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Baking soda costs almost nothing and removes burnt food from a pan better than a specialist cleaner costing eight times as much. It also scratches glass, dulls stainless steel and...
Three bags of oats sit on the same shelf, look almost identical and differ in price by a factor of four. The difference is how much the grain has been...
The largest pack almost always has the lowest price per gram, and it is frequently the most expensive thing you buy. The gap between unit price and actual cost is...
A torn seam repaired with glue fails in a week and leaves a stiff crust that makes the real repair harder. A broken mug handle repaired with thread is nonsense....
Most freezers contain a bag of something from eighteen months ago, three unidentified containers and a bag of peas. That is not storage, it is deferral. A freezer used properly...
A three pack of peppers wrapped in plastic costs four dollars. Three loose peppers from the same shop cost two eighty. Nobody compares them because the wrapped ones are already...
White vinegar dissolves limescale better than most commercial products and costs about a tenth as much. It also etches stone, corrodes metal and destroys grout if you use it in...
A jar of ground cumin is dead within six months and nobody notices, because the powder still looks like cumin. Whole seeds in the same cupboard are still potent two...
A six dollar screwdriver set and a forty dollar screwdriver do the same job on the day you buy them. Three years later one of them has rounded off every...
A jacket with a broken zip pull gets thrown away about as often as it gets repaired, and the repair takes four minutes. The zip itself is usually fine. It...