It’s not great.

The median mortgage payment is over 50% of the median income, which historically should be 30%. Houses are over 60%. But the numbers are getting better than their 2023 records highs.

Our biggest grocers were fixing bread prices for over a decade and were only given a slap in the wrist. People can ask for a $20 rebate.

Almost all of our grocery stores are owned by 3 companies (Loblaws, Metro, and Sobeys (made up of former Loblaws employees)). 3 companies own almost all our phone providers, so they gouge prices too.

You can really see a trend — we seem to concentrate all our industries into 3 or so companies and the competition bureau thinks that’s fine. Historically I think that’s because we were a colony and got too used to being exploited and having our wealth shipped off.

Which Canadian chain is better?

Giant Tiger probably

Seriously, we should do something as a society. We can’t let two companies (there are others, but please) manage all the food distribution in the country, it’s just terrible. Can’t we pass some legislation or something?

This is the way, though.

Grow your own = Insanely cheap, very easy, super delicious.

Farmer’s market = Cheap, convenient, super delicious and big.variety.

Friends with chickens = Delicious high quality free eggs offloaded onto you every week.

Grocery store = Low quality crap; twice the price. An unpleasant experience of other miserable people and awful music. A chore of a thing to do. The whole layout trying to be themed like a fancy farmer’s market but you can’t even find the plum vinegar!

100% Agree, I thankfully have a local grocery store close to me so I can avoid the big 3, but this isn’t a realistic option for everyone. I’m hesitant to just buy online for things like produce as my experience with them has been mediocre (I haven’t tried costco though).

This really isn’t a problem the everyday Canadian can fix without the government stepping in and breaking up the monopoly of Loblaws, Sobey’s and Metro.

I’d love to see a future Canada where there was more local grocery chains, with the same access to product that the big three have. Also would be great if they were closer to where people lives so people wouldn’t feel like the need to drive to get their groceries.

So envious of all of you that have cheap farmer’s markets. Where I am, my choices are

• Grocery store: cheap, highly variable quality, support the conglomerates
• Farmer’s market: expensive, probably higher quality, support local farmers

They’re so much fun to walk through though. If only I could actually afford to buy from them.

I wrote out a longer response but decided to summarise it as: it’s bad. Groceries are unaffordable, rent and mortgages in the cities are unaffordable and we don’t have the public transport infrastructure to support everyone’s commutes, utilities are overpriced. It’s pretty rough rn even as someone who’s household admittedly makes above average

Costco produce ordered online can be a bit hit or miss, unfortunately. You know how when you shop at Costco, it’s usually better to dig down a layer with produce since the top box always has everything that’s been rejected by someone else? I’d guess, based on our mixed success, that some Instacart shoppers just grab from the top of the pile. We’ve had some shops with bad produce, but most have been great.

What sucks is that if you return it to the warehouse, you don’t get the full price back because of the Instacart markup; on the either hand, you can sometimes return things at a net profit because of Instacart offers (like the $10/mo. Executive Members thing.)

Grow your own = Insanely cheap, very easy, super delicious.

Not going to be anywhere near enough food for one person unless you have more land available for yourself than people in a city or even most modern suburban developments are likely to have. Also takes a lot of time and effort if you want more than the occasional tomato, cucumber, lettuce head or zucchini to enrich your diet a bit. (Can be fun on a small scale, though.)

Farmer’s market = Cheap, convenient, super delicious and big.variety.

Nice, but takes a lot of planning, storage and home cooking to work out. You may need to start planning your life around when the farmer’s markets are and what they carry. Also, the variety is necessarily limited to what farmers in your area are growing.

Friends with chickens = Delicious high quality free eggs offloaded onto you every week.

Cool if you got those, but most people don’t.

We should have public run grocery chains. These companies are scum

Man superstore bread used to be perfect but they changed something and now it doesn’t have the extra fluffy inside and chewy crust but they change it back I won’t care about the price(mostly)

Valid concerns. I won’t ignore the orphan crushing machine and every situation is different, but a lot of food can be grown in an apartment.

I had a 300sqft bachelor pad in Vancouver where I managed to grow tomatoes, goji berries, greens and ALL the herbs. I kept my herbs in pots under a full spectrum light indoors, clipping and drying as they grew out. After set-up I only had to water, fertilize sometimes, and prune as needed. Greens, I kept harvesting young and re-seeding. Aside from watering, it took almost no effort to put a significant dent in my grocery bill.

Now, I have a 4x8ft fenced garden in a shared yard where I grow so much I barely buy produce in the summer. Aside from weeding, sprouting and transplanting in the spring, the main labour is watering, which only takes like five minutes. I get my seeds from things I eat or the public library seed share, so those are free, too.

I legit grew three pumpkins, four ziplock bags of sunflower seeds, beets, snap peas, opium poppies, carrots, tomatoes, gooseberries, strawberries and still have a herb shelf inside.

I get that’s still not a year’s worth a food, but it’s a lot for tiny bit of dirt, considering I knew nothing about gardening before.

Oh but get GMO pumpkin seeds. White mildew rot is a pain in the ass and everywhere. And a dehydrator if you don’t know how to deal with lots of food at once, you can make chips and crackers out of anything.

I’m pretty lucky in that my friends hunt, too, so I get a butt load of deer meat every fall.

And it’s not even gonna taste very good when make it.

Galen Weston needs another castle so sawdust bread for you!

I believe the “grow your own” suggestion is intended to be supplemental, rather than a fully developed subsistence farm in your back yard.

The beauty of growing your own is that you can decide what you want to grow! There are some things which are very easy and cheap to grow (such as fresh herbs) that are actually quite expensive and inconvenient to buy! Other things, such as potatoes, are very cheap in any grocery store (when purchased in bulk) such that growing your own is more of a hobby/curiosity than a budget saver.

Tomatoes happen to be one thing you can grow at home that are simply far more delicious than anything you can get at a store. Sometimes you might be able to get nice heirloom tomatoes at a store but they tend to be very expensive and usually seasonal.

If you get some experience growing tomatoes then you can produce a pretty large crop in a relatively small yard. With home water bath canning you can then outfit yourself with up to a year’s supply of home made pasta sauce (or even simply peeled and blanched tomatoes with basil leaf in the jar).

It’s chewy but it’s nutritious!

You don’t have bakeries over there? Bread to me seems like one of the easiest things to self-produce

Tough to boycott the lowest-price option in my area.

Yes, Loblaws, Sobeys and gang are gouging everyone.

But climate change is a big factor in rising food prices too.

Remember olive oil going up in price? Crop failure due to bad weather.

Orange juice? Disease due to climate change.

Coffee prices rising right now? Take a guess.

It’s only beginning.