Shopping around can really save you money!

The 'Ice' news website and the Retail Research Institute conducted a survey of weekly shopping baskets for an Israeli family in the ten leading supermarkets, to see which chain is the cheapest.

Over the last few years, the average monthly household expenditure in Israel has increased significantly. A 2024 study by the Retail Research Institute found that the average household spends about 30% of its monthly income on food alone. This is an increase of more than 10% over the past decade, with the most noticeable increases seen in fruits and vegetables, dairy products, and staples such as oils, rice, and sugar.

These come alongside the sharp increase in the prices of housing, electricity, water and gas, which have made household expenses in Israel one of the highest in OECD countries. The problem lies not only in the price increases themselves but also in the behavior of the supermarket chains, which sometimes operate aggressive and unfair marketing methods, such as "sales" that are not really sales.

The 'Ice' news website and the Retail Research Institute, headed by Dr. Hezi Gur Mizrahi, conducted a survey of prices, for a typical weekly shopping basket in the ten leading supermarket chains. They compared prices of 64 common products from different categories, and they looked at the price differences between the stores.

The cheapest basket was found at Rami Levy costing 972.11 shekels, while the most expensive basket is at the Tiv Taam chain costing 1,177.47 shekels. Osher Ad came in second place, and Yesh Chesed was 4th behind Yochananof. Supersol Deal came in 8th in the ranking of 10 stores. You can see the full comparison table above.

The comparison found some very large differences between the prices of the products. For example, the price of white cabbage was 315.79% higher in the more expensive store. Lower prices may indicate a store's greater efficiency in purchasing and operations, or a clear intention to attract customers through extremely discounted prices.

Another gap was found in the cleaning bleach, where the lowest price was NIS 6.90 and the highest price was NIS 12.90, a considerable difference. Also Osem spaghetti was sold at NIS 3.90 at the cheapest store, compared to NIS 6.90. The table above shows the 13 items with the biggest differences in price between the cheapest and most expensive.

While customers are usually looking to for the lower prices, there may be additional considerations such as ease of access to the store, parking, or customer service.

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