartered in China. I can’t believe how much people are interested in what’s going into the basket. If you are experiencing the pinch, TikTok’s intuitive “For You” page will be a disjointed research trip to the country’s supermarkets, trailing behind the trolley in the company of total strangers who share information that used to be a stable and private part of our lives – what we spend on food. Inflation is something everyone has noticed – even Cardi B went online to decry the price of American lettuce – but not everyone feels the impact at the checkout. People in the middle are floundering around.” Her content, which “began as a joke”, follows her around the aisles, scrutinising produce and bargains against the biggest question at any supermarket in 2023: how can this cost this much? At many mainstream shops, Nixon says: “A £50 shop is now an £80 shop. Unlike other shoppers, Nixon has a press pass, because when she’s filling her basket, she will also be filming a TikTok on her phone, and the Company Shop management requires permission. I’ll go home and look at what I’ve got in the freezer, check the rice, pasta. “Today I’m going with a £50 budget to feed five of us – £10 a day, £2 per person per meal. For the bits in between, she will head either to her local, membership-only brand discounter, the Company Shop in Barnsley, or to a mainstream supermarket such as Aldi. In the garage she usually has a sack of potatoes, and meat, green veg and bread in the freezer. B efore Rachel Nixon goes to the supermarket, she sketches a quick shopping list in her head.
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