Birmingham Shopper

Aldi cod in batter

2012-01-30T14:37:00.000-08:00

I don't think we'd had these before, and first impressions weren't very good. This is what the first one looked like upon cutting into it - virtually empty apart from a couple of grey fish flakes. The others were better from the point of view that the batter actually had fish inside it, but the quality of the fish wasn't that good so I don't think we'll try these again.

No food at the inn

2011-05-02T11:29:00.000-07:00

Took us four goes this afternoon to get something to eat... First we tried the Cock at Wishaw. We got there just after 2 and after a long wait at the bar I was told that they'd had to close the kitchen because they'd run out of various ingredients. Then we headed over to the Green Man at Middleton but the direction signs conspired against us and we ended up at The Bassett's Pole. There we were told there was a 30-minute wait for a table inside and if we wanted to eat outside we were only allowed to choose from the bar menu. So off we went again, this time to the Bottle of Sack in Sutton. On the tables there were drinks menus and Tuesday food menus. Assuming that for some reason Wetherspoons had designated today as a Tuesday, we chose from that, only to be told that they were using the normal menu...

History (recent)

2011-04-12T05:30:00.000-07:00

Do you remember the baked-bean price war of the 1990's? Whenever I see beans these days priced around 50p a tin, I look back with nostalgia to a time when 5p was expensive!

Tesco redux

2010-07-20T16:30:00.000-07:00

Tesco must've done something right in order to grow so big, but they aren't perfect by any means. Lured by a £10 coupon, my wife decided to order the groceries online from them. She wasn't impressed, much preferring the Sainsbury's website. An example of one thing we noticed that's worse on the Tesco site is that special offers that run out before the delivery date aren't honoured. Considering that, given the chance, we'd be perfectly happy to pay for the items today, that policy seems ridiculous.

I regularly spot shelf labelling howlers in Tesco. For example:

Don't take orders from children...

2010-07-01T11:21:00.000-07:00

For the second time in as many weeks, I've had to tell the staff off in a fast-food place for entering into the till the requests that our 6-year-old daughter has made. Today it was in McDonald's, where my wife was surprised that her order was so expensive, and then noticed that extra items were being loaded onto the tray. When this was queried, the assistant said that my wife had ordered X and our daughter had ordered Y, to which I said "You take the order from the adult, not from the child," and after I repeated this, the extra items were removed from the tray and we were refunded the difference.

Pimms and Eton Mess at the Co-op

2010-06-26T09:36:00.000-07:00

Good news for people shopping at their Midlands Co-op branch in Fleckney, Eccleshall, Chellaston or Kingstanding: a posh picnic (cucumber sandwiches extra) for a very reasonable price.

Don't bid 99p

2010-06-02T04:44:00.000-07:00

It's irritating, though not surprising, that many buyers on Ebay don't realise that "price ending" (that's giving a price as £9.99 instead of £10) is something that sellers do to attract buyers, and it doesn't work if buyers do it. The latest example I've seen is an idiot bidding £24.99 for a lawnmower, only to be outbid ten seconds later by a non-idiot who bid £25.

The clever way to bid on Ebay is to bid slightly over, e.g. £10.10, so that if someone bids £10 you're still in the lead.

Some discount

2010-04-16T17:10:00.000-07:00

At Lloyds (the chemist), this rather remarkable offer: one ultraviolet toothbrush cleaning system for £31.99, two ultraviolet toothbrush cleaning systems for £20! (Not that I feel I need anything high-tech to help me clean my toothbrush...)

Free Flowers?

2010-01-24T17:00:00.000-08:00

Via Twitter I've just come across www.freeplant.net - a website that claims it will deliver a free bouquet of flowers to anyone anywhere. Weird. I've put in an order, so we'll see!

eBay madness

2010-01-09T09:49:00.000-08:00

When are eBay going to undo their stupid zero-postage policy on book lots? How are sellers supposed to get the books to the buyers if they can't charge for postage? I don't know about other people, but it's a massive disincentive for me to list any books on the site.

AND I notice that many sellers are circumventing this stupid policy by (a) listing their books in categories that allow postage to be added or (b) just adding postage anyway. If eBay want to continue with this stupid policy they need to stop ALL these breaches, but I don't see them doing it. Ergo: scrap this stupid policy.

Idiots.

Improved :(

2010-01-02T15:26:00.000-08:00

We had Aldi's frozen lamb shanks for tea tonight. A good product, but somehow not as good as I remembered it. Putting the box into the recycling bin, I spotted the words "Improved Recipe" and I understood. In the shopping context, eight times out of ten "improved" means exactly the opposite. People who buy products buy them because they like them, not because they nearly like them. About the only decent Johnsons baby product was their baby-bath but then they went and changed it and we had to go back to Infacare.

My wife gets more upset about this than I do: she really resents it when her favourite household and toiletry products are suddenly changed. If only there'd been a warning, we could've bought in a couple of years' supply of the original product...

Tunnocks

2009-12-18T13:46:00.000-08:00

Back in the nineties, when I first discovered Tunnocks Caramel Wafers, I was won over instantly. The thinness of the chocolate was made up for by the glorious chewiness of the wafer. Then later I found there was a sibling: the intriguing Caramel Log with its roasted coconut coating.

Today, for the first time in ages, I thought I'd treat myself to a pack of wafers, and I can't hide my disappointment: they taste like bleach.

Every Little Helps

2009-12-16T12:01:00.000-08:00

I was somewhat gobsmacked when I walked into Tesco in Aston this afternoon. Almost the first thing you see when you walk in is this Darussalam book display. I wasn't sure whether to get my daughter "I Can Wear Hijab Anywhere!" or "Thank You O Allah!"

It was certainly a surprise in the wake of the recent "Please Don't Label Me" billboard campaign. Maybe the billboards should've said "Please Don't Marinade Me".

You can even buy an amazing "laptob" (sic) - a "specious gift for children" (sic again), "very useful for incarcerated persons" (sic!) - trapped in the prison of their tiny minds, no doubt.

No "Hell: Pits of Punishment" though :-( "Full of faith-building information ... A wonderful introduction for impressionable young minds." Maybe if I asked the store manager he could get some in?

I wonder how many UK schools have books like these in their libraries or, god forbid, in their classrooms?

DIY checkouts

2009-12-09T05:46:00.000-08:00

Over on the BBC website, a surprisingly long article about such a banal subject. How many words can it take to say "You either like them or you don't"?

I found them a bit tricky to use at first, but I think I've mastered them now!

Christmas at Aldi

2009-12-06T08:51:00.000-08:00

☼ Lots of nice Christmassy things at Aldi, including their mini-stollens and Baklava selection (both £1.99). Of course I'd prefer my baklava fresh out of a baking tray, but, as you can see, the Aldi version is popular enough!

Bargain Stock

2009-12-04T15:39:00.000-08:00

☼ Having seen them on eBay and on the Web, I popped over to Bargain Stock on Hockley Hill. Slightly disappointing in that they're out of stock on quite a lot of items (most of which won't be restocked) but the guy was very helpful in helping me find what I wanted.

He also showed me round the rest of the place, and apart from the usual electrical stuff he's got quite a large supply of early-years equipment, so your nursery or school should take a look!

Message to America

2009-12-04T15:21:00.000-08:00

Can we start a campaign to ban crap American products from the UK? I saw these in Aldi today, reminding me of a paradoxical fact: American junk food gives junk food a bad name. Pringles are just about acceptable, but "ranch" dressing, Oreos and those pathetic little bagel things that are coated in some disgusting "flavouring" - don't import them and don't licence them. Just don't bother - they're rubbish.

A new scam carpark

2009-12-04T14:15:00.000-08:00

When I went to Sheepcote Street last night to pick Marti up from the Brasshouse Centre, I saw a sight that gave me flashbacks: a car on the back of a truck in the new carpark across the street. Straight away I could see what was going on: this was a scam carpark (scampark for short) and some poor shmuck was watching their car being towed away to god knows where, where it would be held hostage till he coughs up £350+.

I still don't understand why between them the council, the chamber of commerce, trading standards, MPs, the police and the courts can't put a stop to this extortion. In the meantime, be warned: if a carpark's got little notices up like this one, be sure they'll find any excuse to tow your car away. Scamparks are traps: they lure you in with the "promise" of cheap parking, but they make their money from the ridiculous fines that our even more ridiculous legal system lets them get away with imposing.

The NIA

2009-10-13T06:00:00.000-07:00

Why is there always a fly in the ointment? My wife and daughter are going to the NIA on Saturday, which is nice. The tickets arrived today and we were surprised to see the warning "People around you may stand!" Notice it doesn't say that my wife and daughter may stand, but I guess that's the implication. The problem is that my daughter is 5 and won't be able to see much if an adult stands up in front of her, and my wife is unable to stand for prolonged periods.

So I rang the NIA, who immediately and rather brusquely transferred me to the ticket agent. The young lady told me that in her experience people don't stand so there shouldn't be a problem.

My questions are, if someone does stand in front of my wife and daughter, what can they do about it? And why is the NIA allowing standing on the upper tier?

Plonk

2009-10-10T07:18:00.000-07:00

Sorry for being such a cheapskate, but having got use to paying £1 a bottle for wine when I lived in Hungary, I don't like paying more than £4 a bottle in England. Good news, then, that Tesco have a not-bad Chilean cab sav on offer at under a threer. Shame I'm not a middle-class pisshead.

Nescafe

2009-09-28T16:37:00.000-07:00

Last time we ran out of instant coffee, my wife bought Nescafe. All I can say is, it's a triumph of marketing over taste. Terrible stuff.

The OJ paradox

2009-09-19T04:07:00.000-07:00

Judging by Aldi and Tesco, there seems to be a trend to having from-concentrate fruit juices in the fridges and not-from-concentrates (NFCs) on the open (a.k.a "ambient") shelves. I quite like Aldi's 750 ml NFCs, and it's good that they don't take up fridge space at home until they're opened. Tesco have started stocking Eager ambient NFCs - I've tried the grapefruit and I'm not that keen.

But what's with stacking the cheapo juices in the chiller cabinets? It must just be to mislead the punters into thinking they're getting something they're not.

Tesco Tuscan Bean Soup

2009-09-05T07:17:00.000-07:00

☼ I can't believe how much they're expecting us to pay for soup these days - more than 80p a can! I'm loath to buy any at that price, but I noticed that Tesco sell their Lighter Choices soups for half that, and this variety is nice 'n' spicy. (I had a similar experience to this reviewer: a shopper put half a dozen tins of it in her trolley while I was contemplating my selection...)

GranArom coffee

2009-08-30T11:06:00.000-07:00

☼ At £1.35 a jar (from Aldi), not bad at all.

Alliance and Leicester

2008-05-29T09:22:00.000-07:00

I opened an Alliance and Leicester account last year, with a view to switching from First Direct, and I've been reasonably satisfied, but not satisfied enough to cancel my First Direct account!

The most unsatisfactory thing about A&L is the amount of time they take to deal with complaints. The complaint I made last summer still hasn't been resolved! Part of the complaint relates to something that would be funny if it wan't so inconvenient.

On 13 April last year I phoned A&L to make a payment to my A&L credit card account. But when my next bill came the payment hadn't gone through. Within a few weeks my credit card account was suspended (and I've never been able to get the suspension lifted!) The penny (or I should say the £524) finally dropped last month, when I got a credit card bill stating I was £524 in credit. The guy I spoke to last year had put the transaction through for 13 April 2008!

Latif's

2008-05-26T14:09:00.000-07:00

Among Brum's discount warehouses, Latif's is king. A great place for a browse. Ah, but. The car park's too small, and when it's full, your options are limited. Park on a single yellow line on a Sunday afternoon and you'll discover that that's not allowed in Brum, and parking enforcement officers are poised ready to strike. Park in one of the neighbouring carparks and you'll discover they're run by cowboys looking to cash in on their location.

This afternoon I took our daughter for a bit of shopping and decided to park in one of said carparks. We left the store just over the hour and just in time to see my car being towed away. £20-worth of shopping ended up costing £370.

So, Latif's, until you increase your carparking you're too dangerous to recommend.

rateyourmusic.com

2008-02-26T13:39:00.000-08:00

☼☼ This is the place I go to to review music and to list all my CDs and records.

Pemco

2008-02-25T13:19:00.000-08:00

I can't remember how they first got in touch with us, but the Pemco guy came round this afternoon to quote for some double-glazing. But it wasn't quite as simple as that. First of all a guy called to make the appointment and to give us a code number. Then another guy called to check that the appointment was okay. And then when the rep came round, he measured everything and sang his windows' praises, and then the trouble started. I ought to have guessed when he started asking me what I did for a living, and what M did for a living, that he was planning to stay for more than 10 minutes. Then all sorts of info about the guarantees and (aagh) financing.

We've been here before, with Amber, and then with Sharps. It's not possible for these people to come round and give you a quote. What they want is your signature. Oh, it's okay, they say, you've got plenty of time after you've signed to shop around if you want to, and cancel if you need to. But if you don't sign today, you won't get the special price! Ah, the magic price that is going to disappear if you don't sign today.

Pemco rep (nice guy, by the way, who didn't seem cut out for his hard-sell career) first quotes me £4000, but says if we sign, agree to the financing, and agree to one of three special dates for the installation (he goes through the charade of phoning his boss to get these dates and to find out what our discount might be) they can do the job for £3000.

Why do some firms choose this method of selling? Why can't they just give a quote? Am I really supposed to believe that now that I've thrown the rep out they'll refuse to do the job for £3000? Yeah, right.

p.s. We have had work done by both Amber and Sharps, having gone through one of these hard-sell sessions, been persuaded, and signed on the dotted line. Both did adequate work, but not so good that it justifies the prices they charge. And in both cases we got a special deal for using their financing, changed our minds about the loans and paid the lower price in cash.

Moor Hall Hotel

2008-02-25T13:02:00.000-08:00

☼ My wife has just returned from an excellent weekend at Moor Hall Hotel in Sutton Coldfield, where £88 per night gets you a beautiful quiet location, an excellent breakfast and dinner, and full use of the gym, sauna and pool. Her only quibble was that the room was a little small, and looked smaller because of all the too-large furniture stuffed into it.

Restaurant 182

2008-02-14T08:04:00.000-08:00

☼ There for lunch with M this afternoon. It's a great location, so I wonder why it's changed names so often over the years. In this latest incarnation it serves "English cuisine", and we were pretty impressed. The soup and the mussels were fine, and so were the chicken and the liver. M raved about the sauce on the chicken! Lunchtime price: £9 per head plus drinks. The only real quibble is that when M asked for a glass of red wine she was brought a large glass, price £4.35.

Lido di Jesolo

2008-02-13T13:51:00.000-08:00

☼☼ We're thinking about our summer holidays, and one day we'd like to go back to Lido di Jesolo, a great Italian resort on the Adriatic. The main feature is the infinite beach, but there's also good food and nightlife, and Venice is very close.

This page gives a good overview.

Cadbury's Brunch Bar

2008-02-09T11:44:00.000-08:00

☼☼ We've been eating these for years, especially the raisin variety, and they've established themselves as the family's favourite sweet snack.

They sell for around £1.40 (per box of 6) in most supermarkets, which is a bit steep, but most pound shops sell them for... a pound. So when I'm in Poundland I stock up.

Peugeot 308

2008-02-09T10:54:00.000-08:00

The 308 appeared last year. I bought my 307 in February and at that time there was almost no mention of the new model. When I mentioned it to the dealer he said it wouldn't be out till this year, so it smacks of desperation that it was raced out into showrooms pdq.

I don't know whether it's a good car, but I like my 307 and I wish Peugeot well. The first pictures I saw of the 308 looked great, but the marketing photos they've been using for their UK advertising campaign are rubbish. The car looks like a black lump almost indistinguishable from the 307.