A fictional Tesco shopper has announced that the cost-of-living crisis is finally under control after discovering he can spend £100 on trainers and eventually receive £4 towards groceries.
Martin, 41, had originally intended to buy milk. Ninety minutes later he had opened a loyalty portal, compared three pairs of running shoes and explained to his wife that the household could no longer afford not to purchase them.
“We’re getting money back on spending we were already planning,” he said, adding the trainers to the list of things they had already been planning by writing them underneath milk.
The breakthrough came when he realised his prospective voucher might stretch further with selected reward partners. He began researching restaurant bookings to demonstrate how much the family would save by abandoning the dinner already in the fridge.
His wife asked whether keeping the £100 might also help. Martin said this was precisely the sort of short-term thinking that prevented people from getting value out of loyalty schemes.
By lunchtime he had built a spreadsheet showing that a new television, a weekend away and several beauty purchases could make a modest contribution to next month’s shopping.
“We’ve been doing this backwards,” he explained. “We keep trying to spend less when we should be buying enough things to make the milk effectively free.”
He acknowledged that points depended on the retailer and the offer, and that shopping through the correct portal mattered. This gave him a welcome reason to delay going out for the milk.
At 5pm his wife bought it at the corner shop.
Martin said paying full price like that was why they never seemed to get ahead.
