A new movement is urging shoppers to boycott supermarkets in response to rising food prices in the UK
‘We’re Not Buying It’, a social media grassroots campaign, asked people across the UK to join its 24-hour supermarket boycott on budget day (Wednesday 28th of October).
The campaign claims to have over 30,000 official pledges and volunteers across the UK picketing outside major supermarkets. Its core demand is a mandatory price cap on essential items like milk, eggs, and bread. It advised supporters to buy essential items before the boycott or support independent businesses instead.
The campaign comes at a time of growing concern, with households continuing to feel the pressure of rising prices. The Food Foundation reports that 2 in 5 households (41%) in the UK are concerned about affording food in the coming month, as research suggests UK food prices will have risen 50% from what they were in 2021 by next November.
Around 2.2 million children across the UK live in food-insecure households and, according to the Trussell Group, more than 9 million people in the UK are at risk of relying on food banks in 2028/2029.
Tessa, 22, a spokesperson for We’re Not Buying It, says the turning point that made her join the campaign “was already watching so many people in my life, of all ages and backgrounds, struggle to put food on the table.
“Food is something that we all need; it’s not a choice, it’s literally a matter of life or death and …yet the weekly shop is costing far more than it did a few years ago, and wages aren’t keeping up”.
Tessa explains that the organisation is fighting for more than temporary price cuts but for “the families that are choosing between… being able to eat or heating their homes”. She argues that it can’t be left to the market to decide whether people eat, and the solution is to have a food cap on prices in the UK.
However, others disagree. Earlier this year, Marks & Spencer chief executive Stuart Machin described a government proposal for voluntary food caps on supermarket essentials as “completely preposterous.”
Under pressure from the Bank of England and facing unanimous opposition from major supermarkets, former chancellor Rachel Reeves ultimately abandoned the plan.
We’re Not Buying it cites the example of Croatia, where 24-hour boycotts of major supermarkets in January 2025 prompted calls to expand the food caps already implemented in 2022.
The boycott helped drive the expansion of mandatory price caps from 30 to 70 essential products, which came into force on 7 February. “Ordinary people have successfully forced the governments to implement food prices..And we know that one person doing this is invisible, but millions of us acting together is going to put some pressure on,” Tessa added.
However, lead author Stephanie Walton of the Oxford Martin Program on the Future of Food has scrutinised the effectiveness of food caps: “It is understandable that price caps are an attractive option for providing immediate relief. However, they can also create difficulties elsewhere in the food system that, in the end, erode the benefits.”
This hasn’t stopped the movement. Since the organiser started posting on social media earlier in October, their Instagram alone has amassed over 50k followers, spreading to TikTok and other social media platforms.
Many TikTokers are platforming the boycott on their own pages, encouraging and educating people to join in. “Because if we do nothing, nothing ain’t gonna change,” says Debbie, a 54-year-old food budget coach on TikTok.
She tells me through her content she’s seen people “struggling to make ends meet and stretch their money further…But even with careful budgeting and cooking from scratch, people can only do so much when essentials keep getting more expensive.” She says that despite the boycott only being for 24 hours, “it’s about more than one day. The 28th of October is a starting point” for change.
Tom Phillips, a 40-year-old business owner, said he joined the movement after seeing the reaction on TikTok. He said, “Looking at the situation and seeing people’s experience is what encouraged me to say something.”