As a kid, I remember it was a source of shame to buy own brand products. If someone from school saw you at Tesco with your Mum and a trolley full of budget range food it was an instant cringe. You just knew the whole class would know about it on Monday morning.
I remember begging my Mum to buy Bold washing powder once because I had seen a TV advert for it, and I thought it would make us a trendier family. Whoever produced that commercial did an excellent job on me.
Now I’m a Mum myself, and yeah, I don’t feel that way anymore. If my kids asked me to buy expensive washing powder I would take the extra out of their pocket money 😈
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to be switching out my Heinz tomato ketchup anytime soon, and I like decent coffee which own brand coffee is most certainly not, but I’m not a snob. A lot of own brand products are no different from their branded counterparts. I mean, what can they do to kidney beans to make one tin worth twice as much as another for God’s sake?
For me it started with baked beans and chopped tomatoes, then I slowly began to test other home brand products. Some worked out great and others not so much, but I save soooo much money now I have figured out which are worth buying and which aren’t.
So here are the own brand products I choose every time over big name brands I’ve even taken my own photo’s so you know I’m telling the truth!
Tinned Beans and Tomatoes
You’re absolutely insane if you pay top dollar for tins of baked beans and chopped tomatoes.
These are staples in our house, we go through loads of them. Baked beans for speedy lunches, weekend breakfasts, or those ‘there’s nothing else left in the house’ moments, chopped tomatoes for pasta sauces, kidney beans for chilli, etc. Any tinned beans basically.
You’re going to save a minimum of 50% per tin by buying the own brand option, and what are you paying the extra for? What’s the difference? Honestly, once it’s simmered with garlic and herbs, who cares what the label looked like?
Breakfast Cereals
Not all breakfast cereals, but most of them, especially the basics like Shreddies, Rice Crispies, and Cheerios – those big brands can get in the bin with their £2.50 price tags.
Try 89p for a massive box of the own brand version. My son loves Kraves, those chocolate things, but they are extortionate. The Aldi version is less than a quid (he only has them on a Saturday morning, we aren’t terrible parents).
They’re not exactly the same, but I wouldn’t say they taste any better or worse, just different. Nutritionally the own brand stuff is usually better for you as they don’t cram as much sugar in.
Soaps, Shampoos and Sanity
This is another area that can be hit and miss, but once you find an own brand that works for you the savings are huge.
I do like a few bottles of fancy shampoo and conditioner, but I mix in some own brand products too. I’ve got shampoo bottles all over the bathroom if I’m totally honest, my fella hates it 🤣 I use the fancy stuff if I’m going out or I want a treat, but I use the own brand stuff on a day to day basis. Some of the own brands products aren’t great, I’m not pretending they are, but some are perfectly fine.
I was surprised by how effective most of the unbranded sanitary towels were too. Give them a try.
Toilet Paper and Tissues
There is absolutely no need to buy expensive paper for your snot and your… you know.
The own brand tissue boxes look rubbish in your living room, I know, but you can put them in a nicer container. All this ‘infused with lemon grass balsam’ or whatever is marketing nonsense. It’s soft paper you wipe bogies on. Stop paying over the odds for it.
Toilet paper is a similar story. Although I would usually avoid the very cheapest product on the shelves. There is an actual difference with these products, because the paper is thinner on the really cheap stuff, even if it says 2 ply. You can see through some of them. I want to save money, but not at the expense of… structural integrity, let’s put it that way.
Most supermarkets have a slightly better own brand, and that’s the one I go for. You’ll save £3-£4 per pack of 24 rolls.
Washing Powder and Dishwasher Tablets
Yes, we’ve got a dishwasher, get over it 😝
Ok so this is a big one. A box of Ariel could set you back £10, but Aldi’s Almat range is around £3.50 for the same number of washes. That’s a massive saving. The clothes are still perfectly clean, they smell great, and I can afford to run the washing machine with the savings I make on powder.
Dishwasher tabs are a little trickier in my experience. I’ve found a few own brands that work well, but some of them left streaks or residue. Try a few yourself and see what you think. It probably depends on the quality of your dishwasher and how well (or not) you load it too. But again, you’re looking at a massive saving – around 8p a tablet for home brands and up to 15p a tablet for big brands.
Paracetamol, Ibuprofen, and Vitamins
I didn’t want to just write ‘medicine’ here, because actually, some branded medicines are better than own brand stuff. You have to check the ingredients.
However, the basic stuff just doesn’t need to be expensive. Paracetamol and Ibuprofen should not cost more than 30p a pack. I’m including kids versions like Calpol and Nurofen in that. The unbranded ones are fine.
Vitamins are a similar story, but you need to check the RDIs on any sort of multivitamin, because some of the cheaper ones don’t have enough of each vitamin in them.
Herbs and Spices
It’s dried crushed up leaves for goodness sake! Who is paying £2.20 for the Schwartz jars when you can get the same stuff for 65p, just unbranded?
I empty them all out into some nice little spice jars we have in the kitchen anyway, so even if the own brand labels bothered me they wouldn’t be on show.
This one is just a no brainer for me. You’re practically burning money if you don’t buy own brand spices and herbs.
Track Your Savings
If you do make the switch from branded to unbranded products, make a note of how much you save.
We have a monthly food budget, and noticed we had money left over at the end of the month after we started buying own brand stuff. Instead of letting those savings fritter away, we put them to one side and let them pile up.
We ended up with almost £600 at the end of the year! It paid for Christmas 🎄The 1p challenge is another way to do that if you’re interested, if you do both you could save £1200 by the end of the year.
We were saving roughly £50 a month and didn’t notice any difference. We weren’t scrimping and saving or denying ourselves anything that we wanted. We just bought cheaper versions of the same stuff.
So there you go, easy swaps for big savings!