You are traveling to New Zealand and are looking on where to buy grocery stuff? Great, here’s the place to be … let’s go.
First of all, the country side of New Zealand is fundamentally different from the city side. In the big cities (this is, Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and such), you can buy stuff all around in shop from small to big. In the country side, often times you only have shops at a camp side, which are considerably higher in price.
Nonetheless, if there’s any chance, don’t think about buying in small shops, if you are on a budget. Instead, look for these supermarket stores:
- Pak’n’Safe (http://www.paknsave.co.nz/). These are the cheapest around NZ. They are, although we didn’t find them in Auckland.
- New World (http://www.newworld.co.nz/). We found those mostly on the southern island. A better alternative to Countdown, but you need to look for them. We found them harder to find, but that may be a personal taste 🙂
- Countdown (http://www.countdown.co.nz/). These are all over NZ, even though not too cheap. In direct comparison, they are all over the country but the priciest.
If you have a chance, stop by at those in the listed order in order to get some cheap stuff. Also, you can find a rather lengthy list of super markets here.
Oh, one more thing
If you are traveling on a budget in NZ, be aware of the prices and exchange rates. If you check EUR-NZD at the moment, it’s about 1:1,5. Compare this to the „plain white toast bread“ which costs about 3,50€ if you are too careless to check very closely!