Jasmine Birtles
Your money-making expert. Financial journalist, TV and radio personality.
Expert Tells Us: Christmas Will be Free! If you implement these changes NOW!
Annie
1st Nov 2024
Christmas is only a few weeks away and for many of us, we’re feeling like we have left it too late to afford the Christmas we want. But don’t fret! We’ve come up with ways you can save on other things you spend in the next few weeks, and dedicate those savings to different festive pots to make sure you have a ‘free’ Christmas that doesn’t cost anything on top of your saved spending.
Save £100 for a Christmas Event
Save £150 for That Special Gift
Save £200 for Decorations and Incidentals
Save £80 for Christmas Dinner
Switching up your grocery shop for the next few weeks is all it takes to save for The Big Shop around December 22nd. You know which shop we mean: the one where you get up at the crack of dawn to get your pre-ordered turkey, then brave the supermarket for the final fresh food for Christmas week, throwing extra chocolates in the trolley for surprise guests.
At the time of writing, it’s eight weeks to Christmas. All you need to do is save £10 a week on your grocery shopping to save £80 to spend on Christmas dinner. If Christmas is closer when you read this, these tips will still help you save what you need. You can even feed six people on under £30, so there’s plenty of ways to save!
First of all, we’re in the time of deals. The shelves will be bursting with Buy One Get One Free deals or similar discounts. For your bulk or pantry items, stuff you know you’re going to use, take advantage of these offers. If there’s something on offer that you don’t need two of, ask a friend if they need the other one and go halves on the price.
Switch to own brands, too. This can save a large chunk of cash each shop – and these days it’s often hard to tell the difference between own brand and branded food. You can also switch grocery store, too – Lidl and Aldi are the cheapest supermarkets overall.
Finally, sign up to loyalty schemes while there’s time to save. Some shops, like Morrisons, let you earn points on your shop to convert to £5 increments of Morrisons vouchers. This can save you a massive chunk of cash by the time the big shop comes around – just remember to convert your points on the app a few days before you shop, to make sure it works at the till.
Save £50 for Work Dinner and Drinks
Even if your workplace has organised a Christmas party of its own, you’re bound to be invited to a team dinner or drinks ‘just us lot’. You know, the colleagues you actually like.
In the weeks running up to Christmas, ditch the takeaway cups for your morning Costa coffee. Use a reusable thermal mug and save 50p each time – if you get a coffee each day, that’s a saving of £2.50 a week so an easy £15 is saved before Christmas. Of course, you could save more by skipping the morning coffee and taking your own in a thermal mug from home – saving around £15 a week if you normally buy one every day, or £120 in the eight weeks to Christmas. If you want to compromise, buying three coffees (with a reusable mug) instead of five each week will still save you about £50.
Save £100 for a Christmas Event
Seeing friends is one of the best parts of the holiday season. Everyone is in good spirits and it’s a great time to catch up with people as many will have time off work. To get a free Christmas, this is one of the best areas to save money, too.
The best way to save, first of all, is to arrange to see everyone on the same day. If you have a group of friends, arrange a get together where you go for a dinner, or meet at a friend’s house for a potluck event. This gets your main socialising done in one go, with one expense of food, drink, and travel. You also don’t need to do something big or evening-based – why not meet friends for a wintry walk, hot chocolates in your thermos and biscuits in your pocket?
You can also save money for your Christmas socialising on your usual Friday night drinks. The cost of a pint in London averages £8 – reduce your post-work drink session by just one drink each week, and that’s £64 saved without losing out on your usual routine and social time. If you skip just one Saturday night out with friends between now and Christmas, that’s another £65 saved. If you’re not a going-out person these days, skip a bottle of wine each week at home – saving around £10 a week or £80 by Christmas.
If you like to buy takeaways during the week for convenience, ditch just one each week to save at least £30 a week – that’s £240 saved in the eight weeks up to Christmas!
Save £150 for That Special Gift
This is a three-parter, so pay attention!
First: agree to not buy gifts for some people. For example, if your siblings have children, you could agree to only buy children’s presents from now on. You can also skip the office Secret Santa. Many families even agree a single Secret Santa gift – this works particularly well for large families, so you’re spending £30 on a single, great gift instead of getting lots of things you don’t want or need. When it comes to friends, why not agree on each buying a ticket to a joint experience to have together, rather than individual gifts? Doing all of these things could easily save you £100 or more.
Second: Thrift your gifts. Now is the perfect time of year to raid local charity shops for nearly new items. Go to more affluent areas of town to find the higher-end charity shop donations, too. You can also upcycle thrifted gifts into something homemade. For example, if you spot a wonderful kitchen mixing bowl, bake some biscuits to go in it (or even package up the dry ingredients for Christmas cookies for your recipient to bake!). Thrifting gifts will save you at least £50 depending on the bargains you find and how many you need to buy.
Save when buying
Third: When you know what you want for your special someone, track the price online. Use CamelCamelCamel to find out if it is likely to drop in price before Christmas and get alerts when it does. Use cashback sites like TopCashback and Quidco to earn cashback and extra discounts, too. Use reward points if you can from loyalty schemes like Nectar and Tesco Clubcard to further reduce the cost.
Finally, remember that time spent with loved ones is always better than a super expensive gift. If you can’t afford to buy gifts, don’t. If the idea of that appalls you, agree a budget with friends that you can afford – whether that’s £5, £10, or £50, be honest and find ways to spend time together instead of spending money on presents.
Save £200 for Decorations and Incidentals
This one’s a bit of a cheat for a free Christmas, as it’s actually a way to get £175 rather than save it. But if you act fast, you could have an extra £175 in your bank account in time for Christmas – which could help you buy some new decorations, matching Christmas pyjamas, or even put together a Christmas Eve box if that’s your family tradition.
Yep, we’re talking about switching bank accounts! There are a few currently offering some cash to switch, including:
- First Direct offers £175 to switch and a linked 7% interest savings account for eligible applicants
- Natwest is currently offering a whopping £180 to switch to a Reward current account
- Nationwide offers £175 for switching a non-Nationwide account to a Flex current account (includes existing customers)
- Lloyds offers £200 for switching to a Club Lloyds account
Save the remaining £25 by cancelling your streaming services! If you have four services, like Amazon Prime (£8.99), Spotify (£11.99), Netflix (£4.99 basic), and Disney (£4.99 basic), pausing or cancelling for just one month would save you £30.96. The same goes for things like Audible, Readly, NowTV, Apple TV, even pausing your gym membership for a month if you can. Take just four weeks going back to basics and you’ll save a nice chunk of change to have a ‘free’ Christmas.
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