Jack Monroe praises Asda for making Smartprice range cheaper amid cost-of-living crisis

Anti-poverty campaigner has been highlighting how inflation affecting most financially vulnerable

Asda will roll out its Smart Price range in all 581 stores (Getty/Instagram @jack_munroe)

Jack Monroe has thanked Asda for following through on its pledge to roll out its lowest-price range, Smart Price, to further stores.

The supermarket chain made the decision after anti-poverty campaigner Monroe highlighted how the cost of inflation is affecting the most financially vulnerable.

On Monday, Asda said it would almost double the number of stores that offer its Smart Price range to all 581 of its locations.

The supermarket’s range – which includes items such as a 15 pack of eggs for £1.18, a can of peas for 21p, carrots for 20p and 500g of pasta for 29p – currently contains 200 items, 150 of which are available in 300 stores.

However, from 1 March, all 200 items will be made available in Asda stores across the country.

On Saturday, Monroe thanked the supermarket for taking this step.

“I’ve cried in supermarkets plenty in the last 10 years. Putting back jam that had crept up by sixpence, meaning SB and I faced a week of bone dry toast,” she said.

“Trying to work out what to put back, what to do without, out of a tenner’s worth of groceries that weren’t enough to start with.

“I’ve cried tears of humiliation when a shelf-edge label turned out to be advertising an expired promotion, tipping my shopping over what I could afford from the six pounds or so in change – the only money I had in the world – in my hand.

“And today I cried, quietly, to myself, in Asda, as the enormity of all of the last few weeks finally sank in among all the white labels in my shopping basket.”

Monroe added: “So I guess I just wanted to say thanks to everyone at Asda who has worked really hard over the last few weeks to bring the missing Smart Price products back.”

Meg Farren, Asda’s chief customer officer, said: “We want to help our customers’ budgets stretch further and have taken on board the comments about the availability of our Smart Price range made by Jack Monroe.

“We are taking steps to put our full Smart Price and Farm Stores ranges in store and online to make these products as accessible as possible.”

Additional reporting by PA.