The video-sharing app has become the best place to see the unfolding effect of the cost of living crisis, with weekly shops and ‘receipt reveals’ watched by millions
Before Rachel Nixon goes to the supermarket, she sketches a quick shopping list in her head. In the garage she usually has a sack of potatoes, and meat, green veg and bread in the freezer. For the bits in between, she will head either to her local, membership-only brand discounter, the Company Shop in Barnsley, or to a mainstream supermarket such as Aldi. “Today I’m going with a £50 budget to feed five of us – £10 a day, £2 per person per meal. I’ll go home and look at what I’ve got in the freezer, check the rice, pasta. It’s make do and mend.”
Unlike other shoppers, Nixon has a press pass, because when she’s filling her basket, she will also be filming a TikTok on her phone, and the Company Shop management requires permission. Her content, which “began as a joke”, follows her around the aisles, scrutinising produce and bargains against the biggest question at any supermarket in 2023: how can this cost this much? At many mainstream shops, Nixon says: “A £50 shop is now an £80 shop. People in the middle are floundering around.”
