Rich House, Poor House viewers were left shouting at their televisions last night as a family spent their weekly food budget in a Spar.
Millionaires Steve and Gemma Green, their daughter, Sadie, and Steve’s granddaughter, Arianna, swapped lives with Ben and Demi Gowland-Jefferies and their daughter, Lily, on Sunday (April 12).
Steve and Gemma usually live off a weekly budget of a whopping £1600 after expenses, whereas Ben and Demi are left with just £57 per week for food, clothes and emergencies.
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Rich House, Poor House family head to a Spar
Faced with The Gowland-Jefferies’ small budget, the Greens headed off to do their weekly shop, however, those watching at home were fuming that they went to a Spar.
Rather than a cheaper Aldi, Lidl or Tesco alternative, they opted to stock up in an expensive corner shop.
Viewers at home immediately called them out on it on Twitter.
Is there anything more annoying than people going to SPAR for the weekly shop on Rich House, Poor House? Absolutely idiotic. Are they so out of touch with reality?? And he grew up in a council house!! #RichHousePoorHouse
— Amy Harris (@amyd1987) April 13, 2020
#RichHousePoorHouse every week we see the families going to expensive corner shops rather than large cheaper supermarkets
— mrmadnessfm2 – #StayHomeSaveLives (@mrmadnessfm2) April 12, 2020
OMG £50 budget on food and they went to SPAR#clueless #richhousepoorhouse
— exampleisgod (@exampleisgod) April 12, 2020
“Living on the breadline” because we made bad choices in an expensive AF supermarket.#clueless#RichHousePoorHouse
— Emma Adwoa Sawyerr (@Purple_Worship) April 12, 2020
Channel5 #RichHousePoorHouse if you only have £50 food budget you wouldn’t go to an expensive Spar shop, you’d go to Aldi for twice as much food.
— Lee Noble 🇪🇺 (@LeeNoble) April 12, 2020
Ugh for £50 per week shopping budget you don’t have to live off cereal and egg on toast. Stop shopping at spar to make it look like that kind of money is not enough. Go to bloody aldi! #RichHousePoorHouse
— Debbie (@mrscamwellallen) April 12, 2020
#RichHousePoorHouse no wonder they’re skint when shopping in their local Spar.
— ᄃЯΛIG ↗️ (@Craig74Davies) April 12, 2020
#RichHousePoorHouse for God sake get to @AldiUK, you can buy a huge weekly shop for 3 people for £45 and its nice good quality stuff 👍
— ✨ Roz™Thomas✳️ 🌙 ✨ (@Rozzy67) April 12, 2020
Advertising restrictions?
However some offered an explanation – believing that perhaps the show wasn’t allowed to film in big chain supermarkets.
One person suggested it could be down to TV show advertising laws.
Probably aren’t allowed to film in supermarkets. They probably HAVE to go to independent franchises? Hence why we didn’t see him go into Tesco last week #RichHousePoorHouse
— M rg n Erskine 🏴🇪🇺 (@MorganErskine) April 12, 2020
#RichHousePoorHouse every week we see the families going to expensive corner shops rather than large cheaper supermarkets like Aldi and Lidl etc. The only thing I can think of is the tv show has rules on advertising the big chains or something .
— Bonna (@bonnaburns) April 12, 2020
It’s not known where the Gowland-Jefferies shop – in fact, one eagle-eyed viewers spotted Aldi brand nappies in Demi’s bag, suggesting they do make spend their weekly budget sensibly.
They do shop at Aldi/Lidl, just saw Mamia nappies in her suitcase! #RichHousePoorHouse
— Angela Konadu (@AngelaKonadu7) April 12, 2020
Entertainment Daily! has asked Channel 5 for comment.
Despite the anger over the shopping incident, fans actually loved last night’s show.
“One of the best”
Both families proved popular with the viewing public.
Rich man Steve told how he’d come from nothing, been in the Army, returned from a tour with PTSD and hit rock bottom.
But he turned his life around, and using visualisation techniques and postitive attitude, he is clear on what he wants from life – and he gets it, building up a £6million property portfolio.
Ben, on the other hand, was desperate to achieve similar success.
He and Demi live in a mid-terrace two-bedroom house that they rent and the cost of childcare after Lily’s birth forced Demi to stop working and stay at home.
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Ben then lost his job and has been working as roofer, mostly on zero hour contracts.
At the end of the episode, Steve and Gemma offered to put Ben and Demi through their own personal development training course, worth £30,000 to help them better their lives.
Fans were thrilled and called the episode “one of the best”.
Another wrote: “I love both of these families.”
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