Are you a victim of lifestyle creep? You know, those occasional small upgrades you allow yourself, only to discover a few months down the line that — yikes — they’re no longer occasional.
What starts out as a treat — a vegetable box delivery, a taxi from the airport, the organic red instead of the house plonk — becomes your everyday normal. You never used to pay for extra legroom but then you do, and you add on speedy boarding. You once hooted at the price of Poilâne sourdough and now you have some in your bread bin where the Hovis used to be (the Wotsits are staying, to be fair). And once you’ve crept along the lifestyle scale, away from reality and in the direction of Gwyneth Paltrow, it’s hard to creep back. Probably no one has ever tried. The whole point about creep is that it’s unstoppable: once you’ve tried the Pullman seat in the fancy cinema with the drink holders, the Cineworld ones seem cramped; once you’ve borrowed the Tekla dressing gown, your Primark one feels a bit Waynetta Slob.
Not all lifestyle creep is shameful or necessarily to do with spending more money (although mostly it is), but it pays to know where your creeps are occurring so you can judge for yourself whether they are sustainable.
Wine creep
Wine creep is huge in 2024. We’re all much more interested and it’s now cool to know your wines, or use an app that does. Who hesitates to Vivino the grüner veltliner their friends brought? What director doesn’t make sure the affluent couple are seen quaffing vast glasses of red at the island of their very large kitchen before they head out to an awards ceremony? Who can forget that Meghan’s pre-Harry blog, The Tig, was named after her favourite Tuscan wine, Tignanello? Interest in wine bordering on snobbery is gradually becoming completely acceptable and no different from minding where your chicken came from.
Pre-creep: I’ll have the house wine.
Post-creep: I’ll have the English organic.
Uber creep
Note: not taxi creep because you wouldn’t dream of getting a taxi the way you get Ubers, which is at the drop of a hat. The Uber thing is a lot like vaping. It seems harmless, convenient and something you can afford to do when you need to, but the next thing you know your fingers are reaching for the Uber app just because it’s started to drizzle or it looks like it might.
Pre-creep: It’s only two changes on the Tube and a bit of a walk.
Post-creep: It’s going to be SEVEN MINUTES! I’m trying Bolt.
People will pay anything up to a tenner for some sourdough
Ingredients creep
A few years ago the big kitchen creep was gadget creep. We bought spiralisers and jamon knives and Nutribullets and used them twice. Well, now the creep is all about top-quality ingredients. We have serious olive oil creep (don’t use the Waitrose extra virgin for dressing, use the Xylo). We have cheese creep (in fact, cheese is so important that rustling is now a thing: see the recent theft of £300,000 worth of award-winning cheddar from Neal’s Yard). And then there’s bread creep: people will pay anything up to a tenner for some nicely dusted sourdough. Also catching up on the creep front are olives (once you’ve sampled a nocellara from the fresh section you are less often, if ever again, going to be reaching for the ones in the tin), while the newest creep to watch out for is nuts. Apparently it’s now normal to have a minimum of five types of nuts in your store cupboard and snack on them the way you used to on cheesy Wotsits.
Pre-creep: I bought a party pack of Walkers!
Post-creep: Sorry there are so few of these marcona almonds but I had to put half of them back at the till. They seem be 25p each.
Waitrose creep
Waitrose used to be the once-in-a-while shop for the nice soup or the ready-made stuffing. Then one day you’re walking briskly past Lidl and Tesco and nipping in for tonight’s supper because just stepping inside makes you feel better and they don’t chop up their cavolo nero.
Pre-creep: Hide the bag, they’ll think we’re profligate.
Post-creep: You have to get the Turkish delight there. And the ginger. And the cake.
• ‘We gave up high-paying jobs to do something we loved’
Threadcount creep
Arguably the most insidious of the creeps because you were perfectly fine with your easy-care sheets and then one day you clicked on the higher threadcount on the Soak&Sleep website and now anything less feels like a rail sleeper sheet circa 1976. There has been a similar creep effect with pillows, duvets and mattresses, of course. Your mum and dad bought a small double bed from John Lewis and had it for 50 years but threadcount creep (aka bed-obsessing in general) has made that seem almost shocking. Now double beds are for the spare room only and a superking is just what a lot of average-sized people expect.
Pre-creep: Christ, look at the size of the bed! Let’s cancel the kids’ twin room!
Post-creep: We have split mattresses (I like a firmer one) and different duvet tog factors.
Schöffel creep
If you live in the country, venture outdoors and are a man, you’re wearing a Schöffel fleece gilet. Kaleb, of Clarkson’s Farm fame, always wears one. And so does Mike Tindall. Every second man on the street in any town where you might see a sheep or a Daylesford on the horizon has one of these zip-up vests with the distinctive brown trim. A few years ago they were not unusual but now they’re standard — and countrywear creep in general is catching on. There are clothes in Zara that look like exact replicas of Princess Diana’s Balmoral honeymoon wardrobe.
Pre-creep: It’s my dad’s old jacket.
Post-creep: I can’t do without my Dubarrys.
Premium economy is an increasingly popular choice
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Diet creep
Not as in the diet of the day (Ozempic has stopped that creep dead in its tracks), more the creep of dietary expertise. What’s likely to spike your glucose and what will steady it. Secret sources of fibre (popcorn). The value of apples with their peel versus without. Very gradually this sort of thing has crept up from being simply boffin talk or stuff LA actresses pay specialists for to instead become important information on a par with knowing which of your local nurseries are good. Diet creep is largely positive but it does put those who haven’t yet experienced the creep under pressure: no more giving your guests Pringles followed by sausage pasta and crumble.
Pre-creep: I’ve given up carbs.
Post-creep: Kimchi for breakfast.
Teeth and Botox creep
She’s had a bit between her eyebrows and he’s had his teeth whitened. This teeth and Botox creep has taken a while but now it’s looking more like a speed walk. We’ve gone from OK for some (Sharon Osbourne) to “yeah, someone comes in and does everyone in the office every three months”. All the tweaks are now no more remarkable than appointments with the dental hygienist.
Pre-creep: OMG, did you see her at the Oscars? Looks like a fish.
Post-creep: They can do this amazing neck lift now.
• Lifestyle creep affects us all. Now’s the time to fight back
Cashmere creep
Thirty years ago cashmere was for the rich and you didn’t see much of it about. Now it’s the Waitrose of wools, with all other wools essentially being the reduced section in Iceland. It’s a bit like threadcount creep — regular wool feels like a Brillo pad after cashmere — only more people are in on it. Blame Marks & Spencer for upping its game. Blame Uniqlo (not so soft, very reasonable). People now think nothing of buying cashmere throws, blankets, sweatpants and little hoods, things that would once have been strictly Liz Taylor and Richard Burton territory.
Pre-creep: Shall we club together and get Mum a cardigan for her 80th?
Post-creep: Love my new cashmere joggers.
Exercise creep
This one is terrible. You join a gym but it’s no fun — people are staring at you and there’s scary machinery — so you join a class instead. That’s much nicer but it’s also overcrowded and there’s no shower. Then your friend says, “Why don’t you try Sam, who is one-on-one, but we could do it together and halve the cost?” and … you see where this is going. The Sam option is obviously way nicer but one day Susie drops out and you’re now a person with a personal trainer.
Pre-creep: Must go to the gym. Argh.
Post-creep: Basically Jennifer Aniston.
Parenting creep
Cast your mind back to your youth and you’ll recall that once you got a job you saw your parents maybe three times a year. Honestly, back then they had less than zero idea what we were up to (“what do you mean you had your appendix out?”) and expected to hear from us only if you were looking for a character witness. Well, now we’re parents and are armpit-deep in our young — and not so young — adult children’s lives, with both sides expecting nothing less. We’re the first responder after an incident, the supplier of foreign holidays, the thrower of birthday parties, the flat movers and furniture providers and dental treatment payers. No one knows how the creep started but it has its origins in slacker parental behaviour (fine for the kids to see you three negronis down), boomer guilt (we were going on skiing holidays at their age; they can’t afford to go to Wales) and the fact that we have comforts they do not and don’t like to see them going without organic vegetables. So the hands-on parenting is continuing, sometimes well beyond their marriages.
Pre-creep: You need to get your stuff out of your room, we’re turning it into the best spare.
Post-creep: Dad’s put you all on the car insurance.
The cost of pet ownership is going up
RUTH BLACK/GETTY IMAGES
Pet creep
You may remember what it was like to own a dog in the 20th century. Back then they needed a basket, a bowl and a lead. Well, post-pet creep it would not be that weird to take your pet with you on holiday or to book a pet-friendly restaurant table. And pet creep is showing no signs of levelling out — if anything, it’s just getting going and what was considered Mad Dog Mummy behaviour is now Actually Normal Enlightened (Urban) Owner.
Pre-creep: If it snows again he can come into the kitchen.
Post-creep: Pongo is having a birthday party on Saturday, can Pluto come?
