Price of milk

[ghoti_mhic_uait]

I was just looking into the cost of a milkman, because the price of milk in shops has risen dramatically recently (I suspect the milkman price has too). Turns out the weekly cost of having our milk delivered by a milkman is almost twice that of buying it at Waitrose. That's not quite true, because of petrol coses, but I actually mostly can be bothered to walk to Tesco/Budgens, and therefore only drive (or have shopping delivered) when I need a lot anyway.

Comments

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

We get our milk (plus OJ and bread) delivered by Dairy Crest - it's more convenient than carrying shopping home and our plastic recycling is noticably reduced.

[sparrowsion]

Likewise (minus bread)—it's worth it in the time saved being able to go shopping once a fortnight instead of three times a week.

[eldar.livejournal.com]

The price of milk in supermarkets is approximately the same as doorstep delivery was 10-15 years ago. This is why doorstep deliveries went into decline. Don't forget that any price rises that the supermarkets have to pass on, the milkman will have to pass on as well and they may be steeper rises than the shops.

It is also a fallacy that electric milk floats are somehow "better for the environment":
- Do you realise just how much electricity they use? In general their batteries require charging for 12+ hours each day. Most dairies won't be hooked up to a wind turbine.
- Those batteries? Full of really, really, nasty stuff. Not to mention they require weekly top-offs with distilled water, and there's energy going into making that stuff (and delivering it!) as well.

[olithered.livejournal.com]

Maybe each milkfloat journey uses less energy than everyone going to the shops 3 times a week would?

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

It was Dairy Crest that I was looking at and it just seems too expensive.

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

This may be the issue - I don't regard my time as having a monetary value. I suppose otherwise the half hour a day to collect the milk (I suppose I don't actually go every day, but that's another point) might make a difference. As I have to walk the dog anyway (and if I don't take the dog it's because I'm combining with something else) it's not even extra time or effort.

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

Not if we walk, surely?

[olithered.livejournal.com]

Do you always walk?

[alison-lees.livejournal.com]

Yes, milkmen are only a good idea if you have to buy milk every day and it's too difficult to get to the shops. And if the milk isn't delivered by the milkman until after you've gone to work, (John leaves the house at 7 am) and is delivered by the milkman in plastic cartons instead of glass bottles, then there's no point at all.

[pjc50.livejournal.com]

I'd be interested in some quantification of your milk float slander :) I suspect they do fairly well compared to e.g. a 2L diesel van because they use no energy when stationary..

[sparrowsion]

It's not just my time I'm placing a price on, it's my general well-being. I find going to the supermarket a noticably stressful experience, and it's worth avoiding that. (If I go to the corner shop instead, the monetary saving over delivery is negligable, at the cost of more plastic to recycle and making sure I have cash to hand.)

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

if it's just milk, then yes. If it's not just milk, then we'd be driving to the place where the milk is or having someone else drive from the place where the milk is anyway.

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. I hadn't thought of that, but, again, it's not something that would make a big difference to me.

[badriya.livejournal.com]

What a shame. When I had two small children and a merchant navy husband the milkman was a lifeline. (No! Not for that you murky-minded readers) He delivered milk, butter, eggs, chicken, yoghurt, potatoes, bread and OJ. If one of the kids was ill and I couldn't get out it was handy. And as cheap as the shops.

There was no Ocado delivery then. Ocado and Waitrose are free and one hour slots if the total cost is over £75, or it used to be. Also watch environment and tell you when the van is in your area.

Actually mum was ony 10 mins away by car too and would come over if needed :).

[badriya.livejournal.com]

And I had neighbours with small kids too and we helped each other. 14 terraced newish houses with several young families in them.
I so didn't appreciate how good things were then.

[eldar.livejournal.com]

My father owned an independent dairy for over twenty years; I was the de facto yard manager during the summer - which included basic maintenance of the fleet, which was mixed electric/diesel/petrol. Hence I have a pretty good working knowledge of batteries, chargers, etc.

However it's my father's opinion that milk floats aren't as green as they're made out to be* (and I guess he'd know, he would've got the electricity bills!)

* Except our milk floats were, quite literally, the greenest around. As in painted green.

[eldar.livejournal.com]

That's probably true. It's also probably true that a large number of crimes have been prevented/detected due to the presence of a milkman in a (relatively) quiet vehicle.

[pjc50.livejournal.com]

Interesting - did you charge them during the day or at night? If they're quite expensive because of the electricity, why were they used? What happens to dead batteries (as you say, full of lead and sulphuric acid)?

[ewx.livejournal.com]

I'm fortunate enough to have a choice of supermarkets on reasonable routes to cycle home from work, so I do food shopping (including, indeed, milk) then.

[hatter.livejournal.com]

From an ethical side I wonder if the delivery dairies give more money to the farmers than the supermarkets. But personally I use a milkman because it's convenient for me - I don't go to the supermarket several times a week, I'll buy from local shops as and when I need things unexpectedly, but I don't pick stuff up there as a habit because I'm aware it's more expensive. Part of the high pricing of delivered milk is no doubt due to the lower density of households who use them these days, but there's not much that can be done on the small scale to fix that. Maybe some government subsidies. But perhaps if people didn't need to buy something so frequently from the supermarkets, they'd do fewer, bigger shops.


the hatter

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

But personally I use a milkman because it's convenient for me We have a veg box delivered for exactly that reason.

I'm sure if it took longer than ten minutes to walk to a shop, milk delivery would be more cost effective/buying milk would be less convenient, but for us it's just not worth it.

[alison-lees.livejournal.com]

precisely: our nearest Co-op is two minutes walk away...

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

I suppose going to the Co-op would only take 15-20 mins extra (queueing plus extra walking), but my commute is bad enough as it is.

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

Our weekly bill is 9.08 (8 pints semi-skimmed, 2 pints OJ, 2 wholemeal loaves), but the effort benefit outweighs the financial cost.

[rmc28]

Our Co-op is only 3 minutes walk away, but we get milk delivered because it comes before I get up, and I got fed up of having to go shopping before having my breakfast because one of the housemates (or me!) had finished all the milk the previous night. I really don't function well until I've had breakfast, and I like porridge or cereal if at all possible.

It also means less rubbish for us, as we return the bottles. We recently got them delivering orange juice as well, which is also in returnable bottles, which cut out another source of rubbish for us (and means I rarely miss my morning OJ hit either).

It's definitely more expensive than even the local Co-op, and it has gone up this year (with an apologetic letter explaining so) but it's still not that expensive in the grand scheme of things, and we can afford it, and it makes us happy.

[rmc28]

Forgot to add that the milkman comes 4 days a week not every day, so I also maintain a stock of emergency UHT milk JUST IN CASE we run out on the non-delivery days. This very very rarely happens, but when it does I am very glad for the stock.

[alison-lees.livejournal.com]

which is fair enough, but we don't have housemates stealing our milk, and we buy in larger bottles, so there is milk in our house at breakfast time. Actually, in our old house we did have a milkman, but then we moved to a new place without a milk round and it didn't seem necessary; it might have been nice when the children were smaller, but they're bigger now.

[alison-lees.livejournal.com]

and we never buy UHT either...

[rmc28]

Just to clarify, the housemates weren't 'stealing' the milk, we used to buy big communal bottles. And sometimes it was me finishing the bottle and then realising the shop was shut (or saying "I'll go later" and then forgetting).

I'm not saying you're wrong not to have a milkman, just trying to explain why even with the Co-op so close, a milkman really works for happiness in our household. If I were less lazy or less grumpy first thing in the morning we would probably not benefit so much from it.

[alison-lees.livejournal.com]

I don't mean that you are wrong to have a milkman, just explaining why we don't. I suppose it depends on whether the time you have free to go to the shops is at the same time that the shops is open. Sometimes I am too lazy to shop, and I phone John to make him buy some on the way home instead.