Savvy supermarket shopper: three cast-iron ways to save However, IGD reports that more people than ever are now planning to shop around for supermarket goods - which should have the positive effect of ensuring that supermarkets continue to woo dithering consumers with good prices. I shall be using website Mysupermarket.com to help me compare the cost of my weekly shop with other supermarkets, but I'm also planning to visit specialist stores more often for better deals. Discounters such as Lidl and Aldi have good-quality products at great prices - but I would struggle to do my whole shop there due to the range. I hope to be more organised in the coming year. Plan my meals As well as shopping in different stores, I am hoping to tackle the twin problems of food waste and top-up shopping in one fell swoop. Top-up shopping (those secondary supermarket trips where you pop in just for milk and bread and come out with £20 worth of items without thinking about it) pushes up the cost of your annual consumption considerably. Throwing away food is at its worst at Christmas. A recent survey from Unilever showed that over a third of us throw more food away at Christmas than at any other time of year - with 74 million mince pies and two million turkeys being carted away by the dustmen at the end of the festive period. However, the problem is endemic throughout the year. To keep a lid on it, I'm going to use the lovefoodhatewaste.com website for tips on how to plan meals and shop accordingly. The site shows you how much is enough, however many you are cooking for. It also has recipes for leftovers that may prevent you throwing out quite as much of this year's festive meal. In a bid to stop the top-up shop, I'll also be freezing my milk (it defrosts fine) and making my own bread. Not going into the convenience stores is the surest way to resist temptation. Back out of Bogof Supermarket offers are tempting, but do not always end up with you leaving the supermarket with the products you want. Whether it is a buy-one-get-one-free offer that results in twice as much food as you need or a "bigger pack, better value" product that is actually more expensive than the smaller version, offers can be a minefield. The Office of Fair Trading has signed up eight big supermarkets (Asda, notably, is not part of the list) to a new list of principles that should help to make offers fairer - but it is a voluntary code. Being on your guard with the supermarkets means asking yourself, "Is it cheaper by weight in a big pack?," "Do I really need this much of this product?," "Has this product been placed deliberately at the end of a supermarket aisle to lure me to buy it when there are cheaper versions elsewhere?." Some offers, of course, are genuinely worth having. The list of products below may be worth a look. It is the final call for New Year's party food, and supermarket offers for party products are still very much on the menu. If you still haven't bought your festive fizz, Morrisons is selling pink cava for £4.99 a bottle - that's a third off. If prosecco is more your thing then the supermarket has this on offer from £6.66 a bottle. These offers are available until January 6. Lidl is also offering products to see in the New Year. It is selling fireworks, including a selection box for £12.99. For the inevitable morning-after cooked breakfast, the store is offering half-price bacon at £1.14 for 400g, and four tins of Branston baked beans for £1 instead of £2. Mushrooms are also half price, at 42p, down from 85p.