I've just finished a 160g Marks and Spencer tub of olives and manchego cheese, made up of roughly around 40 olives and 20 pretty small cubes of manchego. The tub cost £3.

The M&S is just around the corner from where I work (yes, on a Sunday) and I know M&S are pricey, but I went anyway.

I shop regularly (I like cooking - I'm a guy) and know the price of foods (many items cheaper at Lidl/Aldi) so I know how much I would pay for a jar (big or small) of green olives and a chunk of manchego, and I should imagine the mark-up on my 160g tub was substantial, but I wonder quite how substantial. Any guesses?

No, but in the grand plan of things three quid isn't a wallet buster for a snack you presumably enjoyed.
If you shop regularly and enjoy "cooking" you won't find it difficult to prepare the same snack for much less and take it with you.
Would you be allowed a nice glass of wine with it at work?
Crusty bread and a recliner and you're away.

50% gross profit. But then they have to pay staff, storage, transport etc, leaving around 5% net profit.

Huge I would imagine but thats the cost of convenience.

Oh, I do. Feta cheese, cucumber, olives, tomatoes and olive oil with that crusty bread. And in reply to other comments, yes, of course I appreciate it's a convenience and I hope my query didn't imply I resented the price. I was just curious.

I remember a few years ago reading a piece about how your average chicken kurma or whatever cost about 50p in ingredients, but then as someone pointed out there are other overheads to be met.

A banana costs around 10p.

I've always wondered how much the supermarket buy them for. Maybe a loss leader?

How can they get a bunch of bananas delivered from Africa for 50p. You can only fit so many on a plane.

Last time I went into a M and S Food Hall I laughed out loud at the prices.

Anyone call Security?

On Dragon's Den tonight a chicken farmer pitched a convenience food.
Two hard boiled eggs, suitably packaged, for £1.58.
The shells were painted in garish colours and he claimed the colourant sealed the shell and elongated the shelf life.
He was quickly dismissed.
It wasn't about price though, it was about the visual appeal, or lack of, the product.

A green boiled egg anyone

Don't bananas come in from the Caribbean on ships? Picked under-ripe and kept in a preservative atmosphere so they are only just ripe when they arrive in the uk, I thought. That way the transport costs are quite low though the amount paid to the actual grower is probably pretty poor - unless you buy 'fairtrade' I suppose.

Anyway average wholesale price last year was about 60p a kilo - see Banana wholesale prices

Well most bananas don't come from Africa and I don't know why you think supermarkets are using planes to get bananas to us, a ship does the job.

Go into M& S early afternoon and buy their "yellow tickets" (reduced stuff) then you pay the right price. When we are in UK we live near so have learned the times they do their reductions. Bread from 1/4 to 5. They close earlier on Sunday so adjust by 1 hour

No, that happened when I played the piano in Harrods piano showroom.
Assistant "Can I help you sir?"
Me "No thanks, I seem to be managing quite well on my own."
Assistant "Security!!!!!"

In my defence, I have got a music degree.

I do hope you seized him by the lapels and said "I'm playing all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order"