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Wenzel's becoming too expensive?
Is it just me, or are others noticing this too?
At this point they are nearly as pricey as Gail's and lets be honest, the quality just isnt there to charge to that level.
:(
i live near the one on church st and honestly their pain au chocolat has been my guilty pleasure for years but last week i paid 3.20 for one that was noticeably smaller than before. feels like theyre testing how much people will put up with before switching
if youre in hackney central theres a polish bakery called olesia on mare st that does really good rye bread for like 2.50 and their pastries are solid too. not as fancy but way better value and the owners are lovely
you're not wrong. the sourdough loaf went up to like 4.50 and it's noticeably smaller than it was a year ago. i still go for the seeded rye because nothing else in the area has that same texture, but it's more of a treat now than a weekly thing.
honestly if you're craving that style of bread, try the bakery stall at broadway market on saturdays. they do a similar german-style rye for 3 quid and it's actually bigger. not as convenient as wenzel's but worth the trip imo.
yeah the shrinkage is real, i noticed it with their pretzels. used to be a decent size for a snack now theyre basically bite-sized. gails is overpriced too but at least their croissants are decent.
What are some innovative ways to anonymously compare rental prices in a city?
SpareRoom's "rooms wanted" ads are underrated for this. people post what they're currently paying alongside what they want next, so you can scrape a rough sense of going rates by postcode without anyone knowing you looked. it skews young and flatshare heavy tho, so not much use if you're after 2-beds in zone 2.
Another one is just the depozit or tenancy deposit scheme data. not public-facing, but your council's housing officer can tell you median rents from deposit registrations if you email them under FOI. takes weeks, but its proper anon and nobody clocks u.
Rightmove and Zoopla only show asking rents, which are often 10 to 15 percent above what a place actually goes for, so they're a poor benchmark. The trick I've used is the ONS Price Index of Private Rents, which breaks things down to borough level and is genuinely anonymous since it's aggregate data, no listing or account needed. For something more granular, the London Renters Union runs a rent reporting tool where you submit what you're paying with your postcode and it maps it against others nearby, though the coverage is patchy outside the inner boroughs.
the openrent "rent check" thing is decent for zones 3-4 where the unions tool barely reaches. also worth checking the london.gov.uk planning portal for new build applications, they list "affordable" and market rent figures per unit in the viability assessments, which is basically the developer telling the council what they expect to charge. bit of a faff to dig through but its public, anonymous & nobody knows ur looking
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