Image may contain: Liquor, Drink, Bottle, Beverage, Beer Bottle, Beer, Alcohol, Person, People, Human

I travelled from Scotland to England because I refuse to pay £11 for a bottle of Frosty Jack’s

It’s actually cheaper to travel south of the border

| UPDATED

Unless you've been living under a rock, or anywhere other than Scotland, you will have heard about the recently introduced Minimum Unit Pricing Law.

All alcoholic drinks are now priced at a minimum of 50p per unit of alcohol they contain. This means many things, but most devastatingly, it means that the once cheap and beloved two litre bottle of cider now costs £5 per bottle at the very least.

That's nearly double what it used to be.

This raises a question – is it possible to hop on a cheap train down to England, stock up on all the grim bottles of cider I could ever dream of, and then return with enough alcohol to have made it worth the trip?

The answer is yes. A bottle of Frosty Jack's now costs £11.25 in Scotland, whereas you can still pay a measly £3.69 for the very same product in England.

We decided to take advantage of this unbelievable discovery, so hopped on the train down to the nearest English town, Berwick-upon-Tweed.

Image may contain: Person, People, Human

One way ticket to Seshlehem please, mate.

If you book in advance, you can pay £7.50 for a day return to Berwick, buy even just one bottle of Frosty Jack's for £3.69, spending a grand total of £11.19. Yes, that's right, that's a whopping saving of six pence.

I must confess, I duped myself early on. I failed to book an advance train ticket, so knew I would have to buy more than one bottle to make it worth my while. I managed to get a last minute return ticket from Edinburgh for £16.80, and I was on my way.

Image may contain: Person, People, Human

Upon arrival, I went looking for the nearest corner shop or supermarket and came across B&M Bargains. I'd heard the stories about how cheap it was south of the border, but you can never quite comprehend the sweet, sweet deals until you're stood in the shop, staring the deals right in the face.

B&M were selling 2 litres of Strongbow for a teeny £2.99. This was truly an offer I couldn't refuse, so I purchased a bottle and continued my search for cider elsewhere. It was in Iceland where I found the truly criminal deals, when I saw three litre bottles of cider for £3.69.

I bought myself a bottle of the infamous Frosty Jack's, along with a bottle of Blackthorn Reserve, so I had a bit of variety.

Image may contain: Drink, Bottle, Beverage, Beer Bottle, Beer, Alcohol

Enough to make anyone cry

As I was now in possession of just under two gallons of cider, cashiers and others were starting to give me funny looks. I decided against buying any more as I felt my point had been proven.

I had managed to buy eight litres of cider for just £10.37, which in Scotland would have cost me somewhere in the region of £30.

This shows that even if you don't book ahead and get the cheap deal on travel, you are still able to beat the cost of your ticket. If I'd bought two more bottles of Frosty Jack's, I'd have spent £17.75 on alcohol, which would have cost me around £47 in Scotland.

Image may contain: Tin, Can, Aluminium, Person, People, Human

Mission accomplished

The days of boozing on a budget in Scotland have come to a tragic end, but I feel as though we can find comfort in the fact that in just one short trip down to Berwick-upon-Tweed, we can stock up on all our beloved beverages, make crazy savings, and be back in time for pres.