What thrifty things do you do that you're surprised no one else does?

Steam my prepared veg in the microwave. Takes 3 minutes to cook carrots and other veg, no waiting for boiling water.
Use a soup maker because it’s quick, easy and doesn’t need watching.
Put unwrapped soap bars in my drawers and cupboards until I’m ready to use them.
Stand shampoo and shower gel containers upside down.
Thanks for all the other hints on here. There are some I wonder how I’d missed

Someone said that if you deform the cardboard toilet roll inner it doesn’t rotate so easily so less paper is used. Never tried it though.

Thanks Cossibabe I was just making soup with leftover veg from last week as it's veg box day - on such a lovely warm day as this, wouldn't you know it! - and it will now be proudly called 'Chuckitin soup'. I do a lot of the things already mentioned so just wanted to add that I also always get one of those free mini toothpastes at the dentist as it's smaller to pack for holidays (who'd have thought we'd be looking forward to going to the dentist!) and there's always plenty left when we get home. When I buy perfume I ask for a trial size too as I don't like to take large bottles on holiday.

I use half the recommended amount of soap powder and half a dishwasher tablet with no adverse effects. Also use a pea-sized blob of toothpaste since my dentist told me you don’t need to use the amount they show on the TV adverts! I keep the posh soap dispensers I get as presents and fill up with watered down cheap bubble bath from Aldi. Don’t need to be so frugal any more really but old habits die hard don’t they?!

I buy good quality foil ( preferably recycled foil ). I then wash each used piece carefully, so one piece lasts multiple times. It's been years since I last bought a roll of foil. The re-using of foil doesn't work that well with the very cheap stuff as it is too thin and brittle. The better quality foil is much more economical in the long run.

I decant half a new handwash into the old empty bottle. I top up the two half-full bottles with water. Voila, two bottles of handwash for the price of one. ( No-one notices the difference!)

I always have a blanket on the sofa to keep my legs warm in winter. Why crank up the heating?

Youghurts can be eaten weeks out of date- they only get chucked when they go furry. I absolutely detest the whole Use By/ BBE nonsense. Such dates are only observed for fresh meat and fish. Everything else - kept properly in the fridge - is fair game.

I HATED seeing the photos in the paper of the bags of perfectly good potatoes being binned a week after lockdown. Just because they were a day 'out of date'. Madness!!!! So much food was wasted by the panic buyers. It was disgusting. It highlighted how much is normally thrown away by people who have no idea about food or economising.

I too always use all the pieces of a whole chicken then use carcass to make stock. I usually make a roast dinner, a salad or perky chicken (adapted from Nigel Slater’s Perky Turkey recipe) and then a risotto with the last bits and the stock with mushrooms added. I saw on Jamie’s programme the other day that he doesn’t waste any veg peelings he just tosses them in a little oil, puts on a baking sheet and bakes to make lovely crisps.

Small plastic bags are useful in the car for collecting the rubbish on long journeys (remember them?)

It's amazinf what accumulates - sweet wrappers, banana peels, apple cores, tissues....

Love this thread and do most of the above as well as shopping in Aldi and Lidl which helped me cut my hours in work which was heaven! My DH and AC roll their eyes but I have accumulated quite a nice nest egg. ??

Lots of ideas ? on here ! I’m going to try cossybabe soup and dareyouto freezer ideas!

I plant a trough about this time of the year with baby leaf salad and Rucula, then pick it for months on end instead of buying lettuce in the shop which quickly looks tired. We look out for Lidl items like drills, cement mixer, that we need, good quality and fraction of the price. When I want new M&S trousers I go online and always get a pair brand new with tags ( BNWT) from no pet no smoke house for £10 instead of £40. I share all my kindle books with my mum so cuts cost. I stopped using fancy dispenser hand soap because of Covid recommendations and discovered it was causing my eczema! So use plain white bars of unscented. I’ll keep an eye on here for more tips lol ?

I too use greetings cards for gift cards and for writing shopping lists on. I will always buy a large loaf of bread and then cut it in half and freeze until needed. I try to avoid small plastic bags but whenever it is not possible I will reuse them. Even recyclable envelopes which some magazines are using are kept for reuse. We rarely throw out any food and my DD used to give us their out of date yoghurts (perhaps by a day) which we gladly accepted as they would buy much nicer and more expensive yoghurts than us!

I keep empty bread bags too for wrapping onion peelings before they go in the flip top bin

As a family we never write on the labels of gift bags and recirculate them.
I always buy either Chinese leaves or little gem lettuce as I live alone and they will keep for up to a month by just removing the outer leaves as required.
Spreadable unsalted butter has a short use by date so I always decant it into small plastic containers and freeze it and the same with grated cheese. The grated frozen cheese usually remains separate and can be sprinkled still frozen to melt into sauces, use as extra topping or straight into an omelette.
Blocks of cheese or butter are cut into sticks and returned to original packaging then popped into freezer bag. Cheese is easier grated before freezing though.
Ginger is grated (a job I hate) then teaspoonfuls of it open frozen then popped in container. Just use as required.
I always transfer bread into freezer bags on day of purchase as I love my bread fresh. Take slices out and make sandwiches up with it frozen and is ready to eat in 10 minutes. Good thing to remember for picnics and the butter spreads so much easier and no lumps! My children laugh and say they were brought up on frozen sandwiches!

As tubes of Nivea and toothpaste become too squeezed to squeeze comfortably I cut them in half and access the contents by removing the lower half as needed. This is not too hygienic for the Nivea, so it gets relegated from face moisturiser to body moisturiser.

I fish the supposedly-empty toothpaste tube out of the bathroom bin after OH has thrown it away, and get nearly another week's use out of it!

If our bread has come in a plastic wrapper, I wash the bags out once the bread is gone, and use them for all kinds of things.

Little plastic tubs are kept for freezing small amounts of left-over food in - and bigger ones for larger amounts, obviously

I add water to the last of the washing up liquid so the plasit bottle is properly empty.

I cut bits off clothes to make them the shape I want them to be, although this does not always work.

*To save on my water bill, I heard this saying about the toilet.
If it's yellow let it mellow. If it's brown flush it down. :-) *
We've been doing this since the drought in 1976, when they told us to save water.

I turn containers of shampoo, body shampoo and other cleaning agents in liquid form upside down when they are "empty". It is truly astonishing how much is left in the container at that point.

The body shampoo one provides soap for at least four showers after it is supposedly empty.

I make my own stock and breadcrumbs too, bake my own bread, rarely buy soup, and keep worn out socks for polishing brass and silver, and have been known to make floor cloths out of old towels.

We turn off lights when we leave a room and turn off the shower while soaping ourselves.

For an inorganic ant deterrent use sprinklings of baking powder/bicarbonatre of soda. The ants never seem to be particularly excited to see the trails but usually by the next day they have all departed. I surrounded the plate containing a freshly iced cake with a trail of BP. It was completely untouched the following day AND the ants had all gone. I later found a pile of dead ants under a frying pan I had left to drain

Thanks to the person who started this thread. I love all the tips. I am an avid reader and buy all my books in charity shops, 50p each. I also look out for yarn in charity shops, usually 50p a ball. I knit baby clothes and donate them to a charity that supports new mums. My husband is the cook in our house and he makes soup with any leftover veg. When I buy a loaf I put half in the freezer as we cant eat a whole loaf without it going stale.

My sort of thread, with some great ideas! I never thought of cutting the ends of toothpaste tubes before although I do stick old slivers of soap to the new bar.
I save butter wrappers to grease baking trays - a habit picked up from my very thrifty mum.

Just a (polite) note to Terribull. Thought that we are no longer supposed to feed ducks with bread - lettuce is the preferred alternative!

I save the cardboard inserts on tights and socks as well as packaging materials like bubble wrap and poly bags.

I'm always making notebooks out of scrap paper - I've enough to last several lifetimes! I also do the 'tube cut in half' thing.

Reading down this list, I’ve realised how many of these I already do, I guess it goes back to my two grannies who had to survive a war with big families, they always taught us about Make Do and Mend, also Waste Not, Want Not. During lockdown I’ve been crocheting pram blankets and baby clothes from scraps of wool given to me ages ago by friends who are ardent knitters, I’ve been reading my way through a pile of books I already have (from charity shops or friends), these are then being doorstep dropped to other pals, also my home made soup and home baking is being shared out (in recycled containers at a social distance, obviously). In fact I’ve even started adding up the cost of the ingredients I use each day for our meals! We’ve certainly realised how little we truly need. My next plan is to pop some stuff on eBay then post it out in recycled bubble wrap etc.