Why the farmers market is cheaper than you think

Everyone assumes the market is a treat. A nice-to-have. Something you do when you want to feel virtuous, not when you want to save money. That assumption is wrong.

I have sent a lot of friends to their local market recently, people who started following these videos and wanted to do something different on a Saturday morning. Every single one of them has come back and said the same thing to me: I am absolutely baffled by how much cheaper it was than I expected.

Not a little cheaper. Noticeably cheaper.

The experiment is simple. Go to the market. Buy eggs. Buy milk. Buy honey if they have it. Then look at the receipt when you get home. Actually look at it, work out the total, and compare it against what you would have handed over at Tesco or Sainsbury's for the same items. My pretty much guarantee is that the number is lower than you think it will be.

The reason people get this wrong is that the market feels premium. The stall, the conversation, the person who can tell you which field the eggs came from. All of that reads as expensive in your head before you have even reached for your wallet. So you walk in braced for a hit, and you walk out having spent less than you budgeted, and you cannot quite explain it.

But the maths is the maths. When you cut out the distribution chain, the central buyer, the logistics, the shelf-stacking, the head office, a meaningful chunk of what you would have spent disappears. The farmer or the smallholder sets a price that works for them directly, and it turns out that price is often sharper than the one a supermarket arrives at after everyone in the middle has taken their margin.

This is not a lecture about where your food comes from. It is not about carbon footprints or food miles or any of that. It is purely about what you spend. The receipt does not lie.

So do one thing this weekend. Eggs, milk, something local. Check what you actually paid. Then come back and tell me.

If you know an independent market trader, a producer, or a stall that deserves more support, you can name them at keepthemopen.com.