M & S Food.

Admiral Huddy

Admiral Huddy

Admiral Huddy

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Joined
17 Feb 2003
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29,640
Location
Chelmsford
Being a keen cook I usually cook for me wife every now and then.

Kids in bed, soft music, candles etc.. I keep my fingers crossed that her legs aren't :D

Anyway, the other day I was running late from work and said I'll have to pick out something nice from M&S.

I bought 2 x chicken, ham and mushroom fillets, 2 x vegs and some mash.

The lots came to over £15.00.

Now is it me or is this "It's not just food, it's M&S food" gone a bit to their heads and their pricing. Our local Carvery is only £8 per head. I know it's convenient bit it takes the biscuit really. Yet some people in the store appear to be actually doing their weekly shopping their.

Is this just so called "designer" food without the label or just over priced and over inflated.. bit like the rest of the country.


Do you buy M&S food produce? What do you think?
 
I do buy M&S food produce, and it is over priced. I don't do the bulk of my shopping there because of the price, but its a damn sight nicer then the usual supermarkets.
 
The food quality has gone down and their prices have gone up. All they seem to do these days is to repackage the food and move it around the shelves in food hall every month. We have stopped shopping there.
 
I only go there if I need to grab something for lunch (usually a pasta salad or the triple wrap pack, and a fresh granola bar). Most of their standard fare is nicely presented and convenient but on the whole not that much better than any other supermarket.
 
When I take the usual monthly trip to Bournemouth with the wife so she can shop, we do go into M&S for a look around.

They are getting a little carried away with the marketing cliche and do charge some extortinate prices for some items.

They do a fantastic bottle of Chateauneuf de Pape in there and she normally gets her 3 boxes of Cheese Straws (says its her way of accounting for my wine).

It gets me how many old people actually do their weekly shopping in there :eek:
 
M&S food is lovely but I couldn't do a weekly shop there, for a combination of price and them not having everything you'd need. They've got lots of choice in specific areas, but not the full range of things like a supermarket.
 
they over package EVERYTHING - all the rubbish they spout about not giving away plastic bags (which i approve of) only to individually shrink wrap everything bigger than a single grape :mad:

and yes, also ridiculously overpriced for what you get
 
Admiral Huddy said:
2 x chicken, ham and mushroom fillets, 2 x vegs and some mash.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't it have been cheaper if you made the fillets yourself rather than buying them pre-made. Did you actually buy pre-made mash or just a potato? Pre-made mash is a silly price everywhere when you can make it's the easiest thing in the world to make..
 
fini said:
Wouldn't it have been cheaper if you made the fillets yourself rather than buying them pre-made. Did you actually buy pre-made mash or just a potato? Pre-made mash is a silly price everywhere when you can make it's the easiest thing in the world to make..
Click to expand...

What if you have had a busy day at work and cba ?
 
fini said:
Wouldn't it have been cheaper if you made the fillets yourself rather than buying them pre-made. Did you actually buy pre-made mash or just a potato? Pre-made mash is a silly price everywhere when you can make it's the easiest thing in the world to make..
Click to expand...


As said, I was running very late from work and I promised the Mrs I'd do a meal.





Also why do all M&S sandwiches have mayonaisse? Yuk.

Since when has cheese and pickle sandwhiches had mayonaisse? It's just wrong!
 
I disagree when it comes to sandwiches. I go to M&S food every lunchtime from work. The sandwiches are second to none, top quality ingredients, good combo's and ironically, the best value for money i've seen.

My favourites are:

Taw Mature chedder with celery dressing - £1.35
Wensleydale cheese, leaf salad and caramelised carrot chutney - £2.00 (it's unbelievably tasty)
Freerange Eggo mayo - Mature chedder ploughmans - Roast chicken and stuffing - £2.85.
Rare roast beef and horseradish (loads of beef!) - £2.65.

Now, i'd be hard pushed to find that expensive. You get what you pay for. I could goto somerfield over the road and maybe get a plain cheese sandwich for £1.20, which tastes awful.

The service is outstanding also, it's like you're a VIP (where i am anyway). the extra 10-20p premium on the sandwiches for top ingredients and taste, is nothing.
 
Their chicken breasts are the best around for me, twice as nice as Tesco or Asda. Unfortunately it's about £10 for 8. :( Also their fruit is about 10 times nicer than any other supermarket.

We tend to do all our major shops at ASDA (which is also getting extremely expensive nowadays).

The main bonus of shopping at M+S, for me, is the lack of crowding. It's a much more serene experience even at 11am on a Saturday. Shopping at a major supermarket (at the same time) is hell.
 
I find it very amusing that people do their food shopping in M&S. Ok some of their products might be of high quality etc etc, but the every day things you get in there are exactly the same as you'll buy in any other supermarket but twice as expensive!!!

A friend of mine worked in a cheese factory one summer. She told me that they would be packaging up own brand cheese for the likes of kwiksave or morrisons etc , all from the same batch of the cheese, then they'd stop, change the packaging over to M&SW packaging and continue, still using the exact same cheese, but the prives on the packages were approximately twice as high for the exact same product!!!

I seriously doubt this is an isolated occurance and is much more likely to be the norm.

I certainly wouldn't shop there under any circumstances!!!

Valve
 
it is expensive but they do some nice stuff. those melting chocolate pudding things are really nice and they do those mini tartlet things which i've not found better elsewhere.
 
Mayo is lovley on everything, so thats a disagreement from me. However as for the price and quality. As saif already, quality has gone down, price has gone up and it is very difficult to tell the difference between non prepared food from M&$ and from anywhere else. Same for bread etc. The things like jams, soups and other prepared foods like that is all very very nice but over priced and some of the time other places sell the same stuff but tastes the same for half the cost. its a mixed bag but in general i don't think it's worth it.

-Pea0n
 
I used to shop there quite regular, but then the new advertisements went on air and whilst the changes to the stores format didn’t take effect overnight the quality of their foods has suffered.

It used to be that M & S food was for most part very comparable to having the best you could get, at an affordable price. Although by no means cheap food, it was good quality at a price that wasn’t over the top.

Now, I feel the price of their foods is certainly outstripping the quality, and for me shopping there just isn’t worth it no longer, and you might as well just shop at Waitrose. Don’t get me wrong, some of the M & S foods are still very good, but a lot of the pre packed convenience foods are very expensive, and obviously marketed towards those who earn above average salary and aren’t too fussed about preparing their own foods, just bung in the oven, and have done so to speak.

There are however one or two products from M & S that do justify the prices. Their meat products and veggies however you’d be better off just finding a very good local butcher and farm shop for the same price and they’ll better M & S each time. Although their chicken is 'very' good at times. Just far too expensive, £7 for a meduim chicken is taking the ...... The bacon is also quite tasty but again pound per pound just too expensive....

If you want ‘decent-ish’ convenience food seems M & S has a purpose, I’ve made many a Chinese or quick pie and mash using their foods in next to no time, but sometimes, it’d be cheaper for to have dined out. Certainly a store that has changed from home cooking to just threw in the oven and have done with it.

I also now find their packaging over the top, and they now charge for plastic bags, yet still package apples in trays etc….. Hmm… Not too bothered about paying for plastic bags, as they aren’t bio-degradable, but please M & S, use less of your own packaging…. Tesco and other supermarkets are no better to be honest…
 
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