Supermarket Own-Brands: The Big Taste Test

In episode one, it's the mega brands versus the dupes. There are not many people on this planet who haven't heard of Coca-Cola. It's the biggest food and drink brand in the world, with the recipe of their famous signature drink a closely guarded secret. Surely a supermarket own brand can't concoct a drink that rivals or even beats the taste of Coca-Cola for a fraction of the price!! Or can it? We put seven dupe colas up against the might of the American giant.

We meet the people who are already converted and brand loyalists that think you can't compromise. Then there's the names. It's not good enough tasting similar - the own brands have to look and sound similar too. Resident dupe superfan Eggsy takes a look at some of his favourites.

And the rivalry heats up as we look at cereals and The Big Mac. And even cats want a say on the matter! As the own brands cause a storm we get a food scientist to show us how the supermarkets are able to challenge the superbrands at a fraction of the cost. With the addition of quick-fire taste tests, the competition is unrelenting. Across eight rounds they battle it out to see who comes out on top.

This episode get a little more luxurious. There was a time when we could only dream of having life's little luxuries on a regular basis. They used to only be afforded for special occasions like birthdays or Christmas. And then the supermarket own brands changed the game. Now we can get extra creamy chocolate, Wagyu beef, expensive French perfume and even champagne on a daily basis. And they are not here to just make up the numbers. They are rivalling and sometimes beating the big-hitting luxury brands out there.

But don't believe us - we have put some of the best luxury own brands through their paces in a series of taste tests against the brands they are trying to compete with. The own brands are disrupting the way we shop and they no longer carry that stigma. Luxury is where the ‘dupes' really come into their own and are saving us vast amounts of money in many cases.

So put the expensive champagne on ice, because you might want to be looking at buying the cheaper own brand champagne after watching supermarket own brands: the big taste test.

In this episode we look at those store cupboard staples. The items we fill our baskets and trolleys with week in week out. We spend over eight months of our lives in the supermarket and have tens of thousands of products to choose from. Brands are often ingrained into us and evoke memories of our childhood. The ketchup we had or the cereal we ate. Own brands used to be unappealing and boring. But now everything has changed. The packaging is cheeky, the names are even cheekier and the taste? …Well we aim to find out, as our panel eat their way through beans, bread and soup to name a few.

The price of everything is going up at the moment and even a tin of beans, once considered a student staple, has gone up considerably. So, switching to the own-brand alternative could save us over £100 a year. In this edition, the savings keep coming and so too the cheeky names.

Nutella has a rival in town that goes by the name of Nutoka, the cheeky chocolate hazelnut spread from Aldi. But how do the supermarkets make these products so cheap? We go to the good food studio to examine the chocolatey spread to see how they can make something that can taste as good but at a fraction of the cost.

In this fast-paced and light-hearted programme, we take you through the aisles of the supermarket as we ask our panel if they can tell the difference between the brands and the own brands, and which do they prefer. It's fun and informative and after watching this you might think twice about picking up your favourite brand and pop the own brand in your basket instead.