sanctified

So I have a confession to make. After a number of years being a great fan of Sainsbury’s I’m defecting to Tesco.

It’s a hard decision. It’s something stupid like £1 in 7 that is spent in the UK is spent at Tesco. I don’t know if that’s actually true or not, but either way Tesco is a huge and hugely powerful company. Generally I do that British thing and fight for the underdog. In this case that’s Sainsbury’s. And it’s not that much of an underdog, they do loads of things I really really approve of. Their commitment to Fairtrade is pretty impressive and despite what people say it doesn’t cost much more to shop there than at Tesco. I feel like their product quality is better too, although again I can’t prove that either way.

So, why have I defected? I used to be pretty well off! Not rich, but Catherine and I were both working and we had money to spare. Now neither of us are working and although our housing costs are being met, we are adapting to a new, lower, standard of living! So what difference does that make?

Well, Sainsbury’s have Nectar and Tesco have clubcard. And it’s the quality of the Clubcard offer that is enticing us away. We love going to restaurants, sometimes you just need to not have the bother of cooking. Now we’re poor(er) we can’t afford to go often (probably at all). With our nectar points we can get dinner at a Conran restaurant for a mere 21,000 points (which equates to spending £10,500 in store). By comparison, we can go to Cafe Rouge (which is more likely anyway), and spend £40 on dinner for only 1,000 clubcard points (equivalent of spending £1,000).

To make it even worse, petrol sales accumulate points at 1 point (worth 0.5p) per litre at Sainsbury’s, at Tesco you still get 1 point (worth 1p) per £1 spent on petrol. With fuel costs getting more and more expensive, that makes a difference!

Unfortunately it’s a no brainer, but I still feel a slight sadness and sense of being disloyal! Doh!

This post is filed as: Uncategorized, personal. It was written by mrdavidberry.