M&S Milk & Coco Hazelnut Pillow Cereal - 375g

About our best-before dates

We work hard to bring proper British groceries to Canada, but importing food across an ocean is not as tidy as stocking a supermarket shelf down the road.

Some products arrive with long dates. Some arrive with shorter ones. Different products come through the import process with different shelf lives, so the dates are not always as neat or predictable as they would be in a regular Canadian supermarket.

Most online grocery shops do not show best-before dates unless something is getting close. We do it differently.

If you were shopping in our Halifax store, you could pick up the product, turn it over, and check the date before buying. We think our online customers should get that same level of transparency.

That is why we show best-before dates clearly on our products.

What "best before" actually means

A best-before date is about quality — flavour, texture, freshness, and how the product is expected to be at its best.

It is not the same as a "use by" or expiry date, which only appears on certain regulated foods.

For everyday groceries like chocolate, biscuits, crisps, sweets, tea, sauces, jams, and pantry items, the best-before date is a quality marker, not a safety marker.

Why our dates vary so much

British imports are unpredictable. We do not get to choose every date that arrives in Canada, and different products naturally come with different shelf lives.

A jar of sauce may have months or years on it. A bag of crisps might arrive with a much shorter window and still be completely normal for that type of product.

We check dates, show them clearly, and give you the information before you buy — because that is how it should be.

What the colours mean

• More than 30 days remaining
• Within 30 days
• Within 5 days, or past the best-before date

The product page will still show the actual date, so you can decide what works for you.

Why some customers like shorter dates

Many of our regular customers deliberately shop shorter-dated items when the price makes sense.

A chocolate bar with two weeks left is often every bit as good as one with six months left — and if we can pass on a saving instead of letting perfectly good food go to waste, everyone wins.

It is not about cutting corners. It is about being clear, fair, and sensible with stock that has travelled a long way to get here.

Questions about a specific product? Email help@thegreatbritishshop.ca — we read every message.