The price of milk is rising so fast at supermarkets that it went up 10p while we were doing an online Asda shop. Our monthly survey of prices has also found that milk has raised by more than 20% in two months.
We have all seen our supermarket shopping bills rise over the past year as a combination of coronavirus, Brexit, lorry driver shortages, fuel cost rises and now the impact of the invasion of Ukraine, but the price of milk has risen above the level of inflation.
Sainsbury's was the first was the first supermarket to push up prices with two pints of milk increasing 10% from £1.05 last Friday to £1.15 on Saturday.
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One shopper from Swansea said the price of milk went when up 10p while he was actually shopping online.
He said: "On Monday night I did my big shop online with Asda, which included four pints of semi-skimmed milk and four pints of whole milk. Both were £1.35 at the time and I completed my order. Later on I realised I'd forgotten to buy a couple of items so I logged back on to amend my order and a message popped up on the screen to say some of the prices had now changed in my basket.
"Both milks were now £1.45, they'd gone up 10p in the time it took me to remember we'd run out of fairy liquid."
Milk is one of the most commonly bought items by shoppers but farmers have complained they are facing rocketing costs of feed, fertiliser and fuel.
While the prices of other staple grocery items have fluctuated, like the cost of cheese, milk is something that has risen sharply in all supermarkets in the last two months.
The price had stayed steady at 95p for the past five months, but that has risen to £1.15 in six of the seven supermarkets surveyed - Lidl, Tesco, Asda, Morrisons, Sainsburys. The cheapest we found for two pints of semi-skilled milk was £1.05 in Aldi.
While some products have risen in price, milk is the one that has risen most - around 21% in two months. Diary producers have warned that the price of milk is set to increase because of increasing energy costs, and because packaging and feed costs have increased by as much as 40%.
Arla Foods' chief commercial officer Peter Giortz-Carlson told Sky News that input costs, driven higher by the war in Ukraine, will have to be passed on to customers.
His company sells dairy products such as Lurpak butter, Cravendale milk and Skyr yoghurt to supermarkets across the country, and said that in his 20 years in the industry, he had "never seen anything like it".
He also said that milk farmers were currently making a loss on their farms due to the rising costs of fertiliser, feed and energy.
We have been monitoring the price of seven staple items for the past five months.
They are:
- two pints of semi-skimmed milk
- a box of 6 free range eggs
- pack of mature cheddar cheese
- 500g of spaghetti
- one loaf of thick-cut white sliced bread
- six Braeburn appeals
- a 12-pack of breakfast wheat cereal.
In June, Lidl was the cheapest but this month Aldi worked out the cheapest again with M&S maintaining it place in second. The basket price went up at Lidl, M&S and Aldi, but did drop in price at Tesco, Morrisons, Asda and Sainsburys.
A Sainsbury’s spokesman said: “We are working closely with our farmers to help them navigate the significant cost pressures we understand they are facing, while continuing to invest in keeping prices as low and competitive for our customers as we can".
Sainsbury’s said that milk prices were also impacted by higher costs of packaging and transport, which has risen by around a third due to fuel prices.
An Arla spokesman said: “The cost of living squeeze is putting real pressure on households at the same time, the cost of producing milk has increased to an all-time high and our farmers are struggling to cover their costs, which is resulting in less milk being produced.
"The cost increases that we are seeing on farm are so significant we do have to pass some of these on to ensure our farmers can continue the supply of products into the shops."
The latest price comparison of supermarkets by Which? found also that Aldi was the cheapest supermarket in June.
They compared prices for a basket of 52 popular grocery items each day during the month of June. The price tracking found that, on average, shoppers would have paid £75.61 for the basket at Aldi – which was £1.38 cheaper than rival discounter Lidl.
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