How much would it cost to buy?

[mrbadexample]

Well I just found wild garlic leaves online for £10.95 for 500g, which means after foraging from a friends garden today I have approx £24 worth of wild garlic in my fridge

That reminds me, I've got to get the wild garlic from my old garden. Is now a good time?

[sparrow100]

It is fairly easy to develop a spreadsheet to do this but there are a number of questions that need an answer before it is done:

* Should it handle expenses as well as "profits"? If so, should those be per crop or cumulative?
* How do you handle waste? That sounds like "I saved £200 in the Boxing Day Sales" if you didn't need what it was you bought you didn't save anything...
* What is your reference cost?
- Which shop? Do you use your local / regular supermarket? Looking up prices is a PITA TBH. Ideally you'd have some master "spreadsheet" that people can contribute to and effectively crowd source the cost
- Which price? The price in Morrison this week is different from next week. So you ideally need a price per week which is what makes reference costing a PITA.
- Which comparison product? How similar do you want it? Does "New Potatoes" count, or do you want that specific variety?

My spreadsheet automatically deducts expenditure from my harvest totals, so I know if I'm in credit or not. I don't waste anything, so thankfully that isn't anything I need worry about. I use the supermarkets I usually shop at, though for fruit I tend to use the PYO places as they are cheaper, and I check prices fortnightly. And I go for as similar as possible, though even though my produce is organic I use the non-organic items to compare with.

I used to update it every time I brought something home, but now I write it on a piece of paper in the kitchen and update by month. It's a LOT simpler that way.

[happyhumph]

Apparently they transfer well in the green. Don't know if you should leave it till they've flowered though.

[polc1410]

Well well well...

I thought - might just register a domain name and see if I could throw something together for this to collate some data... thought http://www.myharvest.org.uk might be good. Already taken...

Its owned by Sheffield Uni - they have a rather nice research study starting in April. They are only interested in 25 crops but most of the common "stuff" is there. They are interested in yield rather than ££. Its a study in co-operation with the National Allotment Soc.

There are bound to be people on here who are interested in it. Data uploaded before April will be lost as its in beta.

Site will let you export uploaded data in CSV, Excel, or XML. I could well decide to take that XML file and do something with it that would let you upload it to another site that would have captured prices for those 25 items each week from the big supermarkets. Then calculate through the annual costs....

Need to double check that it would record each harvest rather than just update previous, so that you could price by season.

So... what would people think? Record the data on the Uni site to help them with their research and get the prices populated through a site that I think I can build... (no promises). Would only work for the 25 things they are interested in so no wild garlic etc...

If people are interested PM me.

If anyone is interested in the uni study follow the link above. All you need to participate is a tape measure to get the dimensions of each bed you are growing in and some scales to weigh your crop.

This is the list of what they are interested in:
•Potatoes
•Beetroot
•Carrots
•Parsnips
•Turnips / Swedes
•Cabbage
•Brussel sprouts
•Broccoli
•Onions
•Leeks
•French / climbing beans
•Runner beans
•Broad beans
•Peas
•Courgettes
•Squash / Pumpkins
•Sweetcorn
•Lettuce / salad leaves
•Tomatoes
•Currants
•Strawberries
•Raspberries
•Gooseberries
•Apples
•Plums

Bits in green I'm growing. Not been through my list to see what is missing, but other than melon with a yield of 0kg in the last 3 years doesn't seem too crazy...

[veggiechicken]

What a coincidence!
Well sleuthed polc
I'm not sure that I'm organised enough to contribute to an official study

[sparrow100]

Very cool, cheers polc! Am signing up - I grow most of those.

[Guest]

Well I have no veg but wanted to join in. I am a T***o person and occasionally an A**a person. I have said before I tend to eat better for growing my own but often would go without than buy it from the shop so this is just a fun thing.

Flowers (daffs £1pb and tulips £3pb) to date - approx. £11
Eggs (duck £2.50 6 and chicken £1.75 12) to date - approx. £19



Edit: Go to put dinner in slow cooker and realise we have been eating veg from the patch over the weekend

Baby leeks (£1 pack) - £2
Parsnips (£0.59 500g) - £0.59

Veg total £2.59

[Florence Fennel]

Interesting thread. I too remember this being done before, I didn't remember Mrs Dobby doing it until you said it Roitelet. I'm not organised enough to do this, but good luck if you are

[Bren In Pots]

Mrs Dobby, there shows just how long I've been here!!

Thats who it was thanks Roitelet I just couldn't think who it was.

I'd be no good with the survey thing I tend to eat while wondering around my garden so that would through out any veg weights I was hoping to collect.

[ESBkevin]

For me the sunshine and exercise are a big benefit, so credit one Gym membership fee. Also the bonus of knowing the food is properly organic (which carries a premium at the shops). The entertainment/hobby value is hard to put a price on, what does an average hobby cost each week for a couple? And finally the taste, well what price do you allocate for the flavour? Add to this the food miles and enviromental benefits of recycling our own and others waste into compost or worm food without incuring more 'waste miles'.
All that before considering the savings on fruit and veg at the supermarket. Now we don't do enough successional growing or storage to provide for ourselves throughout the year, so we do buy a lot of F&V weekly at this time of year, but we do have months where we could be self sufficient and make contributions to the budget the rest of the year.
So while the savings from growing can be measured and I believe they are substantial, the real lifestyle and feel good benefits are massive and people here at home and around the world are realising this more and more. Long may it continue.

[Snoop Puss]

I won't be able to contribute to the university research, I guess, but looks like Norfolkgrey has set us off here. So I'll join in as of today. I'll do both euros (for my own interest) as well as pounds.

[sparrow100]

I'll tot mine up later tonight, but just to give an indication, last year I harvested 150kg of food worth £641 and spent £474, giving a 'profit' of £167. And that was not a great year, particularly for cucurbits or the salads I forgot to sow...

But it was also an expensive year, with growlights and tools (ratchet loppers, woo-hoo!) as well as compost accounting for more than 50% of that. Now I'm making my own potting stuff, the bill for compost is down from £70 to £30.

[veggiechicken]

Today's "shopping" bill:

4 leeks (500g £1)
Spring cabbage (500g 68p)
Butternut squash (stored since last year) 76p each

= £2.44

[sparrow100]

To date this year:

1.75 kg leeks (£2/kg)
2.27 kg cavolo nero/Russian red (£7/kg)
2.52 kg swede (£1/kg)
1.46 kg PSB (£10/kg)
1.1kg parsnips (93p/kg)
0.93 kg rhubarb (£6.25/kg)

Total Jan-now = £43.34

I also had 2 squashes, but I counted them last year and it's rude to enter them twice. About to harvest astonishing levels of PSB as it's all come at once. Plus a silly number of swedes to process and freeze.

[veggiechicken]

Today my "shopping" cost:

500g rhubarb = £2.50

135g trimmed jumbo salad onions = £1.10

18g Bijou mangetout!! - Free sample

Total since I started this thread = £8.54