Marleen Naipal scooped up another pot of face cream, glances at the price tag and tips it into her bulging basket of cosmetic products.
This was no ordinary shopping splurge: Naipal has taken a 400km round-trip bus to Germany from the Netherlands, where the high cost of living is poised to be a major factor in elections on Wednesday next week.
“We came all the way from Rotterdam to Bocholt [in Germany] for a day of shopping because it is just so much cheaper than in the Netherlands,” the 53-year-old hair stylist said.
Photo: AP
“I think some products are half the price, then the day trip is definitely worth it,” she said, with tickets for the “shopbus” costing about 40 euros (US$46.37).
She is not alone. Dutch bargain-hunters boarded the bus in Rotterdam, Amsterdam and Utrecht to cross the border into Germany.
Several companies offer “affordable shopping” trips out of the Netherlands, some even proposing overnight stays in Luxembourg to take advantage of cheap alcohol and tobacco.
Bus driver Ali el-Abassi understands why people travel such long distances to do their shopping in another country.
“I find it really sad how high the price of groceries is in the Netherlands,” the 45-year-old said.
“I just don’t understand how things can be half the price in Germany than in the Netherlands,” el-Abassi said.
The perception that prices are higher in the Netherlands appears to be borne out by data.
A survey by Dutch consumer watchdog Consumentenbond compared more than 130 popular products in France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.
They found that items were on average 15 percent cheaper in Germany than in the Netherlands, with higher quality brands up to 25 percent less expensive.
“Think of soft drinks, household goods and drugstore articles in particular,” the Consumentenbond report said. “In the Netherlands, these items are often on sale, but usually even the sale prices cannot compete with the price in Germany.”
“So in the Netherlands, with a ‘buy one, get one free’ offer, you don’t actually get anything free,” the watchdog said.
The high cost of living regularly features in polls of voters’ most pressing concerns and is sure to weigh on minds as the Dutch head to the ballot box next week.
For bargain-hunting Naipal, it all comes down to politics.
“It has just become very expensive in the Netherlands in a very short space of time. Many people are struggling to make ends meet on an average income, and that’s all about politics,” she said.
“We really hope that the election allows us to move forward ... because people are really suffering,” she added.
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