You would expect entrepreneur and former supermarket tycoon Ben Dunne to be consumer savvy, and it turns out that he is.
However, he overestimates the price of a litre of milk at €1.50 (actually €1.05 in my local convenience store) and underestimates the price of a pint of Guinness at €4.00 (which, in Dublin, can cost up to €5.10).
He is well aware of the borrowing rate of the European Central Bank at 4 per cent. He professes to be neither a spendthrift nor a bargain-hunter.
"I don't really spend too much on anything except maybe my wife, like anyone else!" He admits to sometimes overspending on eating out in restaurants.
"I'd always look at the overall package of a product: the staff, the service, the range of products. If that is good, then a percentage or two in difference of cost doesn't really make a difference." As far as consumer activism goes, Mr Dunne says that he does not complain often. "I just wouldn't go back to a place where I got bad service." He believes that discontinuing his custom is the best way of dealing with unsatisfactory service. Bad service is one of Mr Dunne's main gripes as a consumer.
"It's the thing that annoys me most. I just hate when staff don't make eye contact with you, when they just look through you."
He hasn't made any major changes in his custom to financial or telecommunications service providers. "We would keep an eye on what's on offer all of the time, and if I felt we were being ripped off, I would change where I do business."