The squeezed middle: Why the worst is coming for shoppers filling the cupboard

The cost-of-living crisis has been energy-focused so far but that is changing, as food prices soar

A shopper browses groceries at a supermarket in Sheffield. Bloomberg

Stubbornly high food prices have squeezed British households, with higher prices of basic goods coinciding with a jump in interest rates that is hitting middle-earner homeowners particularly hard.

Data this week showed UK inflation is at 8.7 per cent, a level kept elevated by soaring food prices, which have reached near record highs.

While inflation has dropped from the double digits for the first time in 2023, as weaker energy costs offset other increases, official figures showed food costs were 19.1 per cent higher than a year ago, with even steeper rises for everyday staples such as eggs.

An index compiled by The National tracking the cost of supermarket goods such as bread, milk and beef since the start of the year has found a spike in price for the most basic of commodities.

The cost of locally produced beef has soared, from £3.58 per kilogram in January to £4.98 in May.

The price of baby formula jumped from £13.50 to £14.50, while the cost of corn oil has also rocketed, from £3 per litre in January to £4.75 in May.

Experts say the price rises are largely related to the costs that go into producing the goods.

“If you've got things like baby formula, that goes through quite a lot of manufacturing and packaging processes, which are fairly energy intensive,” Sarah Coles, head of personal finance at Hargreaves Lansdown, told The National.

“So there's a lot of energy used in the early stages there that are still feeding through.”

The rise in the price of beef is partly due to the soaring cost of fertiliser and animal feed.

“Some producers will have decided that it's not cost effective to produce these. So you are actually getting a lower supply as well,” says Ms Coles.

Now that energy prices are falling, the cost of food will eventually follow, but this will take time.

The price of milk has already started to come down, from £1.14 at the start of the year, to £1.10 in May.

“A lot of it is to do with the fact it just takes so long to get from farm to fork,” says Ms Coles.

“A lot of the products that we're buying now [when] the crops were planted, fertiliser was really expensive.

“The price of things like milk changes quite fast.”

But many prices are not changing are quickly as people would like – and consumers are worried.

According to the May Ipsos Issues Index, 38 per cent of Britons say inflation and prices are the biggest issues facing the country today.

“We know right from the beginning of the cost-of-living crisis, when the government asked people kind of how they noticed rising prices, food was always front and centre,” said Ms Coles.

“So it has always the key [place] where people really feel the pain.”

Consumers have responded to the soaring costs by buying fewer premium brands and trading down for cheaper supermarket-produced goods.

The popularity of lowest-cost labels is also soaring, says Ms Coles.

“So we know people are feeling the pinch,” she says. “And it looks like people are taking the steps they need to.”

The government is considering encouraging supermarkets to impose price caps on food staples to help.

But the plan will have no "element of compulsion", Health Secretary Steve Barclay told BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme.

Experts say the problem disproportionately affects those on low incomes, who spend more on food as a proportion of their income.

"In the UK, where food price inflation in 2022 was 10 per cent, the lowest-earning households spent 11 per cent of their budgets on food and beverages, while the highest earners allocated only 6 per cent of their budgets to the same," Jana Rude, Consumer Insights Manager at Euromonitor, told The National.

"So, even though absolute spend on food and non-alcoholic drinks was three times higher for the most affluent Britons, the impact on their budgets was rather limited."

But the lowest-earning households suffer significantly from food price inflation, said Ms Rude, leading to "growing inequality and shifting purchasing behaviours".

More people are turning to food banks, or perhaps put the cost of their weekly shop on their credit card, storing up problems for the future.

“It's the summer, so you tend to find that a lot of these households are on metres so they're not having to put as much money in the metre,” she says.

“It's not like when you have your direct debit, which is spread out over the full year. So they maybe have a little bit more to play with right now.

“But they will also be thinking about the long term, you know, hoping for the best but trying to maybe prepare for the worst.”

However, the data suggests there are some interesting things happening, too.

People are continuing to spend on special occasions, despite cutbacks.

“Sales of chocolate went through the roof over Easter, despite the fact that we saw prices high,” Danni Hewson, head of financial analysis at AJBell, told The National.

“And that's because when you have a situation where people are having to cut back, they're focusing on spending on those little luxuries.

“So they'll give themselves the treats, but they'll do without some of the other stuff.”

Data also suggests people have prioritised holidays, which suggests spending may fall over the summer, says Ms Hewson.

“People won't be getting those extra treats because they'll be focusing all of their cash on that one week,” she adds.

“Because you can only spend it once. So I think that is certainly something that will be sort of filtering through.”

And then there is the question of mortgage costs.

Home-owning middle earners, who spend less of their income proportionally on food and energy, have not yet felt the full brunt of the cost-of-living crisis.

But they may be about to.

About 2.5 million people are coming off fixed-rate deals this year, and many of them will see a substantial rise in their mortgage costs.

Interest rates are expected to keep rising for the next several months, mainly because the overall inflation rate is still more than four times the Bank of England’s official 2 per cent target.

Core inflation – which is also closely watched by the BoE and strips out volatile energy and food costs – has accelerated to 6.8 per cent, the highest since 1992.

That cemented expectations of another interest rate rise, with some investors predicting it could reach 5.5 per cent by year's end.

“Markets are expecting a further four rate rises. They’re now predicting that they'll go from 4.5 per cent to 5.5 per cent, between now and September,” says Ms Hewson.

“That's substantially higher than we were thinking just a week ago, when people were expecting that they would peak at 4.75 per cent.”

Ms Hewson points out there is one more inflation print before the central bank has to make its decision, but either way, homeowners will see at least one more interest rate rise.

“The middle earners, the homeowners are ones that maybe have been OK,” she says.

“Maybe they've traded down in some places, but they've still pretty much been able to buy what they want.

“But a mortgage shock, if you're talking about hundreds of extra pounds a month, then that's huge.”