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March 1, 2017   |   Articles

Is it worth paying more for expensive supermarket wine?

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Are you missing out by buying cheap wine? Or are you wasting money splashing out on a special bottle? I’ve looked into whether the average punter like me can tell the difference. Plus, how you can tell whether a wine is on offer more often than full price.

I’m not a wine expert. If anything I find the variety available at the supermarket a little daunting. So when shopping I normally restrict myself to what’s on offer, normally paying between £6 and £8 – rarely more, never less. But I’d like to know more.

Fortunately, my friend Rob is a wine expert (he’s also a top chef – check out his website)! So I roped him in for a blind taste test. The aim was to see if there really is a difference between three bottles of wine. One priced £7.50 (on offer at £6), one priced £9 and one priced £13 (on offer at £11).

To make it slightly scientific, I bought them all from the same supermarket (Sainsbury’s) and all the same type of grape (Pinot Noir). Then I disguised the bottles and poured a glass of each for me and Rob.

To complicate it even more, we added in a £5ish bottle of wine to see how that compared.

Watch my latest video to see what happened:

For me, the most interesting result was neither of us particularly liked the most expensive bottle of wine. Though Rob felt it would improve with food, I’d have been hugely disappointed to spend the full £13 on it.

The cheapest bottle was almost half the price and at first sip, much nicer. Given the choice between the two, I’d have picked this one every time. Hey, I could have picked two bottles for the same price!

But the best one for taste and value came in at £9. Not only that it was an own brand “Taste the difference”. This is more than I’d normally spend, but it was really good, and I’d be happy to spend more to get something this nice. So perhaps the safest price point is around that mark?

Of course, the problem is for the amateur like you and I is we’re still guessing. And everyone has different tastes. But at least I know expensive doesn’t necessarily mean good.

As a result of our test, I’m certainly going to avoid supermarket wines above £9. I’d hoped the most expensive wine was going to be the best, and if I’d shelled out for one as a treat I’d have regretted it. I don’t think it’s worth the risk.

Perhaps the answer if you want something special is to ditch the supermarket. Rob advises heading to a local wine shop and talking about the wines you like. That way there’s less risk of wishing you’d just picked up the old familiar. And hopefully you’ll get to enjoy something new.

How much wine are you paying for in a bottle?

We weren’t able to keep all of Rob’s insight in this video (it’d easily have been close to 20 minutes – there’ll be another video soon), but it’s safe to say there are lots of factors which contribute to the price you pay at the supermarket. However, there’s one fixed cost which is quite dramatic.

Whether you buy a £5 bottle or a £200 bottle (as if), the price includes a flat £2(ish) duty.

Costs like bottling and shipping don’t change much either, so once you add on VAT and supermarket profit the wine itself in a £5 bottle could be worth just 50p!

But for a wine that costs £6, the wine could be worth £1.50. A wine that costs £9 could be worth an extra £3, if not more.

Though the wines we tasted showed expensive doesn’t mean good, and cheap doesn’t mean bad, it’s an interesting statistic to remember when comparing similar wines.

Are special offers the real price?

Some wines seem to be on special offer ALL the time, which makes me question whether “full price” is just an inflated figure to allow for “discounting”.

A great trick to find out the real price is the website/app MySupermarket. Here you can see price history, including how often the item is on special offer.

I took a look at some of the wines I frequently see cut-price to see just how often they are cheaper. The Casillero Del Diablo Cabernet Sauvignon has been on offer for more than 50% of the year at Sainsbury’s, while a Campo Viejo Tempranillo was only full price at Tesco for 24 weeks. Clearly both examples of the real price being the discounted price.

So what about the wines we tested?

Hautes Côtes de Nuits Pinot Noir

The first wine we tasted was reduced to £10.50 for 10 weeks in the last 41 weeks and then spent two weeks at £11 (when I bought it). So it’s been on offer for a third of the time it’s been on shelves at an average price of £11.98. Still an expensive wine by supermarket standards.

Bouchard Aîné & Fils Pinot Noir

The cheapest wine in our test was also on offer when I bought it, costing £6 rather than a full price of £7.50. MySupermarket shows the average price at £6.98 – but it’s been on offer for 17 weeks in the last year – so it’s cheaper one-third of the time.

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference New Zealand Pinot Noir

Our favourite was £9, and MySupermarket shows the average price is £9.11. That’s because full-price for most of the last year has been a higher £10.  But I didn’t buy this Marlborough Pinot Noir on offer, so it must be a price cut, perhaps suggesting why we felt it was such a bargain. Again it’s been on offer over the last year, but less often than the other wines at just 25% of the time.

McGuigan Classic Pinot Noir

 This bargain £5.50 bottle I threw in at the end of our taste test is new on the shelves so there’s no price history to examine. But we both felt it’s a good price for an easy to drink “session” wine.

February 24, 2017   |   Articles

Be Clever With Your Cash turns three!

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Wow, it’s three years since I told the world (ok, my Facebook friends) about Be Clever With Your Cash. Three years since I went from mid-career “what do I want to do?” crisis to a proper personal finance journalist.

I don’t often write blogs like this, but since a huge amount has changed, even in the last 12 months, I thought it would be good to reflect on some of that – and what the next year holds. Plus, at the bottom of the page I’m keen to get your thoughts on the content I produce for you.

The blog

In the last year, I’ve written close to 100 articles and updated dozens and dozens of deals. Which means there’s a good chance you might have missed one or two. So here are some highlights from the last year:

My favourite posts from the last year

I’m always amazed that traffic to the blog keeps growing every month. There are now around 75,000 views a month and in total 1.5 million since I started. If this carries on and grows a little there should be one million views in the next 12 months. I think that’s mad. But thanks for reading!

My career

A year ago the blog was my hobby. Now it’s the main part of my working week.

In October last year, I cut my hours at my day job. I’m now working three days a week on the blog and my UK Money Blogger community.

I’m doing more freelance work too. I write regularly for Moneywise magazine and giffgaff money. And, I’m the new money columnist for Readers Digest!

I enjoyed my years working at the BBC and again at The Money Advice Service, but it’s not until now that it’s all clicked. Self-employment (even if just part-time) really suits me. I hadn’t ever considered it as an option, but I really wish I’d started earlier!

Going multi-media

This is the weirdest development. In all my years at the BBC behind the camera, I hated the idea of being on screen.

But in the last year I’ve been a money expert for BBC Right on the Money team last Summer, vox-popped punters in Manchester for Rip Off Britain and even appeared on BBC Breakfast on Black Friday. I’ve also become a semi-regular on the Share Radio morning show, reviewing the papers and fighting for consumer rights.

The more I do it, the less nervous I am and the more I enjoy it. In fact, I get a real buzz out of it.

So as a result, I’ve set up my own Cash Chats podcast every week and I’m increasing the video content for the blog too (you can subscribe to my YouTube channel here). I enjoy producing this extra content for you, so I hope you enjoy listening to and watching it as much.

What do you think?

The blog is still just me, deciding on a whim what to write. Obviously, some stuff is more popular than others, and I can’t write about everything – so I want to know what you want me to write about. If you’ve 5 minutes, I’d really appreciate you filling in the survey below.

January 4, 2017   |   Articles

2017: Six easy ways to make nearly £2,000

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It’s all well and good to try and save money, but you should be thinking about earning extra cash too. And we’re talking decent sums of money – possibly more than £2,000.

Each of the money making actions I’ve listed below might take a little time, but they’re all easy to do. You can get through most of them in a couple of hours if you wanted, or spread them out over the next 12 months. To get the most of some you need to repeat the action through the year, but others are done once and will earn you cash every time you shop or pay a bill.

Do these alongside my six ways to save money in 2017 and you could be better off by £3,500 in a year – perhaps even more!

1. Switch (and switch again) your bank account

You could earn: £585 in 12 months

Time it takes: 20 to 30 minutes to open each account

Fancy a free £150? Of course you do. How about another £125, and another £100? It might seem too good to be true, but it isn’t.

Five banks are currently offering a cash bonus if you switch to them, and it’s possible to do four, possibly even all five over 12 months (you often need to wait a couple of month to get the bonus in your account).

With the current bonuses available you could earn a possible £585 tax-free cash in a year.

The switching guarantee means everything is moved for you, including future payments, though my tip is to open another account for your day to day banking (see below).

Warning: you will be credit checked each time you apply so make sure you’ve a decent rating and aren’t planning on applying for a mortgage

>> Here are all the current account switching offers

2. Get cashback on your household bills

You could earn: £100 plus (after fee)

Time it takes: 20 to 30 minutes to open a new account

Santander and NatWest both have accounts which give you money back on your bills.

Though each charges a fee, you should easily cover it with the cashback and make more on top. I’m pretty good at getting the lowest bills possible and I’m still up £100 a year. If you spend more on pay-TV or have lots of people using up energy, it could be even more.

The great thing about these accounts is you don’t have to switch from an old account. You can simply open it up as a new account, leaving you free to maximise the switching bonuses mentioned above.

>> How to choose which cashback current account is best for you

3. Spend with a cashback credit card

You could earn: £100

Time it takes: 15 minutes to apply

I rarely use cash or my debit card anymore. Instead, I’ll put as much as I can on my cashback credit cards, unless there’s an extra charge.

We’re not talking about huge amounts per purchase – probably just 1% per pound. But added up over a year and you should easily met £100, particularly since the best ones have sign up bonuses.

However, these cards are only worth it if you PAY THE BALANCE OFF IN FULL EACH MONTH. Sorry for shouting there but it’s soooooo important.

>> The best cashback credit cards

4. Shop via cashback sites

You could earn: £252

Time it takes: Five minutes to join each site, less than a minute extra each time you shop

Even more cashback? Yup! And it’s a good earner too. Quidco say the average earned each year is £252!

Pretty much every time I shop I start at either Quidco or TopCashback and search for the retailer I’m buying from. There’s also a new one called TBSeen, run by Kate Thornton.

Simply clicking through can earn me between 1% and 10% from my shop. It’s even more when you’re looking at broadband, TV and mobile switching.

Plus use your cashback credit card and you’re earning twice.

>> See how you can earn even more with an exclusive sign-up bonus at Quidco

5. Make decent money on your savings

You could earn: £286 or more

Time it takes: 20 to 30 minutes to open a new account

With rates so low, you might think there’s no point trying to earn interest on your savings – but it’s still possible to get 5%, even if it’s just on small amounts of cash.

There are less options than in 2016, but my top pick is to open a Nationwide FlexDirect account, where you can save £2,500 and earn 5% for the first year – a total of £125 earned.

Then you can open a Nationwide regular savings account and save a further £500 a month, also at 5%. Put in the full £6,000 over the year and you’ll earn an extra £161.

There are other accounts worth considering if you’ve more money to put away such as Lloyds (2%) and TSB (2.5%), while First Direct and M&S also offer 5% regular savers for customers.

Again, you don’t usually have to switch accounts to get these offers, simply open up a new account instead.

>> Find out which current accounts have the best interest rates

6. Check for any money owed

You could earn: £600

Time it takes: Five minutes to check bills and bank statements, then however long to call and claim your money back

I’ve switched energy, broadband and my mobile twice each in the last two years, and each time I’ve been owed money by the old company. That’s my money they’ve kept and wouldn’t have given back if I hadn’t asked.

There are other places where you might be due some cash. If you’ve returned an item to a shop, especially if it’s online, have you got a refund? Have you been overcharged on any bills? Has anything broken within its warranty you could take back?

All of these can and will boost your bank balance this year – I found £600 of this type of money in the first six months of last year.

>> How I found £600 of lost money
September 6, 2016   |   Articles

Beat the touts: How to get a gig ticket and save money too

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The rise of internet touts has made getting a ticket for a gig frustrating AND expensive.

Tickets, even for massive venues, sell out in minutes, and magically appear  with hugely inflated prices on secondary sites moments later. Even if the concert doesn’t sell out, tickets aren’t cheap, with the hefty face-value boosted by questionable booking and postage fees. However, you can beat the touts most of time.

Here are my top tips for not just getting a ticket, but getting it as cheap as possible too.

1. Get your ticket before they go on general sale

To cheapest way to get a ticket is to get it before the touts and avoid massive resale fees. Use E-Festivals, Songkick and GetToTheFront, and follow the twitter and email lists of your top acts to know what’s happening and when they go on sale.

You then might be able to grab the tickets before anyone else. Look for presale through fan sites and forums, O2 Priority Tickets or Amex and Mastercard member schemes. If a tour in announced sign up straight away to their mailing list – you might be in time to get a special code.

2. Be ready for when they go on sale

If there’s no presale, you need to be one of the first to try for tickets. These tricks will help.

If the sites require accounts, register and log-in ahead of the ticket release time.

Have more than one browser open at the same time (so Chrome, Safari and Firefox for example) and have different ticket sites open on different tabs in each browser. Use your smart phone, tablet and computer at the same time to give you a better chance of getting through.

And finally, have the pages loaded up well before the published time. Start hitting refresh and keep your fingers crossed.

3. Shop around for the lowest booking fees

Fees are a pain, so if it’s not a hot ticket and not likely to sell out in 2 minutes, shop around.

Booking and delivery fees vary from gig to gig and site to site, so it’s impossible to say which is the best. In the past, I’ve found WeGotTickets and Skiddle have really low fees but few of the big acts.

4. Pay face value when you get them in person

Even better than low fees are no fees, and you can often avoid them if you try the box office in person.

Venues such as the Brixton Academy and the Phones4U Manchester Arena don’t charge any fees if you do this, though you’ll need to pay cash. Stargreen has a free collection service in London, while Tickets-Scotland only charges £1 to collect from their Edinburgh or Glasgow offices (booking fees still apply to both).

5. Be careful of re-selling sites

You can pay through the nose on sites such as Viagogo, StubHub and Get Me In through hidden fees, and I don’t recommend it unless you really want a ticket. If you can leave it to the last minute you can sometimes get a real bargain with people desperate to sell. BE CAREFUL OF ANY SITE YOU’VE NOT HEARD OF – they could well be dodgy.

Fan selling sites such as Scarlet Mist and Twickets keep money away from touts so are worth a punt.

6. Go for free

London’s Rough Trade shops often have free in-store gigs when you buy the band’s new album. Every autumn the iTunes Festival in London gives competition winners entry to 15 gigs by big acts. Pubs around the country have local bands gigging for nothing – they could be the next big thing.

If you’ve the time and don’t mind missing some of the bands, you can register to volunteer as stewards and bar staff at most of the big festivals. You get a ticket in exchange for a couple of shifts. Oxfam handles big ones such as Glastonbury.

June 15, 2016   |   Articles

New TSB cashback credit card: do I need my Amex?

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There’s a new cashback credit card in town from TSB, offering 1% back on your spend. I’ve crunched the numbers to see how it compares to other cards.

This month TSB launched the Platinum 20 Month Purchase Credit Card. What makes it interesting is it offers 1% cashback on all purchases. That’s not too far off the 1.25% I get with my American Express. I love my Amex, but it’s still not accepted everywhere, and it comes with a £25 fee – so could this new TSB be a better bet?

First, here’s a look at what the two cards offer:

TSB Platinum cashback credit card

  • 1% cashback on first £500 spend each month until 30th September 2017
  • 5% cashback on first £100 spent via Apple Pay until 31st December 2016
  • 20 months interest-free purchases
  • You need to have a TSB Classic Plus current account

This card could be a nice little earner. If you spend £500 every month on the TSB Platinum 20 Month card, you’ll get a fiver. Over a year that’s £60 in free money.

On top of this, there’s another £5 a month available until Christmas if you spend using Apple Pay. Plus, to get this account you need to have a TSB Classic current account, which offers a similar 5% cashback spend on the debit card via contactless until 31st December. So there’s a potential £30 more to be made this year.

If you really want to push your returns, you could also take advantage of the interest-free period. Rather than paying the credit card off in full each month you could move that money into a high rate interest account  or regular saver account where you’ll be earning another 4-5%. Just make sure you pay the card off when the 20 months end!

Another advantage is this Mastercard TSB will work with the Supercard and Curve card (more on these soon), meaning you can keep earning cashback when spending money abroad.

One downside though is if you spend more than £500 a month, or £700 if you include Apple Pay and the current account, you won’t earn an extra cashback.

American Express Platinum Cashback Credit Card

  • 1.25% cashback
  • 2.5% for one month each year if you spend £10,001 in a year
  • 5% in first three months on spend up to £2,500
  • £25 annual fee

If you don’t have either card, I think the American Express Platinum Cashback card is the best option, at least for one year. The 5% on a £2,500 spend is worth £100 after the fee – a great extra if you’re spending that much and are able to pay it off in full every month.

Since I’ve already got the card, I only get a bonus 2.5% month every year, and only if I’ve spent £10,000 in the previous 12 months – that’s £800 a month. Since not everywhere takes Amex, and I use my Santander 123 card for travel (see bottom of this article), that’s not necessarily going to happen.

Still, even just 1.25% is a better rate,and you earn get the cashback if you spend more than £500 each month – perfect for big purchases.

Also, Amex run special offers throughout the year that provide even more cashback. I’ve just redeemed one for a £30 statement credit when spending £100 at Selfridges, and these can easily add up to £100 a year – if not more.

How much do you need to spend for the Amex to be the better option

An annual spend of £6,800 (equivalent to £567 a month) on the Amex would earn £85 cashback a year. Once you remove the £25 fee that’s the same as spending £500 a month on the TSB card. So you will earn more cashback for every additional pound you spend.

However, if you used the full Apple Pay and contactless TSB offers you’d need to spend £9,200 a year (£767 a month) on the Amex to earn the same £90 (after the fee).

Factor in the TSB’s 20 months 0% purchase option and you need to spend even more on the Amex to compete. However, you will have a credit limit – i.e. how much you can spend on the card – meaning there’s probably just £2,500 to £3,000 you could keep in savings.

Remember, you only get cashback on full pounds. Amounts will be rounded down, so £1.99 is the same as £1 as far as the banks are concerned.

Also, only spend on credit cards if you’re confident you can pay them off each month – or before the end of 0% period – otherwise you’re be paying far more in interest than you’d make in cashback.

So will I ditch my Amex?

It’s a tricky one, but I think I’m going to try the TSB. There’s very little in it based on how much I’d probably spend on the cards, but the 0% spending aspect and the ability to connect it to the Supercard give it a slight edge.

That doesn’t mean I’m going to give up on American Express completely. There is a Platinum Cashback Everyday card which doesn’t have an annual fee. The cashback rates are less – 0.5% for the first £3,500, eventually leading up to 1.25% – but I’d still have access to the statement credit offers.

A little note about the Santander 123 cashback credit card

The decision was a little more complicated for me as I’ve also got a Santander 123 cashback credit card. I get 3% back on all petrol and travel spend, up to a max of £9 a month. We generally get £6 or £7 back each month, which after the fee is worth around £50 each year. So there’s £300 or so each month we wouldn’t be spending on either the Amex or TSB card.

Sadly, if you don’t already have the card, new customers are capped at £3 back on travel, which is cancelled out by the £3 a month fee, so it’s not really worth it. Due to this I didn’t factor this card into the calculations above.

April 22, 2016   |   Articles

How we saved thousands on our wedding

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The list of pressures surrounding a wedding is too long to list. It’s your BIG DAY. It has to be PERFECT. But worries about everything going to plan, or if people will have a good time, are dwarfed by the general insaneness of just how much weddings can cost.

The average spend on a wedding in the UK is £30,111 – well, according to Brides Magazine. For some reason, they include the gift list in their sums (why?), as well as engagement rings and the honeymoon. Stripping them out the total cost comes to £20, 261.

Obviously, you still need to pay for the engagement ring and honeymoon; but I don’t count them as part of the wedding day itself. Nonetheless, spending £20k on one day – ONE DAY – isn’t something you’re ever likely to repeat.

I got married last year (yes, I know I promised this post ages ago) and, being dedicated to getting the best value from everything I spend, I wanted to share with you how we managed to have a pretty awesome day AND stay on budget.

We didn’t have a frugal wedding – we still spent £16,000 – but I’m confident anyone who attended would be surprised we didn’t spend a lot more, particularly for a London wedding; and that’s because we worked hard to get as much for our money as possible.

Here’s how we planned and paid for a pretty fantastic day.

Setting the budget (and the date)

When we got engaged, Becky and I were both travelling South and Central America having taken redundancy from our jobs. So, we had to start planning our wedding without knowing when we’d start working again.

This was probably the most important decision we made; we didn’t let the date decide our budget, we let our budget decide the date. We could easily have chosen a day six or twelve months away – but we knew we’d not have enough money saved up to afford the day we wanted. So we looked at existing savings and made a guess on how much we’d be able to save each month.

With this in mind, we chose a date two-and-a-half years after our engagement – a long wait by today’s standards. But any earlier and we’d have had to compromise on the day; there was no way we were going to get into debt to fund it.

Deciding the guest list

Money wasn’t the only factor that shaped our guest list – we didn’t want something so big it lost its intimacy – but it played its part.

We could only afford 70 guests for the sit-down meal, so that’s how many people we invited. It wasn’t easy – I ended up inviting my aunts and uncles, and most of my friends’ partners just to the evening – but I think this is where you can totally lose control of the budget.

You probably will lose some people this way, but hopefully most people will understand and enjoy themselves at the parts they do go to.

Choosing reception venue and food

As with any big purchase, we shopped around to compare what was on offer and the prices we’d have to pay. We looked in London, where we live, and Yorkshire, where Becky is from.

Unsurprisingly, prices jump as soon as you mention the “w” word. Working out costs is also incredibly complicated. Some venues will offer all-in, others will have different charges for the venue, staffing, catering, ceremony etc.

We eventually chose the Hawksmoor restaurant in London’s Guildhall for our wedding reception. It held special memories for us and cooks the most amazing steak.

Unlike many of the other places we looked, they operated a minimum spend system. We had to pay up-front, by instalments, £9,500 plus 12.5% service charge. We also managed to negotiate with them a refund of £2,000 if the bar spend exceeded that amount.

We calculated this cost less than a separate room and catering hire at other venues we liked, but with top quality food (it’s genuinely fantastic food – regarded as one of the best places to get steak in the UK), fantastic wait staff and a really lovely venue. Of course, this was only possible as the restaurant closes at the weekend – it’s in the City of London which is a ghost-town at weekends with all the bankers back in their country retreats. To get one of their other restaurants in Covent Garden or Mayfair to ourselves would have been far far more expensive.

All-in and after the drinks refund, £8,700 covered the venue (with a late licence ’til 2am), a few canapés, welcome cocktails, a three-course meal for 70 guests, wine, evening food (lobster roll, yum), the service charge and a couple of drinks each for another 20 evening guests. Not cheap, but I’d say outstanding value for money.

We’d have liked to have provided more free booze for our guests, but our budget didn’t allow it. However, we did save on the fizz to toast the speeches. We found it was cheaper to buy some decent supermarket prosecco (on offer, of course) and pay the corkage charge than buy bottles direct from the venue.

Getting what we wanted for far less

I could write a hell of a lot more here (if I wrote about every element in detail then this article would be well over 2,000 words – another blog post – or two – perhaps), so for the sake of brevity here are other ways we saved.

Buying the dress for less

Becky didn’t choose the dress based on the budget, but it just so happened it was cheaper for us to order this dress from the States and fly to New York to collect it than buy a traditional wedding dress! The savings made freed up cash to spend elsewhere.

My tux was also a bargain. I knew what I was after and happened to chance upon the online Moss Bros sale with one left in stock of exactly what I wanted – for just £79! Becky also found great deals on high-street dresses for the bridesmaids.

Finding the right suppliers

Any London photographer with a decent portfolio will easily cost you £1,500 to £2,000, if not more. We cut this drastically by using someone out of London. She’d taken pics at a friends wedding in Stratford the year before, which we knew were good, and she was happy to come to London for our wedding.

Cakes also don’t come cheap, but, thanks to a huge amount of research by Becky (research by Becky was key to so many of our savings), we found a relatively new baker whose prices were a fraction of others we looked at, but just as tasty, and if anything, more talented in decoration.

The quotes we got on flowers were the most ridiculous, but we found one amazing florist who was happy to work within our budget. She and Becky had very creative ideas to get the most for our money on tables, bouquets and buttonhole flowers. Less really is often more – when it’s done right.

A little bit of DIY

We were also lucky that the venue looked pretty fantastic as it was. We simply added some cheap fairy lights from Amazon to give a little sparkle.

In fact, Amazon, along with Hobby Craft, Not on the High Street and Etsy, was our friend in helping us buy decent quality materials to boost our invites and table plan.

Breaking with tradition

We didn’t buy favours for our guests, choosing instead to give them more booze. Likewise, we didn’t kit out the grooms people in matching gear.

We also asked our guests to contribute to our honeymoon rather than buy us stuff we already had. Not everyone did this, but it made our three weeks in New England far more affordable and allowed us to put more cash into the wedding day itself.

Saying no when we couldn’t afford it

I really, really wanted to hire a mariachi covers band (the ones from those Doritos’s adverts). They weren’t actually that expensive compared to what I know friends have paid for bands, but it was too much for our budget. So sadly we said no. But my carefully curated playlists did the job perfectly, so we didn’t even need a DJ – though we did shell out for a dance floor, PA system and lights.

As much as we’d have liked to have stayed in a posh hotel the first night, knowing we’d have got there about 3am and left at 10am meant it was a bit of a waste of cash – better spent on the first night of our honeymoon. In the end it was lovely to be back in our own bed.

You can read more – and find our suppliers – in this article Becky wrote for Boho Weddings (even though ours was absolutely not Boho!)

I really could keep on writing about this! But I won’t. Instead I’ll leave you with what might have been – the Mariachis singing East 17…

April 7, 2016   |   Articles

Are festivals worth the money?

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Seeing your favourite bands in a field can cost a lot of cash. I’ve taken a look to see if festivals are worth the money and if there are ways to spend less on a ticket.

Pretty much every summer I’ll head to a festival (or two). The line up is my biggest consideration when choosing which to attend, but with ever increasing ticket prices, I always keep an eye on how much it could cost – and whether it’s worth it.

So how do you know if you’re being ripped off or getting value for money?

How much are you willing to pay?

A simple question: Do you think it’s worth shelling out whatever the price is?

I’m a big fan of Beck, but his outdoor summer show at the one day Flow Festival with Chic in JUne comes in at nearly £70. I like Beck, but not that much, especially since the rest of the line-up holds no appeal. And it’ll probably rain. So for me that’s not worth the money.

A few weeks later, British Summer Time with Florence + The Machine, Jamie XX and Cat Power comes in at a similar price but has five or six acts I want to see. A bit pricey but much better value.

A while ago I compared the price of festivals and live music based on the cost per band. Glastonbury – pretty much the most expensive ticket to buy – has a full schedule for three days and has so many stages that you’ll see far more acts than heading to something like V Festival or a one-dayer in London. On that basis, even though the weekend festivals cost more, they’re usually much better value – as long as you can afford it in the first place.

How do you get value from live music

I like the cost per band method (I don’t expect you to actually work it out, just get a gist), though for some people what bands they see isn’t as important as who they’re with – I’ve got friends who miss half the day as they’re still recovering from the night before!

So you’ve got to think about what you expect to get from a weekend – and what else you would do with the money. When I produced the infographic above in 2014, for the all-in cost of a Glasto experience you could buy an iPad or return flights to New York!

Can you afford the extra costs?

I’d hoped to head to a festival in Portgual this summer. The ticket was a bargain £100 for three days of Radiohead, Arcade Fire and others, but when flights and accommodation were added in, it no longer made sense, and regrettably, I decided to give it a miss. But you don’t have to go abroad to add extra costs.

My cost-per-band infographic took into account some of the additional costs such as travel, food and fees. These will quickly add up.

Not all festivals are created equal here. Some, such as Glastonbury, will let you bring food and drink onto the festival site, saving you a decent amount – if you can carry enough. Others won’t let you bring anything through the gate, forcing you to pay at least £5 for a pint of Carling.

Fees are one of my bug-bears, especially being charged postage for an e-ticket you print at home! Often they are unavoidable so do check the total cost and shop around different websites as they all charge different amounts.

Can you pay less for a ticket?

One option is to wait for a special offer – and these aren’t as rare as you might think.

For the last two year there have been discounts for British Summer Time on sites like Groupon. There’s also been a bargain £2.50 plus charitable donation flash sale each year in the days before the event.

With this in mind, I’m going to hold off buying my ticket.

Whether you do this depends on how popular the festival is and whether you’re willing to risk missing out.

If you want to go to Glastonbury you needed to get tickets as soon as they were available and pay the full whack – if you’re lucky enough to get through.

But over the last few years most of the other festivals haven’t been selling out. It’s always a risk, but I choose to wait and see before committing my cash.

I’ve a festival deals page I’ll update when I find cut price tickets. Last year there were savings to be found on Bestival, V Festival, BST and many one day festivals. This year I’ve already seen £20 off Field Day and I’m sure we’ll see more as festival season approaches.

What about resale sites?

I’d stay well clear of sites like Viagogo and Stubhub. You’ll pay over the odds and there’s no guarantee you’ll buy a legitimate ticket. Though you’ll usually get a refund if it turns out your ticket isn’t valid, that won’t cover the cost of getting there and the disappointment of not getting in with all your friends.

Other ways to save

Some festivals – such as Bestival – offer discounts for students (don’t forget, it’s easy for anyone to legitimately get an NUS card).

If you’ve got the time you can often volunteer and get free ticket in exchange for a few shifts in the car park or behind the bar.

You can also keep an eye out for smaller festivals which might not have the big name acts but will cost a lot less – or even be free!

>> For more tips read my 8 ways to save at a festival article

So, rip-off or great value?

My last Glasto experience had some fantastic moments, but also one day where I didn’t really like any of the bands, reducing the value I got from my hefty ticket, travel and food costs.

I love live music, and for me there’s nothing quite like a good festival. But with prices higher than ever before so I’ll now only go to festivals which have a cracking line up.

So my advice is to try my cost per band method, or work out your own system, and see if you think the festival you fancy is going to be better than a flight to New York or an iPad.

March 15, 2016   |   Articles

My addiction to yellow reduced stickers

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My rules to making sure I get the best value from reduced food – and don’t get carried away by the yellow stickers.

If you regularly read my blog, you’ll know that even though I love getting a bargain, I’m a realist too and will pay what I need to pay for the life I enjoy (yes, even if it is full price).

But I’m pretty disciplined and rarely buy things I don’t need. I’m a lean, mean saving machine. I’ll always find the best deal, and I’ll always make sure I’m getting the best value for my money.

Well, nearly always. I have a slight money saving problem. I’m addicted to the yellow reduced stickers in the supermarket.

My yellow sticker addiction

What’s the harm in that you might say? Well, I’ve become aware (isn’t acknowledgement the first step to sorting a problem?) that I can’t walk past a supermarket without wanting to check for reduced items.

I do sometimes just think about it and carry on walking, but if I’m honest it’s only because a) I’m going somewhere, or b) the freezer is already full.

But pretty much every other time I’ll pop in to see what’s there. Most nights after work I’ll go to the Sainsburys under my office (often chock-full of yellow stickered items), then past the tube station a few meters to the M&S Simply Food, just in case there are big reductions.

Going the extra mile

Sometimes I’ll take a longer walk to a different station. I say it’s a fitness thing, simply getting a little exercise in, but a big part of it for me is seeing if I can pick up some bargains at the Sainsburys, Co-op, Tesco, M&S and another Tesco I’ll go past on the way.

Bizarrely this is only with supermarkets, not other shops. I can easily walk past places selling clothes, tech and trinkets and not even notice massive sale signs.

Far too excited

Once in the supermarket, big or small, I’ll generally make a bee line for the reduced-to-clear aisles. The limit to what I buy is really down to the space in the freezer or if I’ll be at home enough to eat the food before it goes off.

If some mince costs £4 and is reduced to £3.60 I’ll probably ignore it. If it’s £3 I’ll consider it. When it’s down to £2 I’ll snap it up. If it gets towards £1 I’ll be far more excited than a grown man should be by the price of mince.

Some self control

I do have some dignity. I won’t hang around while the shop staff are reducing, ready to pounce, but I do loop around the aisles and come back, which is only slightly less stalkerish.

I’m also not someone who times my supermarket trips for the biggest reductions, though I expect I would if I knew when that was!

My four rules for buying reduced food

Of course, getting reduced food is a good way to save cash. The haul in the main photo should have cost £30 but I only paid £7.50 – and I could have got more if I had space in the freezer!

I’m not sure how to stop my addiction to yellow reduced stickers other than just willpower, but to make sure I don’t spend for the sake of it, I’ve come up with these four rules.

I only buy what I need

Food waste is a huge problem in this country, both ethically and financially. So I’m sure to only buy reduced food I’m confident I can eat or freeze before it goes off.

I only buy food I’d want at full price

In the past I’ve been guilty of buying reduced food just because it’s cheap. But now, even if that pasty is only 20p, I won’t buy it. It’s better I pay full price and enjoy what I’m eating!

I only buy if it’s a ‘good’ reduction

Simply because it’s got a yellow sticker doesn’t make it a good price. Mysupermarket is a great app to test whether it’s actually cheaper on offer elsewhere.

I’ll check my receipt

It’s easy to miss something going through at full price – just last week I was paid £2 too much.

>> Read my tips for non’t getting caught out by special offers at the supermarket




March 4, 2016   |   Articles

Are Easter Eggs worth the money?

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Easter is only a few weeks away and the supermarkets are adding more and more chocolate goods to the shelves. Are they worth buying, or are you being ripped off?

Plus, your chance to win Hotel Chocolat easter goodies!

This week myself, seven other money bloggers, journalists from the Telegraph and Mirror and the teams at Quidco and CheckoutSmart took part in a blind taste testing. It was all part of my UK Money Bloggers community, and Quidco very kindly sponsored the event.

Our mission: To find the best value Easter Eggs.

It was a lot of fun, with some big surprises. Lindt – which I normally like – was one of my least favourite, and big brands like Thorntons and Cadburys were pretty average. One of my favourites turned out to be a Free-from egg from Asda, and their own brand Extra Special Egg was really tasty too.

When we looked at the prices, it had a huge affect on our faves. The Divine Fairtrade egg and Heston by Waitrose egg both scored highly for taste, but when their huge prices were revealed (£20 for the Heston one! A crazy amount even if it was painted gold) they became the two worst value for money eggs of the 12 we tested.

>> Read the full results of the UK Money Blogger / Quidco Easter Egg blind taste test

Overall, the winner for both taste and value was a Mars bar egg. It tasted good and was pretty cheap – but that’s not always the case with Easter Eggs.

Do Easter Eggs give you value for money?

I’ve taken a look at a few of the popular options to give you a sense of whether you’re getting value for money.

Are easter eggs worth the money

As you can see, buying a Cadbury Dairy Milk egg is 36% more expensive than buying the equivalent in Dairy Milk Bars. It’s a similar story for most eggs of this size and brand.

When you go premium, it’s jaw-droppingly outrageous just how much more you spend for an egg. Divine is generally pretty tasty, and many are happy to pay a little extra for the ethics of Fairtrade. But buying their egg is 263% more expensive than a bar of the same chocolate. TWO HUNDRED AND SIXTY THREE! You could have two bars and four times as much chocolate for the same price. Or just save yourself some cash and calories by buying one bar.

There are exceptions. I looked at a few mini eggs and they actually worked out pretty good value. The Galaxy Caramel eggs were 5% cheaper than buying the same amount in Galaxy Caramel bars.

Offers just in time for Easter

Of course, special offers can make a big difference. But with Easter Eggs you really need to make sure you don’t get caught up in the excitement of the offer.

A few weeks back Tesco offered “Buy two, get two free” on most of their eggs. Great! Except do you really need four eggs?

And remember, part of the reason we see the Easter chocolate on the shelves straight after Christmas is so they can be sold at a higher price long enough for “special offers” to kick in when people want to buy them. I may be slightly cynical here, but there’s no need for the supermarkets to discount the eggs as loss leaders. People will buy them anyway.

They expect you to buy two for £7 or three for £10. They don’t expect you to pay the full price.

>> My guide to deciphering supermarket deals and special offers

It’s not just about the taste

I’m happy with my chocolate in bars rather than egg shaped, but most people like unwrapping the foil and smashing the egg. It’s a treat to have it like this once a year. I get it.

So my tip for you if you want to buy an egg but don’t want to get ripped off is to compare the price per unit on the shelf label. This will include any extras, such as Buttons or Mars Bars, but it’ll help you compare the different options for value.

And don’t forget to see how we all rated the different eggs at our taste test!

I’d definitely avoid the show off eggs such as Heston by Waitrose. Yes it’s gold and has “edible” straw (basically tasteless rice paper), but you can get good tasting eggs for far more reasonable prices. My top tip is the Asda Extra Special Belgian Chocolate Egg. Just £2, the egg was really thick and creamy and the packaging makes it feel like you’ve picked it up from a posher place than the supermarket.

Easter chocolate competition

Quidco have very kindly given all the bloggers in my UK Money Bloggers community these delicious Hotel Chocolat Easter goodies as prizes. It’s free to enter and closes at midnight on Sunday 20th March 2016.

If you like the idea of Hotel Choc treats (they are pretty expensive!) you can get 12% cashback right now on Quidco, which helps to justify some luxury choc a little!

Easter egg competition

Win Hotel Chocolat Easter goodies!