Christmas dinner to get pricier this year

With the supply chain crisis looming over the UK’s food and drink sector, higher prices are expected to be the most dominating flavour of Christmas dinner this year.

Be it turkey or pigs in blankets or vegetables or other frozen foods, almost everything Christmasy is expected to pricier this year. 

Although British poultry producers said on Monday (15) there will be enough turkeys for Christmas after the industry focused on delivering whole birds to overcome a shortage of processing workers, it is estimated that it will be between 5 and 10 per cent pricier.

Richard Griffiths, CEO of the British Poultry Council (BPC), has admitted that though there will be enough turkeys, customers will have lesser choice this year.

Owing to widespread media coverage of labour shortages in poultry, many Britons reportedly have opted to pre-order a bird or have already bought a frozen one.

Similar to poultry, pig farming was also reported to be under pressure owing to labour shortage. There have been reports of mass culling of about 14, 000 healthy animals amid which the government allowed temporary visas for butchers. 

Pigs in blankets are going to cost about 4.2 per cent more, The Guardian stated in a recent report.

Apart from Christmas special, Britons are also being warned of shortage of champagne as well as other popular wines, such as New Zealand sauvignon blanc. 

The higher champagne price is linked to production problems in the region as well the delivery problems bedevilling the whole retail supply chain. Analysts think wine prices more broadly are going up, but just not before Christmas.

The price of the Veuve Clicquot yellow label is expected to rise by 7.3 per cent as per media reports. 

“If you are a consumer, you won’t be out of wine, but you might not be able to get the one you want,” the report quoted Robert Foye, the chief executive of Accolade Wines which owns Hardys, as saying who added drinkers should be open-minded and swap sauvignon for sancerre or opt for an English sparkling wine.

Last month, British retailers had warned of pre-Christmas price rises after they reported the smallest year-on-year decline in the average selling price of goods in their stores since before the start of Covid-19.

“It is now clear that the increased costs from labour shortages, supply chain issues and rising commodity prices have started filtering through to the consumer,” BRC chief executive Helen Dickinson had said, adding that “three in five retailers” planned to raise prices before Christmas, she added.