I was going to buy a soda stream, well the eBay ones which are about £25 are clones, in order to enjoy carbonated water without having to worry that the bottle ending up in the oceans and, I hoped, maybe save some money.
The cheapest CO2 canisters I can find are 40p each and do one litre, which is twice the price of the bottled sparkling water from Tesco, plus the cartridges themselves are single use (but, I think metal) so need disposing of responsibly.
Oh well back to the drawing board.
I prefer to donate them to a charity before the items get too tatty!
This is one of the things I love about France, smart, casual seems to be the norm for any occasion. I adapted to this very quickly:smile: While my attitude is ‘what you see is what you get’ I have to admit I bought far too many ‘things’ when I lived in the UK, but did not realise I was on the hampster wheel! Many people/friends trying to impress 
Go for the larger canisters, which are cost effective as they do 60litres
Sorry, weird link, but basically we’ve found that the 60l refillable canisters are ok value compared to buying bottles.
Thanks, Véronique. It’s a good long list. I’ll keep an eye out and will definitely try the chocolate, at least. In fact we may have seen some of their packaging on our last visit but didn’t know the idea behind it.
I bought 6 L of milk today in Leclerc in Bayonne 
And got a promotional 2e off
You do have to show some consideration, such as if you are going out for a meal with friends.
I made Jim change his working sweatshirt for a pullover yesterday. He wondered why.
The dairy farmers are getting hit hard but it’s the same in the Uk, it’s cheap imports from the eastern block countries which have low wages and taxes. Then the supermarkets tell them how much they are willing to pay,
It’s good that this brand is doing this but you can’t just blame capitalism is a flaw in the EU as it’s not a equal market and never will be.
[it’s cheap imports from the eastern block countries which have low wages and taxes
And the rest about the EU…
Sorry Barrie - but what on earth are you doing here in Europe when you (seemingly) despise your fellow Europeans so much?
Just asking? Because, honestly I don’t get it ?
Do you want to be a part of Europe and the European project? Or not?
No it’s not. The UK imports around 16% of its dairy products and 98% of these come from the EU. Yes 98%! So a measly 0.32% of UK dairy products come from outside the EU. Get real and stop repeating stupid propaganda.
I guess that by "eastern block countries " Barrie means ex Soviet satellite states (or Iron Curtain countries if you prefer) which are now EU members.
As far as I can see Jane is correct that something like 98-99% imported dairy is from the EU (her comment is very similar to this report on the possible impact of Brexit on the dairy industry.
Looking at the sources within the EU the largest are France, Germany and Ireland
Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands and Italy make up about another 15-18% so the “eastern bloc” can only be less than 1/6th (maybe 13-15%) of our imports - I can’t see them skewing the market much.
About 90% of our dairy exports go to the EU - under WTO terms the average tariff would be 18% (plus there would be a tariff we’d have to impose on imports) but it is up to almost 80% on some products - that makes UK produce much less competitive in the EU which is our single largest market.
See also https://projectblue.blob.core.windows.net/media/Default/Imported%20Publication%20Docs/Horizon/Horizon_Dairy_Bitesize_Brexit_20190417.pdf for more explanation of our dairy industry than you could ever need 
There is a world wide surplus of milk and this sets the price.
It is not just from the EU.
Russia has stopped importing milk from the EU which means that there is now a surplus.
I don’t understand why the UK is importing dairy products if it is exporting them. 
The UK imports about 60% of its food, It really isn’t self sufficient so it could well export speciality dairy products eg cheese, with relatively high value added, but have to import milk, yoghurt etc.
Sadly, so many smaller UK Dairies were forced to close, due to the punitive price-wars wages by the big UK Dairies vying for the Supermarket contracts.
Now the UK has to import milk… 
Because the types of goods on each leg are different - eg exporting milk for processing (quite a lot of NI milk goes south for processing) and then importing the processed foods afterwards.
I watched the most harrowing footage of calf abuse in the USA a few days ago…I won’t put the link here as it’s horrendous and had me in tears…
It was filmed undercover by the Animal Recovery Mission at Fair Oaks farm where milk is supplied to Coca-Cola’s Fairlife brand…
I have long boycotted “Coca Cola” for many reasons but should the lieing smirking bojo brexshit ever come to pass then I think my label checking is likely to become fanatical rather than just an obsession…
Ditto Helen
Not all milk stays as liquid milk.
The UK imports a lot of butter and cheese.
It exports a lot of dried milk.
