What a fickle bunch UK consumers are. One minute they are clamouring for quails’ eggs and Chanterelle mushrooms, all washed down with organic green tea - but put your average middle-class shoppers in the midst of an economic slowdown, and they will be beating a path to the door of the nearest discounter before you can so much as utter the dreaded words “credit crunch”.

New research out this week from Verdict suggests we are becoming increasingly disloyal in our shopping habits, allowing Aldi, Lidl and Netto to steal a march on their very non-traditional rivals, Marks & Spencer and Waitrose.

The news is equally good for Asda, which with its value-for-money image is also attracting more affluent shoppers during this recessionary period. Last week, the chain controversially cut the price of a 454g punnet of strawberries to £1 (p1), angering some of the growing community - despite the supermarket claiming it absorbed 100 per cent of the hit to profits.

The anonymous tipster who alerted FPJ to the story had a very good point. Consumers know little enough as it is about how much it costs for food to be produced, and unrealistic pricing policies from the major retailers can only serve to exacerbate that ignorance. While the media is ably talking consumers into hunting down cheaper food, perhaps stories like this one should also be making headlines at national level.