A Slice of Bread and Butter
The voice of The Bread and Butter Thing - with stories from the frontline of the cost of living crisis from one of the UK's leading food charities.
A Slice of Bread and Butter
When essentials become a luxury
Imagine managing a family's food shop on a razor-thin budget as food and energy prices continue to soar. Join Mark and Vic as they chat to Claire (featuring baby Cassidy!) as she opens up about navigating maternity leave on a limited budget but also the guilt of overshadowing others in need and how shopping habits evolve when essentials become luxuries.
Welcome back to A Slice of Bread and Butter with Vic and Mark from the Bread and Butter Thing. We're a charity that delivers affordable food into the heart of deprived neighbourhoods to help nourish communities and act as a catalyst for change.
Speaker 2:We provide access to a nutritious, affordable range of food, which means our members can save money on their shopping, feed their families really healthily, as well as access other support right in the heart of their communities.
Speaker 1:And this is where we meet to share a slice of life of somebody involved in the bread and butter thing and hear about how they connect with us.
Speaker 2:And this time I met Claire.
Speaker 3:I'm Matt Clare. When I'm shopping, it is a case of okay, what is the essentials that I need and what is the cheapest option I can get, and that's all you're looking for. And then the thing extra is above and beyond that that you can't really afford.
Speaker 2:Does that change your relationship with food?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it does. It does. I think there's definitely been times when I've not been eating as healthily because I want to save the nice fruit for the children. So like a packet of raspberries is a luxury now.
Speaker 2:What does your supermarket shop like compared to what it was? Do you shop around? Do you look for the reductions? Now, do you really strictly plan what you do, and is that how you always were?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I've always been like that to an extent. For sure, Looking back to in the pandemic and even slightly before then, we would sometimes get a Tesco delivery, especially when you've got a baby, and getting out to the supermarket can be a bit of a slog. I wouldn't dream of doing that now because A shopping in Tesco's is too expensive. So I'm going to places like Aldi or Lidl where it's a bit cheaper not much cheaper, but a bit cheaper and you don't want to have to pay for the delivery fee. So things like the bread and butter thing, we have a community grocery that we go to as well, and then I'll go to the supermarket to get whatever left that we need that we couldn't get from there and that's brilliant.
Speaker 2:That's the kind of pattern of behavior that we look for and support and just say, hey, come to us first and then fill up around us, because we've never, we never know what you're going to get, because it's a big surprise yeah, yeah, definitely, yeah, yeah I've always thought that home delivery might help you because you're avoiding the impulses and such and you can get.
Speaker 2:It can really be quite ruthless in how you plan your shopping. Yeah, but you've still got the impulses and such and you can get. It can really be quite ruthless in how you plan your shopping yeah but you've still got the delivery fee and you don't see the promotions and the cheaper supermarkets don't really do home delivery tell me about using bread and butter. You say you sometimes feel guilty.
Speaker 3:I think, because I know there are people worse off than we are. I'm kind of conscious of how privileged we are in that we've had quite a lot of support from family. We own our own home because my parents supplied me with a deposit by my first place. We'd be a lot worse off if we were having to rent. And we also get some support from parents in paying nursery fees and things like that. So we do a lot better than we could otherwise be doing because we have help.
Speaker 2:But it's the kind of banker, mum and dad, that's bailing you out? Yeah, definitely. So we do a lot better than we could otherwise be doing.
Speaker 3:Sure, but it's the kind of banker, mom and dad, that's bailing you out, yeah, definitely. Which you know you wish you could stand on your own two feet.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Baby's waking up.
Speaker 2:Don't worry about Cassidy if he's waking up.
Speaker 3:Hello, hey.
Speaker 2:Cassidy, good to see what's going on.
Speaker 3:What were we talking about? Yes, feeling guilty. So yeah, we're talking about, yes, feeling guilty. Um, so yeah, I think there's. You feel like to use something like a community grocery. You have to be like really rock bottom or you sort of you feel like you don't want to be taking food away from people that might need it more than you, if that makes sense it does.
Speaker 2:It's a really interesting one for me, claire, because I've always seen things like bread and butter as a balance of fairness around a community. It's for all, so we just see everybody the same, and we're not a food bank. We do see that obviously, food banks are there for crisis, etc. There's two aspects to it. Yeah, of course, there's stretching the budget, but the other side of it which I'm getting the vibe that you feel this way, claire it's all about food waste as well.
Speaker 3:Right, Definitely yeah. That's another reason why I do like using it actually, because it's much better someone eats that food than it just goes into landfill. For sure.
Speaker 2:Could you give me a feel as to how you think prices have changed in the last five years? You move in in 2019, everything's great, everything's affordable, and then bangop yeah yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So everything has gone up by varying degrees. Obviously, energy bills are a huge one and you know, you see things about how oil, the price of food, has gone up one, two percent, five percent, but that's not my experience in the actual day-to-day stables. We're talking like 100%, 200% actually increases like double, triple prices of things like butter, meat, just the basics stuff that you buy is like pounds more than it was before and that's everything really. And wages have not really increased at all. So you are just having to do so much more with less. And myself and my husband I would say we are skilled people. You know, we're both university educated but we just can't seem to earn any more than we're already earning. And it's very frustrating feeling like you can't really better yourself any more than where you already are. And especially with when you've got children to look after and you're balancing um child care costs, you've got way less money than you did before kids you know. So, yeah, are you okay?
Speaker 2:hello hello, I can see you just thinking about how it's not your budget that shrunk, but it's the outgoings that has massively increased yeah, definitely so what have you had to do to tighten your belts?
Speaker 3:it's just cutting everything that's not essential really okay, that's an interesting one.
Speaker 2:What do you consider luxury? That probably you 2019 you you probably thought was essential.
Speaker 3:So going out to places, going out for meals, getting takeaways If you want to take the kids out somewhere, you have to think about is it going to cost money? Things like that. Going to the cinema is ridiculously expensive now. So, yeah, I would say we allow ourselves luxury to like streaming services because we think, you know, we can't, we can't really go out anywhere because of both money and children. So if we're gonna, if we're gonna stay sane, we need something to enjoy at home. Um, so that's the luxury we allow ourselves, like buying new clothes. I had to wait quite a few months before I could afford to get myself a new pair of jeans when I had a hole in my old ones. And, like I, you know, I go through our bills every month and check what our outgoings are. Is there anything that that we can cut? Is there anything that we could get cheaper? That sort of thing.
Speaker 2:How would you describe that position now? Going back, Theresa May used to talk about people that were just about managing the jams. Is that kind of the category where you think you are nowadays?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know you get to halfway through the month and you're having to put purchases on your credit card because your money's just not stretching quite far enough. And we're lucky to have family support as well to help with stuff that comes up like emergencies.
Speaker 2:I've been waiting for it. Thank you, Cassidy.
Speaker 3:There's always something like you feel like you're just getting on top of stuff and then something else happens. Like you know, the house needs something doing to it, or the car needs something doing to it, so there's always something where you're having to. Oh okay, we managed to save up that money and now it's gone again, kind of thing so how do you think you'd manage if, if it wasn't for the bank and women dead? We'd be screwed, honestly, we'd be completely screwed that's pretty horrifying yeah, it is.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know how people survive without support. We probably wouldn't have been able to have children, honestly, if my parents hadn't done that for us. Sorry, because this is pulling, trying to pull off my mic, my head no, I can see.
Speaker 2:It's great. I'm enjoying this. I'm sat here watching because I'm going. I remember those days yeah and that that's pretty horrifying, though, to think that Cassidy wouldn't be sat there if you didn't have support from your mum and dad. That's quite historic.
Speaker 3:I'm so thankful that I have had parents who are financially able to give us support and willing to. You know.
Speaker 2:We talk to a lot of people, claire, about the state of the nation and social mobility, etc. The the Tory government basically said that in 2023, there wasn't social decline in this country, and that social mobility is really a thing that, although it's not great at the moment, is happening, really a thing that, although it's not great at the moment, is happening. How do you think you compare to your parents? Do you think you're in a better place than they?
Speaker 3:were at your age. No, definitely not. Financially, we're definitely not as well off as my parents were, even though my, my dad left school with hardly any qualifications and he got a job at a company and worked his way up. In terms of kind of opportunities to progress in employment, that just doesn't seem to be there. I'm going to give me a second.
Speaker 2:I'm going to put this down Just a moment.
Speaker 3:Go for it, go for it hey, you're gonna go sit down for a minute. Hey, come on here, we go there, we go okay. Thank you right, sorry, continue given.
Speaker 2:Given the situation, what? What do you think's changed and what do you think we could do to actually highlight the issues to new government right?
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, yeah. I think if costs are going to keep going up, wages need to go up in accordance with it. Um, it's just I. I don't even know what I would do to earn more. I don't know what more I can do.
Speaker 2:Mobility in companies and the ability to get pay rises seems to be incredibly difficult do you think if you moved out of your area you could actually improve your chances of getting a better wage? I don't think so.
Speaker 3:No, I mean, we live in Manchester. Manchester is a pretty up and coming city. One of the things that is positive, I would say, is the ability to work from home that has increased. I know a lot of companies are trying to row back on that a little bit now and do more hybrid working, but actually it's been incredibly helpful for us because it's helped a lot with child care.
Speaker 2:That's a difficult one, isn't it? How does government look at that cycle, even? Because if they put wages up, prices go up as well, right?
Speaker 3:Well, they say that, but I think one of the biggest problems is the discrepancy in pay between those at the very top and those at the very bottom. If you say the CEO can't earn this times much more than those at the bottom, that would maybe be a better solution Rather than saying well, you know, you've got to put everyone's wages up across the board. I think we need to reduce the gap between the richest and the poorest, because I think that's one of the things that's most frustrating. If it was a feeling of we're all in it together and everyone's struggling, it wouldn't be so bad, but you just know that there's all these people who are earning millions and millions that they don't need, while so many other people are struggling. I think that's what's incredibly frustrating in this country at the moment. It's just that feeling of inequality.
Speaker 2:What did you think about Claire? I thought Claire was great.
Speaker 1:And the reason I thought Claire was great, and the reason that I thought she was great, is that she's making positive decisions for her family, so she's using us to enable. She said that raspberries is a treat.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:To be able to stretch their budget. Clearly they're finding things really tough and they've got little mouths to feed and that the amount of money that they've not got is dictating what they do with their life.
Speaker 2:So adding in bread and butter helps them stretch and hopefully makes them get a few more choices there's some big choices in there as well, because claire was clear that to me she wants more kids, but she can't afford them and doesn't want them. As a result, that's a real tough challenge for her and her family right now.
Speaker 1:They would love to have a couple more kids, but life choices are restricted by budget yeah, that makes her clearly feel a bit stuck when she could have more opportunities and she's hindered because of a financial position yeah, and it really made me stop and think, because Claire said it herself.
Speaker 2:She is, and her husband are both university educated. They both have good jobs and yet they're still stuck. Yeah, what is happening? That means that everybody is feeling so much of the pinch. It sounds really, really difficult. Yeah, one of the other things that Claire was talking about as well was the online versus in-store and how much cheaper it is. This came up on one of the podcasts with Alex as well, but one of the things that didn't which Claire said really clearly, is the discounters just don't do home delivery.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And it clearly doesn't fit in their model somehow, but it just shows that to be able to access affordable, nutritious food, you've still got to go out of your community to do that if you don't have one of the discounters on your doorstep.
Speaker 1:And sometimes the public transport links on there, or it's really tricky to get to those places. So that's also limiting, isn't it for people? Yeah, she also said that the promotions aren't the same. She did On the website. So even if you go into the mainstream stores and get in a delivery, you're still not getting the same bargains as you might be able to get if you were in the shop itself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we get told this a lot actually. So a lot of members would tell you that they follow the reductions around. You shop later and you wait for the clearance items and that's how you shop and that's how you stretch your budget, but none of that ever appears online, right?
Speaker 1:Not at all, and that implies that you've got time to go around and do this at the right time. But if you've got little kids and you've got bedtime and bath time to do, there's no chance that you're going to be able to do that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's difficult. I think that's why we're such a resource for people like Claire because we're on the doorstep. They can access affordable food through us, through the community, food through us, through the community. And I like the idea of it as well, because claire, I would say, is probably more affluent in that community. Two professionals still working charlotte nursery, and yet bread and butter's bringing. It doesn't matter how well off or how not well off you are. Everybody's coming together in that community to use bread and butter in the right way, to access discounted food and other services that we can offer yeah, and stop food going to waste, because the food that we redistribute is surplus food, so there's an environmental thing and meet your neighbors and meet your neighbors which is lovely.
Speaker 2:No matter which one you go to, they're always a chatty bunch yeah, get the feeling of community yeah, claire was definitely somebody that felt the impact of stopping that food going to waste as well and was very much looking at challenging themselves around what they waste.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of members do that. A lot of our members are really focused on making sure that they use all the food that they're given or that they buy through bread and butter thing along with the stuff that they top up with the supermarket. Generally, I don't think anybody wants the household waste because they see it as a bad thing.
Speaker 2:You know I have a thing about this. I know there are many statistics out there about how much the average household wastes in domestic food waste and I would very much say that it's a class thing. I don't believe that people that are struggling to get by waste anywhere near as much, and we should try and work that out and we should try and find more out about that, because I don't think anybody has ever looked at it that way, vic. I think everybody's looked at it generally and I don't know whether people don't want to lean into the fact that the middle class is waste more.
Speaker 1:I don't know, it's a class thing. I think it's. If you're really conscious about where you get your food from and how much it costs you and you're making really critical decisions about do I get this item over that item, then you're going to appreciate it more and want to make sure that you eat it. It's about the thought and the effort that goes into getting it probably makes you appreciate it more. Our members go to great lengths to get affordable, nutritious food for their families, hence why they use us. So I think that that effort, the conscious thought that they're putting into choosing their food, means that they are gonna eat it all and not want to waste anything.
Speaker 2:That's fair enough, but I do think that the more you can afford it, the more you'll waste, and I need to try and do a bit of work on proving that.
Speaker 1:Less thought because you can afford it more. Yeah absolutely.
Speaker 2:I think that food waste in the domestic home, you could argue, is a luxury.
Speaker 1:Yes, and that's another thing that came out on Claire's podcast and the one with James and Braith luxury, you know, what used to be essential and now it's a luxury. That's a real mindset change in, you know, maybe a couple of years. Something that they would just take for granted previously is now seen as a treat, and that also doesn't really feel right.
Speaker 2:No, it doesn't, and it also makes it feel more and more like there is social decline.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we've seen that with our members, that people feel that they're struggling more than their parents did, or that their parents owned a home and they don't. And if you think about Claire, claire got help to own her own home. So we see that across all of our members really.
Speaker 1:We do, we do if you'd like to know more about the bread and butter thing and what we get up to, you can find us at team tbbt, on instagram and twitter, or on linkedin, and maybe even tiktok, or online at breadandbutterthingorg I still think it's a myth that we're on TikTok.
Speaker 2:but there you go, and if you have any feedback or thoughts or ideas for the podcast, you can get in touch with us by email at podcast at breadandbutterthingorg.
Speaker 1:Lastly, we're always open to new members at all of our hubs. If you or someone that you know would benefit from our affordable food scheme, you can find your nearest hub on the Become a Member pages of the website you got it right.
Speaker 2:Well done, thanks, and please do all the things that podcasts ask you to do. Like us, subscribe to us, leave us a review, share us with your friends and chat about us on social and tell your mum, and tell her to tell her friends thank you for the reminder. Yes, tell your mum and we'll see you next time great, see you next time.
