You know your grocery bill has gone up. Everyone does. But here's what the numbers actually show: Auckland's food price index sat at 12,647 in 2020. By 2024, it hit 15,553. That's a 23% jump in four years.

To put that in context, it took the previous decade. 2010 to 2020. for prices to climb 19%. We've just lived through food inflation that moved faster than any period since the global financial crisis.

The trajectory tells the story. In 2020, as COVID hit, Auckland's food prices were already climbing. Then came 2021: up to 13,021. By 2022, they'd broken through 14,000. In 2023, they pushed past 15,000. And this year, they've kept climbing.

This isn't a blip. This is a structural shift in what it costs to feed yourself in New Zealand's biggest city.

Here's what that means in practice. The index measures the relative cost of food over time. When it moves from 12,647 to 15,553, every item in your trolley costs proportionally more. Your $200 weekly shop in 2020? It's now $246 for the exact same basket of goods.

And unlike rent or petrol, you can't cut back much on food. You still need to eat. Families still need to pack school lunches. The price just keeps rising, and the budget has to stretch further every week.

The speed matters here. A 23% increase over four years works out to roughly 5.3% per year, compounding. That's well above the Reserve Bank's inflation target of 1-3%. Food prices have been running hot, consistently, for years now.

What comes next? The 2024 figure of 15,553 represents the highest food price index Auckland has ever recorded since this data series began in 1975. We're not recovering from a spike; we're living at a new baseline.

The question isn't whether food got more expensive. It's whether wages kept pace. For most Auckland families, they didn't. That gap between what you earn and what you pay at the checkout? That's the story inside these numbers. And it's not getting smaller.