Christmas Food Shopping
Food Shopping At Christmas
The Pressures
Saturday was a busy morning. We scrapped plans to go see the Christmas stuff in Manchester city centre due to the weather. The girls went to the local retail park whilst I took Bowie on a lengthy road walk. Whilst the weather did ease from earlier, all parties still managed to get a damn good soaking. Once we’d all arrived back at HQ and eaten lunch (or in my case due to my shift pattern, breakfast!), me and Larice made the executive decision to go to Tesco.
As Jim Diamond said back in the 80’s “I should have known better”. Supplies were low. The meat from Muscle Food was due yesterday, but we cannot live on meat alone! As we work different shifts, sometimes we just don’t get our shit together to do an online shop so to the store we headed. Always a bad idea on a Saturday afternoon a few weeks before Christmas.
Problem #1
Booze
The moment you walk in, you are confronted with “bargains”. Lots of yellow Clubcard stickers and a nice welcoming ‘Merry Christmas’ sign. Oh yes, that’ll make you feel festive straight away! Only at Christmas will supermarkets thrust a heap of cut-price booze in your face! I nearly fell for the ten quid Baileys.. I’m sure many did! This is how clever supermarkets are with marketing. Christmas is naturally worse than any other time but when you think about it they’re at it all year round. They are a business and it’s their business to make money out of us!
An observation is there is none of the ‘hard stuff’ (spirits) but the shelves are laced with liquors and wines. The only reason for this I can think of is to ease you into the whole buying more than you should process and to not promote the ‘hard stuff’ too soon! Those are the kind of things you would drink at Christmas dinner. A clever manoeuvre sticking the Baileys on top, it’s your classic opening your presents at 10 AM drink. A lot of us associate Christmas with BaiIeys. I did a business degree in a past life and this is exactly the kind of stuff we were taught! They’re sneaky beggars!!!! And the discount is probably the best they have in store, a tenner for a bottle which usually retails at 22!
Problem #2
Goodies
And to the left of the nice, welcoming shelves of Christmas-themed booze, your other Christmas classic… sweet, addictive goodies! The out-of-reach Christmas crackers at the top are just there for decoration. Everything has a yellow Clubcard sticker, bar the chocolates at the bottom which are a set price of a fiver. I’m not the only person of a certain age to notice how the chocolate tubs (used to be tins back in the day!) have got smaller with no price increase over the years. I’m sure a massive tin was a fiver back in the 80’s! And the chocolates were practically spilling out!
Nowadays, there is more air in the tub than chocolates! I get that prices have increased but the reality is nobody would pay £10-£20 for a tub of chocolates. Good move, keep the price the same but give you less product. I have no problem with that. The 80’s were some 40 years ago!
Dealing With The Pressures
When Things Get Tricky
What you see above is a recurring theme throughout the store. All are designed to make you purchase. My family has been there, spending more than we should. Christmas is worse than ever now with aggressive marketing. If you are trying to lose weight, you must stay strong and focused. You’ll thank yourself when it’s over and the buttons on your clothes aren’t popping. Everything you see is tailored to get inside your brain. You have to stay strong.
Booze, goodies, booze, goodies, gifts, booze, goodies. Just relentless. Bargains galore, fill your trolley to the brim! We’ve all seen people with trolleys so full they can barely move them!
Easier Said Than Done!
Temptations
Yep, I get that. It’s a much easier option to bow down to the pressures of the season and gorge. I mean, it’s what they want! The diet can wait until the 2nd of January, that’s when it starts! Great but if you’ve gorged on the so-called “good stuff” for two weeks or more, the sudden change to a healthier lifestyle will be even more difficult. Starting 23 October was perfect for me because it gave me time to reprogram before the hardcore nonsense of over-indulgence at Christmas truly kicked in. Never in a million years did I think I would be so focused so near to the “big day”. And I bloody hate it being referred to as “the big day”. Nothing more than a glorified Sunday!
The food and drink temptations were littered around the store. I mean I love all that booze on the shelf. More Baileys, top two rows! JD for 19 quid a bottle! Spiced rum for 15! I had to blank all this out. Took a photo and quickly moved on!
Try And Limit
You’ll Thank Yourself
If you are desperate to lose weight and struggling with Christmas food shopping, at least try and limit what you buy/consume. I know people have demanding families. Kids can be hellish at Christmas but think of yourself and what you do. Just because you have it in the house, you don’t have to eat it! That is the most difficult aspect. Being firm and strong. It’s probably too late to stay focused since Christmas is in full swing. There are a few things you can do to limit weight gain such as weighing yourself the Saturday before and after Christmas. All too often I’ve been guilty of not weighing myself for the whole of December and the weight just piles on. Try not to fall for sneaky marketing tactics.
Shop Online Then!
Surely That’s Better?
I’d argue this point. Fantastic you don’t need to leave the house and are not battling with crowds, but they’re at the same old marketing ploys. It doesn’t matter whether you shop in-store or online. We sometimes food shop online and in some ways, the marketing tricks are worse. I mean, you are nice and relaxed at home. Bargains galore are thrust in your face. They even have their own section dedicated to Christmas! You can even do the shopping with a nice glass of sherry which might hamper your way of thinking. Doesn’t matter where you do your Christmas food shopping, same rules apply.
The convenience aspect of online food shopping is always going to be a better option than going to the store but you still need to be careful. My advice is to have a list and stick with it. We’ve been guilty of spending more online than we planned, same with in the store. We stuck with our list on Saturday and that worked. And by Jove, we had to wade through a lot of buy this for Christmas stuff!
More clever tricks, no food for sale but some nice-looking foodstuffs into the picture above! All are designed to make you think of food.
Summary
Christmas Food Shopping
Christmas food shopping is designed to make us eat and drink too much. Images are everywhere, bargains are everywhere. Nobody wants to think about losing weight, that can wait till after the new year, right? Wrong! Don’t fall for this endless crap. Indulge by all means but limit your indulgence. Start thinking healthier lifestyle and healthier living. So much of Christmas is designed to make us overindulge. And we fall for it, time and time again. I feel thankful and blessed I am going into this yuletide season with the right attitude.
Just try and limit your over excesses. Nobody is suggesting depraving yourself at Christmas but if you let yourself go then your asking for serious trouble. And that diet you planned for January will be a little easier if you take action now. Just think a little smarter and realise what is going on. Nobody had a weaker mind when it came to food than me! Being strong takes hard work but is also extremely rewarding.
Midweek Update
The week so far has been excellent. I’ve stuck to the plan 100%. And there have been many hurdles in my way. The sheer amount of cakes and chocolates at work yesterday was bordering on scary. But, I stood firm and stayed standing. I’m blanking everything out, staying focused and concentrating on other things (like my actual job!!). Yes, I know one chocolate won’t kill me (and Monday I consumed two hobnob biscuits in a controlled, sensible manner) but I fear should I eat one chocolate, it could well descend and spiral into many more.
