Poundland and the 99p Stores are the new giants of the high street.

Like glittering Aladdin's caves, they tempt you in with their simple pricing structure and the promise of bargains undreamed of – mostly because you had no idea you even needed half the stuff you come out with.

Those self-service supermarket checkouts we all have so much joy in using, often result in longer queues – not to mention near-lethal check-out rage when the damn things bleat about "unexpected item in the bagging area" and the need to "call member of staff".

Research shows that queues at the staffed checkouts often get longer when the self-service (cost-cutting) tills are introduced.

It's hard to put a price on a commitment of love. But Tesco thinks it's £15, since that's the price of their engagement and wedding rings.

It's traditional, of course, for the chap in love to blow a month's salary on the first ring. But times are hard, so £15 should do it, and the rest can go on the gee-gees.

Anyone on the lookout for a new credit card deal at the moment is in luck thanks to the recent launch of market-leading new 0% balance transfer and purchases offers from NatWest/RBS and Tesco.

The supermarket bank's Clubcard is now charging new customers 0% on all purchases for 13 months, and on balance transfers for nine months, while the NatWest and RBS Platinum card has a new offer of 0% for 16 months on balance transfers and three months for purchases.

The Tesco Clubcard credit card looks like stonking value for Tesco regulars. It offers a market-leading 0% on purchases for 13 months, and a host of other goodies for shoppers. Surely it's a no-brainer.

Except that in money-management terms it's a complete nightmare.

Supermarkets predicted this weekend could have been their busiest since Christmas as fair weather and diehard football fans stocked up on World Cup essentials from beer to England bikinis.

And though some local authorities and po-faced businesses refuse to allow their workers to fly the England flag, retailers have emblazoned everything from burgers to baby clothes with the cross of St George.

So the England football team didn't exactly deliver the kind of opening match we were hoping for. It looks like another troublesome tournament all round.

Your World Cup party is therefore going to have to be fairly spectacular to make up for the disappointment on the pitch. So we've tracked down some of the best deals to help you make the most of it.

After the coalition pledged to ban excessively cheap alcohol, a health watchdog has weighed in today with recommendations that could push the minimum price up, reduce the number of places that are allowed to sell booze, cut the amount that can be imported or slash the days and hours when it can be bought.

So what effect will all this have?

Supermarkets and off-licences face a ban on cheap booze, as the government has pledged to ban "loss leader" sales of alcohol in the battle against binge drinking. It's a daring move with the World Cup round the corner.

But they have received support for the move from one very surprising business leader.

We've all started doing more petrol maths. We like our friends, but do we still want to visit them when the journey costs £80? And the school run, it costs a fortune, do the kids really need to learn? When a tank of petrol is pushing £100, these things need to be considered!

However, there's good news today. You can start visiting friends again, and the kids can get to school, because Asda has started a much-needed petrol price war.

There was a time when being together meant sharing everything. When you became a couple you didn't just have to give up half the duvet and half the remote control. You also had to hand over your financial independence, signing up to a joint bank account.

There are those who still swear by it. They argue that if you are sharing a life, money should be part of it, and that it's the fairest way to iron out imbalances in income and what we're putting into the household expenses. But they are wrong.

Good news for Tesco is that the competition watchdog has decided to drop some allegations of price fixing against them as part of a dairy investigation that has seen some of the supermarket giant's rivals fined a total of £70 million.

That means Asda, Dairy Crest, Lactalis McLelland, Safeway, Sainsbury's, The Cheese Company and Wiseman will each pay a portion of that hefty whack. But exactly how much they'll all pay is uncertain yet because if they continue to co-operate with the Office of Fair Trading investigation – which is expended to end early summer – then they'll earn themselves a discount on the fines.

Tesco has become bored with simply taking in every pound we earn, and has decided to own the houses we live in too.

Soon there will be Tesco mini-villages, as the supermarket chain has announced it will be building four small communities, each complete with its own Tesco store. There could be more Tesco towns in the future.

The four villages already on the drawing board are in the South East. They will be in Streatham, South London; Bromley-by-Bow, East London; Woolwich, south-east London and Dartford, Kent.

The Streatham scheme will include 200 homes, a bus depot and an ice rink. So native Streathamite Naomi Campbell (pictured) will no longer have to travel across London for her grocery and ice-rink needs.

There will be a few "mixed-use living and leisure" built in the North East and Ipswich.

Amidst the general economic gloom of a country desperately trying to claw its way out of economic difficulty, the financial results announced by Tesco yesterday seemed almost impossibly bright and sparkly.

While the rest of us are struggling to get by, the supermarket giant reported record profits of £3.4 billion, up an astonishing 10% from last year.

So where did it all go right? How are they cashing in?