One thing I would have really liked to know before starting uni was how much I could expect to spend on food and groceries. Now I know if you’re just starting you

a) probably have a cupboard overflowing with food and a fridge filled with ready meals and
b) aren’t planning on eating anything except pizza and take-aways during freshers week anyway…

But in case you wanted to know in spite of this, here are my findings and tips:

• I spend between £10 an £15 on my weekly shop, depending on whether I have to buy slightly more expensive things like mince or toilet paper, or if I’ve run out of things that last more than a week, like cereal.
• I plan my meals for one or two weeks. I know this makes me sound a bit obsessive but I swear it really helps! Also, it’s flexible and I often swap things depending on what I feel like, unless I have to cook something before it goes off.
• When I want to buy a certain branded product (say Müller Rice) I look on mysupermarket.co.uk and compare between Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Asda (there aren’t any Asdas close by but they do deliver). It also has Waitrose (yeah right, I’m a student after all!) but sadly not Morrisons. It shows you what’s on offer and you can look where it’s cheapest, and there’s even a new feature where you can be alerted if a certain product is on offer. You can also look for beauty products including at Boots (there’s a massive one at Buchanan Galleries and the St Enoch centre) and Superdrug.
• Poundland has a suprising amount of food and can be good value for things like mini tins of Heinz and Cadbury’s fingers (and lots of other products too of course).
• I usually shop at Aldi for most things. (It’s just down the road and cheap but still tastes nice. Plus you can often find really useful random things there sometimes!) Remember to bring bags though – I use the cloth ‘Strathclyde Business School’ bag I got at an open day once ☺ It folds up nicely and fits in a bag or even pocket. Lidl also has nice food, for example from other countries, and it also sells my favourite Spinach Pizza (it tastes WAY better than it sounds, honestly!)

Other good shops nearby are:

• The (quite) new giant Morrisons that’s more or less around the corner from Aldi. It has an amazing bakery section so do not shop there when you’re hungry – you have been warned! (If you go shopping when you’re hungry you’re more likely to buy stupid things you really don’t want or need, apparently, and you spend way more.) It also has a lot of random interesting things you wouldn’t find in smaller shops that are nice to try and you can buy single vegetables there, which is handy if you’re only needing them for one person and one meal.
• Unfortunately there aren’t any decent sized Tescos close by (unless you want to get a bus to Silverburn which has an awesome huuuge one), but the smaller ones sometimes have stuff on offer, though they usually only sell bigger brands rather than their own brand. There’s a Tesco Express on Ingram Street (basically if you cross the road at Aldi and walk down the street on the right hand side) and a slightly bigger one at the St. Enoch Centre, although that’s a bit of a trek!
• For some reason there are about 5 Sainsbury’s near Strathclyde. I’m not kidding (and I challenge you to find them all!). They’re mostly a bit expensive but stuff like their own brand chicken is good, and if you get your timing right (i.e. through dumb luck as it’s not very predictable) you can find cookies and cakes and other nice things for about 10p in the evenings (the same applies for the Co-Op, the closest is on George Street). There is one on George Street, just down that really steep hill (North Portland Street) from halls, opposite the Co-Op. The one at Buchanan Galleries is a ‘Superstore’ though and therefore bigger and better.

Here is a link to a map of the nearest shops, although you’ll also get given one when you arrive in halls. The directions on Google are sometimes a bit longer, e.g. for Morrisons there’s a shortcut through a sort of car park bit at the junction of George Street and High Street.