Swan Rescue

Another of our Yorkshire holiday trips was a visit to Lightwater Valley Theme Park, once again courtesy of Tesco Clubcard vouchers.

Two things made an impression on our arrival at the park – the lovely countryside setting and the amazing animatronic dinosaurs at the entrance.

On entering the park properly, the first area that we came to was filled with fairground rides, although we soon realised our favourite of these (the dodgems) was missing. What did grab our attention was the birds of prey centre, which we thoroughly enjoyed. Containing many species of owls and other birds, and even a small snake section, this made for interesting viewing and a change from the rides.

A wide selection of rides are on offer at the park, a good number that are suitable for younger children, as well as some more daring thrill rides. The park setting is great for picnics and the little train that runs round the park is a good way to view what’s on offer.

The Lightwater swan rescue begins!

One of the more traditional attractions available is the pedalo ride, little boats in the shape of swans. We fancied a relaxing trip across the lake, so we climbed aboard. The boats hold four people and are operated by a steering wheel as opposed to a tiller. This should have been straightforward, but unfortunately we were assigned a boat that malfunctioned.

A short way into our ride the steering would no longer allow for a right turn. “Never mind”, we thought, “We’ll just do a circuit bearing left.”

But no! It then refused to go in even a straight line (having jammed) and would only send us round in small circles. As we started to drift into the bank, we waved at the attendants on shore – who promptly ignored us!

For some time we debated how best to remedy our situation, until finally another family came along and offered to tow us in. This was not as easy as it sounds, as both boats kept drifting, but after a concerted effort, we made it back to dock – some 40 minutes after setting out!

The young girls managing the ride were still oblivious to our plight, and looked blankly when we tried to explain. However, we eventually managed to persuade them to contact maintenance and left it in their hands.

Looking back we found the situation slightly comical, but at the time it was extremely annoying!

Our saviours!

Apart from this blip, we quite enjoyed our day; Lightwater Valley is a bit different from other theme parks that we have visited.

July’s Jaunts

Have been a bit quiet on the blog front of late, life has a habit of taking over, and I’ve recently returned from a holiday in Yorkshire. We stayed at the Tollerton Caravan Park, some 10 miles north of York, which proved to be a very peaceful place – well, except for the train line on its border!

Anyway, there will be lots to report on with regard to that trip, including visits to Lightwater Valley Theme Park (watch for the interesting tale of the swan pedalo rescue), Rievaulx and Byland Abbeys and The National Railway Museum (a bit of a sting in the ‘tale’ with this one, or more specifically a burn on the belly).

So that’s a taste of future posts, but in the meantime, before I leave the Yorkshire theme, a word of warning if you’re visiting Thirsk. The short stay car park in front of the Wetherspoon’s in the town square, states that parking is free for up to 60 minutes. However, what is not immediately apparent is that you still have to press for a ticket to record your time of arrival. We missed this bit and were almost presented with a parking ticket, but fortunately our mistake was pointed out to us by a friendly parking attendant (yes, they do exist) so that we could remedy the situation in the nick of time!

As with any holiday, we returned with bags full of washing, only for the washing machine to go into meltdown. There’s no doubt that appliances do tend to pick their moments to break down! However, following my favourable experience of buying a new fridge/freezer from Co-op Electrical online, I headed straight to the website in search of a new machine. I was thrilled to find a sleek silver Beko number, at an astounding £110 off, which boasted rave reviews, so I wasted no time in placing my order. This was on the Monday – by 9.00 am Wednesday morning the machine was here and raring to go! I’m extremely pleased with it, and will be looking at reviewing it in more detail in a future post.

Earlier in the month we returned to a favourite visitor attraction of ours – Dover Castle. Having rejoined English Heritage this year (courtesy of Tesco Clubcard vouchers) we were eager to make the, now free, trip. However, this meant journeying across Kent, a manoeuvre greatly hampered by the existence of Operation Stack, which is still in place as I write. The journey was a nightmare, with many other roads on route log-jammed as a result. We finally arrived at the castle over an hour later than we should have done, but fortunately went on to have a lovely visit.

For those of us living in Kent, Operation Stack is a nightmare, which needs to be remedied by creating decent lorry parks just off the motorway. Of course, the source of the problem is far more complex, with its origins in Calais, which also need to be addressed.

So with July coming to a close it’s been a busy, but interesting month, now I’m just waiting for the return of summer, which I hope is just round the corner!

June’s Japes

The warmer weather has seen a return to the family picnic. One of our favourite picnic spots is Reculver in Kent, where we recently enjoyed another lovely trip. For those of you not familiar with Reculver, it’s on the North Kent coast and is the site of a former Roman fort, still boasting the ruin of a 12^th century church. The area is also a country park with small visitor centre and has a beach complete with rock pools. Car parking is a bargain, at 20p per hour or £1 for the day! However, the car park is not that big, sometimes resulting in queues. Despite that it’s a great place to visit.

Of course, a picnic isn’t complete without the food, for which I turn to the Tesco picnic range for additions to the usual home-filled rolls and healthy fruit. Their tubs of picnic goodies can be bought on a two for £3 deal, and include pasties, cheese onion rolls, pizza pockets and our new favourite, mini chicken kievs.

Until last year we owned a static caravan, which we kept on an independent site on the Norfolk/Suffolk border. However, following our rural move, we decided to sell up and just in the nick of time it now emerges! When we’d first bought our caravan we’d kept it on a Park Holidays site in Kent, but due to astronomic charges and appalling service, we moved to an independent site – Broadland Sands. Now I’ve heard this once lovely caravan park has been taken over by, you’ve guessed it, Park Holidays – a company that I do not recommend. If we hadn’t already removed our caravan from the site, we would now!

In light of that last revelation, you may like to read Static Caravans Can Move and Static Caravan Update

Finally, having had a couple of years break from English Heritage, we’ve just rejoined using Tesco vouchers. For £30 worth of vouchers, we’ve been able to take out a year’s joint membership (includes up to six children under 19 free), which is great value considering the number of places we can now visit at no extra cost. It’s a great use of Tesco Clubcard vouchers!

How did June work out for you?

Shopping Heaven Is...

Finding an item of clothing on a sale rail that is actually your size!

Stopping for an indulgent treat!

Finding an item of clothing on a sale rail that you’d coveted for ages at an outrageous price, now being sold for a bargain – and it’s actually in your size!

Money-off vouchers – and lots of them!

Being served at the till and discovering that an item that you are purchasing has actually been charged at a much lower price than you’d expected.

Finding just what you were looking for!

Fast, friendly service and hardly any queues.

Bargains, bargains, bargains!

What's your idea of shopping heaven?

A Move To Morrisons

Since moving to a new, more rural location last year, my shopping habits have changed somewhat.

At my old home, I did my main grocery shopping at the local Tesco Extra, with smaller top-up shops at Sainsburys’ and the Co-op, but all that has changed since the move.

My current nearest Tesco is rather smaller than the Extra at which I once shopped, with far fewer product lines on the shelves, making it impossible to replicate all my most common buys. Although the store can meet a lot of my needs, it falls short on others.

Similarly, I have neither a Sainsburys’ or Co-op within easy reach, so have needed to look elsewhere. Attempts at buying groceries in Aldi failed dismally, I couldn’t get on with their products at all, and although I like Lidl better, the journey to the nearest branch is too far to justify any savings. And when it comes to grocery shopping, I’m not a fan of doing it online, as I like to scrutinise the meat, carefully select the fruit and veg and take the time to mull over relevant offers.

Therefore, my weekly shop now tends to be divided between the smaller Tesco, and Morrisons’, as there is a large branch of this store near to said Tesco.

On my first few visits to Morrisons I tentatively tried a selection of own brand products, as well as selecting some well-known labels that were on offer. I decided that many of the products were of good quality and therefore represented good value, an opinion further enhanced by the introduction of the Match and More card. This loyalty card price-matches your purchases not only with other leading supermarkets, but also with Aldi and Lidl, converting any extra money that you have paid on your comparable Morrisons’ shop to points, which then accumulate until you have sufficient to be awarded a £5 voucher. Despite targeting many own brand and offer items in my shop, I always seem to earn points, and have received several £5 vouchers, further reducing my shopping bill.

In addition to this, Morrisons have been sending me a variety of additional money-off vouchers through the post – they’re really making an effort to gain custom!

I’ve now also become a fan of certain of their own brand products. Here are a few of my favourites:

Morrisons Laundry Gel (Bio) 540ml (up to 18 washes) for just £1.75 – just as good as the Ariel version in my opinion and much cheaper!

Morrisons Pure Fabric Conditioner £1.50 (up to 42 washes) is a great bargain buy that leaves my laundry really fresh.

Morrisons Bolognese Sauce 725g for 99p, we actually preferred this to many other makes that we have tried.

Morrisons Chilled 100% Fruit Juices, 1-litre bottles, 3 for £3 (£1.29 each), not only are these really tasty, but there is such a great range of flavours. In addition to the normal apple, orange and pineapple, I love the apple and mango, Clementine, apple and pear and red grape and berries.

I’m also a big fan of their deli items, such as vegetable samosas and olive selections, and am pleased to see that their meat tends to be sourced from British farmers.

It would definitely seem that I’ll be doing much more of my weekly shopping in Morrisons in the future.

January’s Highs And Lows

It’s been a strange month. The weather has been freezing cold one moment and unseasonably mild the next. With a general election looming this year, there have been debates on how and even whether there should be party debates and slanging matches have started between party leaders.

I’ve been trying to keep warm in the ‘glorified shed’ (you can keep up with the latest on that at www.ruraljoy.blogspot.co.uk) and despairing as to whether any party leader is actually fit to run the country!

 

Anyway, here are a few of my other highs and lows for the month.

Highs

Discovering a handy website for knitting patterns and wool, as I had been very frustrated at the lack of decent patterns available. My local craft and wool shop only seems to stock patterns that appear to belong in the 1970s and knitting magazines tend to print lots of patterns for small items, with only the odd cardigan or jumper that may or may not be appealing. I was very pleased therefore to discover www.deramores.com where you can sign up for a newsletter giving you access to free patterns as well as purchase reasonably priced patterns and wool. My order was processed and despatched literally within hours and I was very pleased with my purchases.

Grabbing some late sale bargains, including a pair of trousers from Wallis reduced from £30 to £10, a cardigan from Dorothy Perkins down from £25 to £10 and a perfume set from Boots for just £8 as opposed to its original £28! That amounted to £83 worth of shopping for just £28 – well £20 actually, as I used my Boots Advantage points for the perfume!

Receiving my first £5 Morrisons’ Match and More voucher, despite only purchasing quite minor amounts of shopping in the store and targeting offers most of the time, these points still added up very quickly!

Enjoying Father Brown on TV, although why it’s shoved into an afternoon slot on BBC1 I don’t know – it would make great evening viewing. In fact, that’s exactly when I do watch it, as I record it on my Humax box. It has a great cast and if you’ve never seen it I strongly recommend you start watching!

Lows

Finding out that Sainsburys’ online grocery shopping slaps on an extra charge for orders under £40, although I can report that Tesco only put an extra fee on the bill for orders under £25. My elderly mother-in-law particularly wanted to order some groceries from Sainsburys’ and enlisted our help. As she is only catering for herself, we checked that the minimum order for delivery was indeed £25. It was not until we got to the checkout stage, that we discovered the extra charge. Fair enough, there has to be a minimum amount to make delivery viable, but I don’t believe any supermarket should be charging extra for orders above the £25 mark.

The return of Broadchurch to our TV screens has been somewhat of a disappointment to me. I’d read various articles saying that the story was going to be really different and exciting, yet half of the programme each week seems to be going over old ground and dwelling on the court case relating to the last series. I would have much preferred more emphasis on a new story than dredging up the past – I can only hope it will improve as the weeks go by.

Reading ‘Natural Causes’ by James Oswald, which I’m not criticising for its writing or characterisation, but purely saying the plot was not for me. I like a good detective story, but this was too gory for me, with a higher body count than even a series of Midsomer Murders! It has some great reviews, but personally I prefer a little more mystery and a little less graphic content.

A Year In Supermarkets

With only weeks left of the present year, I thought it was time that I started looking back at some of my shopping experiences for the year, and in particular, what has been happening with the supermarkets.

Tesco were in the news this year for dodgy accounting, which has resulted in a criminal investigation. Now whilst this is serious stuff, and we should theoretically be concerned, as a shopper, I’m more interested in what is actually happening at ‘ground level’ so to speak. All the while I can go into a Tesco store, find what I want at a reasonable price, get good service from the staff and earn valuable Clubcard points I will continue to shop with the chain. They certainly operate the best loyalty scheme around, with points amounting to four times their value when exchanged for days out and Clubcard send out a regular supply of relevant money-off and extra points vouchers too.

Sainsbury’s, on the other hand, announced that they are set to cut the number of Nectar points that you earn on your weekly shop. (Loyalty cards) With their loyalty scheme already offering a poorer deal than the likes of Tesco I don’t think this is a very clever move. They are, however, pledging to cut more prices, so we’ll have to see how all this works out in practice.

Morrisons launched their new ‘Match & More’ card this year, (I want more) an interesting twist on a loyalty card, whereby you earn points on items that you would have been able to buy cheaper elsewhere – a price comparison that includes the likes of Aldi and Lidl as well as the other major supermarkets. What pleased me about this card was that Morrisons offered three options when it came to registering the card – online, by post or in store – a refreshing change from companies that expect you to do everything online!

Asda has never been one of my favourite supermarkets, but they’ve certainly put themselves in the doghouse recently. My daughter placed an online grocery order with them, but the goods never actually materialised (Oh dear Asda) and despite phone calls, completion of an online form, a blog post and a Twitter conversation (which reaps results in most cases) the company failed to properly apologise for the inconvenience, or offer any explanation as to what went wrong. Needless to say it’s not an experience she has rushed to repeat. In fact, my prize for “The Worst Customer Service of 2014” is hereby awarded to Asda. Perhaps they’d care to take note!

Whilst I continue to give Aldi a wide berth, having rated previous shopping experiences with them at 2/10, I have become a bit of a fan of Lidl. For me, Lidl have been one of the great emerging retailers of 2014. Most recently I’ve found them a great place to stock up with Christmas spirits – port, cream liqueur and cherry brandy all costing around the £5 mark, and tasting delicious – and I love their Stilton too! I’m sure that I’ll have much more to say about them in 2015.

So wherever you shop, I hope you’ve had good experiences this year – if not, let me know, I’m always keen to hear your shopping stories too!

I Love My Loyalty Cards

Like many shoppers, I was quite incensed to hear that Sainsburys’ are halving the amount of Nectar points that they award to customers as of April next year. They will only be awarding one point per pound spent, as opposed to the current two (two points are only worth 1p ).

It’s true to say that Nectar points always have been slightly inferior to those awarded by Tesco Clubcard, with the exchange rate of the latter being four times their face value when converted to Days Out vouchers, and each point being equal to 1p .

There are some shoppers (misguided in my opinion) that question the value of loyalty cards, but I believe that any reward you are given for shopping is better than no reward at all.

Less effective than a loyalty card

The argument goes, that if stores are operating reward schemes, they subsequently have to set their prices a little higher to offset these incentives. However, I would refute this, as many good value items I buy are purchased in shops that offer reward points.

Many of the products that I purchase in places such as Tesco and Superdrug, are not only cheaper or at least comparable to those offered at other shops, but earn me points. Over the years I have acquired so many points under the Clubcard scheme, that we have been able to pay for several family days out each year, including trips to expensive theme parks, which we would not otherwise have afforded. Even if I have occasionally paid a few pence more for the odd product or two, I have received this amount back umpteen times over. It’s true to say, that if I could have bought some items slightly cheaper elsewhere and put the pennies I’d saved into a savings account, I would not have accumulated anywhere near enough to pay for the equivalent number of fun outings.

I regard all loyalty cards (and I can boast a considerable collection) as mini saving schemes that allow me to enjoy life’s little extras. Unless prices are considerably higher in a shop that offers a good value scheme, I am unlikely to shop for identical products somewhere that does not offer me these extra benefits.

So my message to Sainsburys’, and any other stores planning to reduce or withdraw their points schemes, is that this may result in a customer-cutting exercise as opposed to your intended cost-cutting one!

Thank You Tesco Clubcard

I’ve previously written about my frustration at how more and more businesses only want to conduct transactions or communications online. Although I’m happy to use this method for certain things, there are cases where I prefer to get in touch by phone or letter, or even in person.

My argument against the emphasis on things being ‘online only’ has been that some people still do not have Internet access or the skills to use it.

I was recently without Internet for some time (during my 'big move' ), but wanted to exchange some of my Tesco Clubcard points for days out vouchers. Forms used to be provided for doing this by post, although this no longer seems to happen. In addition to encouraging the ordering of vouchers online, Tesco now operate a system whereby they email some of their vouchers to customers to be printed at home. A straightforward system when you have the facilities to do so, but not so good if you don’t.

However, after having communicated with Tesco Clubcard, I’m happy to report that vouchers can be ordered by post or over the phone. If you are unable to supply an email address (as I couldn’t for a short time) then they will print vouchers and send them to you.

So if anyone else is looking for the more traditional way of exchanging Clubcard points, here are the details:

By post: Tesco Clubcard Boost, PO Box 654, Crawley, RH10 1RG (You need to send a request by letter, not that there is no form available).

By phone: 0808 100 0707 (free from BT Landlines) or 0330 123 0707 (charged at local rate from mobiles and private telephones), Option 2, Monday to Friday: 9am to 8pm and Saturday: 9am to 5pm.

So thank you Tesco for providing these services, responding promptly to my query and issuing vouchers to me via the good old-fashioned postal method.

Customer Service – Responses

I’m a stickler for good customer service and am of the opinion that we should always speak up when service falls short of reasonable expectations.

Since starting my Shopper’s Joy blog nearly two years ago, I have taken up customer service issues with various retailers and service providers with rather mixed responses.

In the fledgling days of my blog, I experienced problems with both Sainsbury’s and Greggs, both of whom I sent letters of complaint, in addition to featuring them on the blog. I was pleased to report that both responded promptly and reasonably sympathetically, assuring me that they would address the issues raised and sending some handy vouchers by way of apology.

Long before my blogging days, I occasionally had cause to approach a company, either by letter or phone call, with regard to poor customer service, sometimes receiving an appropriate response, although at other times being totally ignored. It is fair to say that since any complaint that I’ve made has been shared on the public domain, responses are much more forthcoming. Thank goodness for the likes of Twitter, Blogger et al.

In the days when our grievances were only aired behind closed doors, companies had the option of brushing any complaints under the carpet, in the belief that they would be unlikely to become common knowledge. Although some firms have always responded well to reports of customer dissatisfaction, others have had to improve their reactions in the light of social media. Let’s face it, when we’ve had a poor experience, first and foremost we want an understanding reply, backed up by the promise that future service will be improved.

It is true to say that sometimes it is only an individual employee or isolated branch of a chain that lets customers down, but if the company as a whole does not respond positively to criticism, they risk being given a bad name.

More recently, I blogged about my experience of two different branches of the Hungry Horse pub/restaurant chain. One branch couldn’t have been more helpful and friendly; whilst the other gave the impression that they really couldn’t be bothered with my custom. On this occasion I cut straight to the blog without directly contacting the company and lo and behold, the manager of the poorer branch responded with a request for further details so that she could resolve the issue. The only sad part is that despite an encouraging first response, I never heard from her again. For the record this was The Star at Gillingham in Kent – just so you know!

Needless to say I have not returned there since!

In the last couple of weeks, a trip to my local B&Q store resulted in me leaving without my intended purchase, following what I can only describe as total indifference from the staff.

My attempt to by a floral arrangement in an odd-shaped pot was thwarted, when staff could not supply the means of transporting said pot without either crushing or totally losing its contents. A request for a box resulted in being presented with the most pointless, shallow example of its kind known to man – totally useless. An additional colleague was summoned who shrugged off the request with a kind of ‘haven’t-got-anything-hard-luck’ attitude. Right, thanks for your help guys!

Interestingly, however, a single tweet about my trip elicited a response from the B&Q help team, promising to investigate the matter. Great! Trouble is I’m still waiting for the result of that one …

And now BT is in the doghouse. My recent move saw me cut my ties with this company – a more expensive transaction than I would have thought. Watch this space for more news on this one.

So the point of all my waffling? Well, I have several in fact:

- When you receive poor service, do speak up; it’s the only way to get things improved.

- If you have access to social media, then use it! Pushing your complaint into the public domain increases your chance of a response.

- If you are a company on the receiving end of a complaint, then for goodness sake acknowledge it, investigate it, improve on it and say sorry! Remember, ignoring a complaint is just another form of poor customer service!

Which companies do you find are good or bad at handling complaints?

Loyalty Vouchers – The Reply

As a follow on from Monday’s post, bemoaning the short expiry date on some of the loyalty vouchers printed at the Sainsbury’s checkout, I’d like to share with you some comments I have received from the store.

They remarked, “I am sorry to hear you have been unable to take advantage of some of them (vouchers) and understand this can be frustrating to find they have expired when you are shopping. We know a lot of customers shop weekly and therefore find these vouchers appropriate and appreciate receiving them each time they shop.  We are trialling different types of offers and validity periods to ensure we meet our customers' needs. I have logged your comments on our internal system and they will be shared with our marketing team.  They take all customer feedback into consideration when issuing similar coupons in future.”

Pleased as I am to receive a prompt response, I do feel this is still all a bit vague. I was not saying I did not shop weekly at the supermarket, just not on the same day each week, so was missing out on valuable offers.

I sincerely hope that they will be reviewing the expiry dates soon, to make it better for all their customers. I look forward to that Sainsburys.

Follow me on Twitter @shoppersjoy

Loyalty Vouchers

I’m a big fan of loyalty cards as regular readers will know, My purse houses a fine collection, all of which are put to good use. But as with everything in life, there is always room for improvement as I have discovered.

Recently, I’ve started buying the larger part of my food shopping in Sainsburys, following the discovery of several products and prices that I prefer to those at Tesco – my previous store of choice. When my Nectar card is swiped, I’m invariably presented with a selection of vouchers printed at the till point, my favourite being those giving me extra points on or money off my entire shop. However, there is a drawback with these, and that is the expiry date.

Suppose I shop on a Wednesday one week, the vouchers issued (with the exception of those for specific products) expire the following Wednesday. Now that’s fine if I want to shop the same day the following week, or even a day of two before, but not if that week I would like to do my shopping on, say, Thursday.

Surely the point of a loyalty card or vouchers is that they are to thank you for your loyal custom. Therefore, if I’m buying a trolley full of shopping each week in Sainsburys, I should be rewarded whatever day of the week I shop. The answer would be to ensure that the vouchers in question are issued with the end date of the following week, meaning they are valid for your shopping on any day in that week.

I’m not of my mother’s generation where I have set days for things. I like to vary my shopping day in line with whatever else I may need to do, but don’t expect to lose out on an offer just because one week I shop on a Tuesday and the next a Wednesday. So come on Sainsburys, review this dating policy!

Follow me on Twitter @shoppersjoy

Christmas On A Budget

Christmas can be a magical time of year, but it can also be a drain on already struggling finances. More than ever we’re having to watch our shopping bills and budget as much as we can to get by, in view of rising prices and static wages.

But it’s important to remember that whilst we want to celebrate the festive season with our loved ones, it’s not the amount of money that we spend that counts, it’s the time that we actually spend with our family and friends.

Christmas is a very commercial affair, but there are ways to enjoy the celebrations without spending a fortune.

Now is a good time to check your points’ balances on any loyalty cards that you may have, and make use of these if you can. I recently bought a host of Christmas goodies from Sainsburys using my Nectar points to buy items such as crackers, drinks and chocolate, after discovering I had a balance worth almost £30.

If you’re a Tesco Clubcard holder, then you can use their current points boost promotion to double your points’ value. Just exchange your Clubcard vouchers for coupons to spend in specific areas of the store, to get twice their face value. Categories include Finest Wines, toys, clothing and electricals. You can exchange vouchers up until 20^th December and redeem the new vouchers until 31^st December. I’ve made use of the Finest Wines offer to get a few good bottles in for Christmas dinner – prices in the range start from just £5.99.

You may also have points on cards such as Boots Advantage Card and Superdrug Beautycard that can be exchanged for last minute gifts.

If you don’t own a loyalty card (and why not?) then you can still find some bargain offers around. Here are a few recommended buys:

O’Gradys Irish Cream Liqueur – A great (more creamy, I think) alternative to Baileys at just £5.50 a bottle from Sainsburys.

If you like Archers Peach Schnapps, then a great budget alternative is Peaches, costing just £5.50 at Iceland. You can also find lower cost supermarket versions of other drinks such as ‘Malibu’ as ‘Pimms’.

Love liqueur chocolates? I recommend The Co-Operative Loved By Us Brandy Liqueurs costing just £1 per box! Lovely! Most supermarkets also stock boxes of tasty after dinner mints, that I enjoy much more than the famous After Eights, for just £1 a box.

Enjoy your Christmas without too much expense!

Follow me on Twitter @shoppersjoy

The New Card On The Block

I’m a big fan of loyalty cards and have quite an impressive set, as previously blogged in my loyalty card ratings but now I’ve discovered a new card on the High Street.

As an avid reader I often take a trip to The Works to buy multiple books at reasonable prices, so imagine my joy when I was offered a loyalty card for that very shop! I didn’t hesitate to accept the offer, taking the proffered card home and registering it online.

Within a few days I was sent an email including a selection of vouchers to use instore but I have yet to see how the long-term benefits actually stack up.

The card is called the ‘Together Rewards Card’ and you actually earn 5 points for every £1 spent, with vouchers issued four times a year, providing you have a balance of at least 50 points – you actually receive your first 50 points when you register! Every point then equals 1p, so it depends how frequent a visitor to The Works you actually are, as to whether you gain much during the course of a year.

Still, as a rival company would say, “Every little helps”, which is why I collect all the loyalty cards that I can!

Follow me on Twitter @shoppersjoy

To The Tower!

I’ve visited many tourist attractions over the years, a number of which I have blogged during the past year or so, but somewhere that I had never got round to visiting was The Tower of London.

But now I’m back fresh from a visit to said tower, full of enthusiasm and information about my day.

As with all the London attractions that I visit, I tend to go on a Sunday, when there is no congestion charge and parking can be found cheaply or even free. When there are several of us going together it is cheaper and more convenient than using the train.

For our visit to The Tower we parked in The Minories Car Park, details here, a multi-storey just a few minutes walk from the attraction, which costs £2 per hour during the week, but on a Sunday costs just £2 for the whole visit.

Arriving by 10.30 we found that there were no ticket queues (on this particular Sunday at least) and instead of paying the admission fee of £19.50 for adults and £9.75 for children (higher rates if you include the voluntary donation) we exchanged Tesco Clubcard Days Out Vouchers for tickets.

Once in the grounds I was pleased to find plenty of benches to pause and picnic on, several blocks of well-kept toilets and a restaurant providing drinks, meals and snacks at quite average prices, as opposed to the more inflated ones found at some attractions. We paid just over £9 for a Latte, an Americano, a bottle of 7Up and three delicious pieces of shortbread.

I loved seeing The Crown Jewels, especially the dainty coronet sported by Queen Victoria and thought the moving walkway system past the main jewels a clever way of keeping visitors moving.

Other highlights included St Thomas’s Tower above Traitor’s Gate complete with bedchamber and small chapel with a lovely stained-glass window, The Coins and Kings Exhibition with fun interactive displays and the small monument at the Scaffold site.

The White Tower is full of armoury, which I confess to becoming a little tired of by the end, and whilst the climb up was not bad, ascending one floor at a time largely via reasonable staircases, the climb down was by way of one long spiral staircase leading to a cellar before depositing us in the gift shop.

There are plenty of other exhibits to see and a great view of Tower Bridge, the Yeoman Warders were helpful and informative and the ravens a powerful presence. We had a really great day.

For more information see http://www.hrp.org.uk/TowerOfLondon/

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Short Measures

When buying many products, it’s often possible to tell when selecting them whether we are being ‘sold short’.

It’s obvious if a loaf of bread is shorter than its neighbour, or whether a bar of chocolate doesn’t fill out it’s wrapper as much as the next one. But the way in which some products are packaged can mean that we don’t know that we’ve been given short measures until we get home from shopping and open our purchase.

At least you can see how many eggs are in a box

Multipacks of crisps, biscuits and sweets may often contain fewer bags than the stated amount. But let’s be honest, do you always count?

I recently bought a multipack of Curiously Cinnamon Cereal to take away on a short break. The packet was supposed to contain five bags of cereal, but in actual fact there were only four inside, leaving me short of breakfast supplies.

Although this wasn’t a major catastrophe, I decided to write to Nestlé with my complaint. Well, I say complaint,  I kept my letter light-hearted, adding humour, and was rewarded with a reply within the space of a week. Not only was it a reply, it was an apology accompanied by £8 worth of vouchers to spend on cereal.

I have to say I was impressed by Nestlé’s speed of response, the fact that they held their hands up to their mistake and more than reimbursed me for the shortfall. I, in turn, would like to thank Nestlé for their efficiency in dealing with a customer complaint and congratulate them on having a customer services department that actually works for the customer, as opposed to defending the company at all costs.

In my early days of blog writing, I wrote posts about ‘How To Complain’, ‘Saying Sorry’ and ‘Saying Thank You’. I think this blog post illustrates all of the above very nicely!

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Head For The Hills

Amongst the most recent round of trips to visitor attractions that I made this summer, was a great day spent at Pleasurewood Hills, a family theme park in East Anglia.

Those of you who have been regularly reading my blog will know that I’m not a big fan of thrill-seeking rides, but I was largely drawn to this attraction by the shows that it provides.

Fans of Britain’s Got Talent may remember Sean Alexander, a past contestant on the programme and a very entertaining illusionist. His twice-daily shows performed at the park’s Castle Theatre are definitely worth a mention. My son and I were spellbound by the series of surprising illusions performed by Sean and his ‘Angels’ and highly recommend his show.

We were also greatly entertained by the park’s sea lion duo, performing a string of antics both in and out of the pool. The pair obviously enjoyed the limelight, ‘smiling’, ‘clapping’ and executing a number of clever tricks. I was particularly amused by the sea lions’ impression of a seal!

Not to be outdone, the Pleasurewood Hills parrots put on a fun show too. From counting to skating, they certainly had mastered a fair few tricks to perform.

Shows aside, there are plenty of rides to choose from – there’s certainly something available for all ages and levels of daring. Traditional dodgems, roundabouts and a carousel sit alongside thrilling rides such as the 120ft tall ‘Wipeout’ and 600m long ‘Enigma’. There are even a few more unusual attractions such as chair lifts and pedalos.

Although Pleasurewood Hills is smaller than many of its counterparts such as Chessington and Thorpe Park, it still provides a good day’s entertainment at very reasonable prices. Tickets cost £19 on the day for adults and £16 for children, with youngsters under 1m high going free. There is a reduction of £1 per ticket if you book online, with group tickets also available if you choose to buy them in this way. Or you could do as we did, and use Tesco Clubcard Days Out Vouchers to pay for admission.

Pleasurewood Hills is currently open at weekends only, with a full week of opening at October Half Term holiday.

For a fun family day out, then be sure to ‘head for the Hills’!

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Colchester Zoo

Ahead of my son’s birthday last week, we allowed him to choose a venue for an outing, and he picked an old favourite of ours, Colchester Zoo in Essex.

You really need the whole day to work round all the areas of Colchester Zoo, we were aided by the fact that on the day we visited they were offering late night opening until 9pm, a fact of which we were unaware until our arrival.

Colchester Zoo is very much an ‘all round’ zoo, with a wide variety of animals from across the world as opposed to a particular speciality. However, we certainly have our favourite areas that we love to visit.

The ‘Edge of Africa’ experience is one of my personal favourites, as amongst its inhabitants it features giraffes (much loved by me), which you are actually given the chance to feed (you can feed the elephants as well) at special, keeper-supervised sessions. Many animals are free to roam together on the ‘savannah’ as they would in the wild, including the giraffes, zebra, ostriches and rhino – talking of which we were thrilled to see a baby rhino on our visit.

Another of our favourite areas of the zoo is the sea lion tunnel: here you can wander through a tunnel underneath the sea lion pool and watch these fascinating creatures swimming above and around you. In turn, this tunnel leads to the orang-utan area. Orang-utans are my son’s favourite and he loves visiting Rajang and Tiga (the zoo’s resident orang-utans) to see how they’re getting on.

Other animals that we enjoyed seeing were the meerkats (complete with tiny babies), red panda, Asian short-clawed otters (who were fighting over a fish), aardvarks and one of the most amazing to our minds, the anteater. What an incredible creature!

However, we must remember, many of the animals in the zoo are endangered in the wild and Colchester is involved in conservation work and animal rescue.

As usual, we had a great time at Colchester Zoo. There are lots of picnic areas and benches (understandably these got very busy at lunchtime), shops selling refreshments (ice creams reasonably priced) and plenty of toilet facilities.

Admission costs £19.99 for adults, £13.50 for children aged 3-14, with a slight reduction if you purchase an e-ticket, and Tesco Days Out Vouchers are accepted. Parking is free.

I can certainly recommend Colchester Zoo for a fun, family day out.

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Old-Fashioned Thrift

Over recent years, due to the recession and a change in personal circumstances for many of us, we probably consider ourselves to be exercising ‘thrift’.

Paying bills by direct debit to ‘spread the cost’, stocking up on cheap supermarket offers, making use of discount vouchers, swapping branded products for shop’s own, limiting treats and so on are all ways that we try to cut our costs.

However, the so-called thrift measures that we employ today aren’t quite on the level that I remember from my childhood (cue violins). Not that we actually suffered then as such, but people’s priorities have changed, and some now consider themselves hard up if they can’t afford the latest gadget or sunshine holiday.

A survey last year revealed that many young women would rather go without food than cut back on trips to the hairdresser/manicurist/tanning salon!

As a child, I remember the excitement when my family acquired our first chest freezer. We visited our local frozen food warehouse (Cartiers in Rochester), which also sold bulk-sized containers of grocery items. Once all the purchases were safely stowed away at home, my mother proceeded to break down the costs of all the food items, calculating how much each sausage/pie/bag of crisps/chicken portion actually cost, noting down the prices. From then on each time that an item was used, the cost of it was placed in a specially allocated jar. If I wanted a bag of crisps, I would either ‘buy’ it with my pocket money, placing the necessary coins in the jar, or my mum would ‘treat’ me and put the money in herself. When the original supplies ran out, there was enough money in the jar to re-stock them.

Early on in my married life I had one of those cash boxes with little compartments marked ‘gas’, ‘electricity’, ‘food’ and so on. Once the required amounts of money had been allocated to each, then I knew that any ‘surplus’ funds (if any) were available to save or splash out on a treat.

I don’t use any of these actual methods today, but I do collect odd coins until they are sufficient to use for a treat, and in a more 21^st century way, accumulate loyalty card points to pay for ‘extras’. Some of you may collect supermarket savings stamps, putting a few odd pounds on your card at each shop, to help buy supplies when things get tight.

Personally, I would never sacrifice food or skimp on other essentials to pay for beauty products or treats, but hope that by employing a bit of good old-fashioned thrift, careful budgeting and a little of the ‘make-do-and-mend’ mentality, I can afford not only the necessities, but the odd little treat too!

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Bressingham Steam Museum and Gardens

On my travels last week, I visited Bressingham Steam Museum and Gardens near Diss, Norfolk.

When a sunny Bank Holiday dawned, it seemed the perfect opportunity to have a family outing, and as we had previously driven past Bressingham, but not actually ventured inside, decided it was time that we checked it out.

The drive into the attraction was a bit like going on a mystery tour – a winding track meandered along until it reached the car park – or parking field as it technically was, but more on that later.

Bressingham boasts some beautifully stunning gardens (17 acres), especially the quaintly named, award-winning, ‘foggy bottom’. The lovingly-tended, ‘private’ garden of the Bloom family is open to view at certain times and is a wonderful place to sit and soak up the natural surroundings.

Of course, what my son was really eager to see was the steam museum and all that it has to offer. On ‘steam days’ (Wed – Sun and Bank Holidays) you can purchase an inclusive ticket (£12.95 adults, £8.95 children, Tesco Days Out Vouchers accepted), which entitles you to unlimited rides on the narrow gauge steam trains and three rides on the steam carousel.

We really enjoyed riding the trains, one line takes you around the gardens, another tours the old nursery area and a third travels over the water meadows. The steam carousel, known as the ‘gallopers’, built over a hundred years ago, proclaims it was ‘built to last’, and it sure has! As tunes from Mary Poppins played, I could imagine the horses riding off across the fields as they did in the film.

We also loved the collection of steam engines and the fun Dad’s Army Walmington-On-Sea display, including original props. My son delighted at the old penny machines, whilst for an extra charge, we could have ridden the waltzers and dodgems.

The one little blip of the day occurred on our arrival at the parking field. Unfortunately our car became stuck in a previously unnoticed muddy patch. However, the Bressingham staff came to the rescue, towing us out of the mud, offering apologies and then promptly roping off the ‘dodgy’ area, so all ended well.

We loved our trip to Bressingham – there was plenty to see and do, the staff and volunteers were friendly and helpful and the day represented good value for money (even the ice creams were reasonably priced). I thoroughly recommend Bressingham for a fun family day out. For more information visit www.bressingham.co.uk

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