Supermarkets the world over festoon their stores and websites with special offers, in various forms, some of which might save you money, but many of which, if not on your regular shopping list, are pretty useless. What supermarkets do NOT make a big deal about with their adverts and promotions, is how you can save money just by studying the unit prices that they are obliged to display for most items and as a result of careful budget management, make considerable savings every time you shop.
The Numerate Shopper has been created to help people to better understand “unit pricing”, using real examples*, together with simple calculators for long term budgetary savings.
*Note: Examples used to illustrate supermarket pricing will invariably be historical, due to the practice of almost constantly adjusting prices to suit market conditions.
Example: The 220g can of beans
Do you know that 9 times out of 10, the larger a package, can or bottle of a product bought in a supermarket gets, the lower its unit price becomes?
You go to buy beans and find this 220g can 3-pack with a check out price of $5.99. You don't look closely but it has a unit price of 91c per 100g.
On another shelf there are more 3-packs, being 420g cans at $6.49. or only 52c per 100g! You're a bit short, so you don't think much about it and just buy the "cheaper" beans. If you had looked closer and knew all about unit prices, you'd have realised that for another 50c, you could have taken home almost twice as many beans! (True as of 5th August 2025)