Homemade Ice Tea and Sirup: The Swiss Summer Drink Hack

A litre of bottled ice tea costs CHF 1.50–2.20 in Swiss supermarkets. A litre of homemade ice tea — tea bags, sugar, lemon, tap water — costs about CHF 0.20–0.30. For a household that drinks two litres a day through the hot months, that is a difference of roughly CHF 80–110 per summer month, for ten minutes of work a week.

Sirup tells the same story: a bottle of concentrate at CHF 3–5 makes 6–9 litres of finished drink, landing at CHF 0.45–0.70 per litre — and homemade elderflower or lemon sirup cuts even that in half. Summer drinks are one of the quietest leaks in a Swiss grocery budget, and one of the easiest to fix.

How much does bottled ice tea really cost over a Swiss summer?

The per-bottle price feels harmless — CHF 1.80 here, CHF 2.20 there. The season total does not. A two-person household drinking 1.5 litres a day from June to August buys around 135 litres. At an average CHF 1.80 per litre, that is CHF 243 for the summer. The same volume made at home costs about CHF 34. The gap, roughly CHF 200, is one of the largest single-product savings available in the Swiss summer basket — bigger than most people's entire Aktion savings for the season.

It is the same mechanism as coffee at home versus the café: a small per-unit habit, multiplied by season-long frequency. And exactly like bottled versus tap water, the base liquid — Swiss tap water — is essentially free and of excellent quality.

What do ice tea and sirup cost at Migros, Coop, Lidl and Aldi?

Two readings of this table. First: if you insist on bottled, the house brands at Aldi and Lidl at under CHF 1 per litre are half the price of branded bottles at Migros or Coop — and in blind tastings, few people reliably tell them apart once chilled. Second: even the cheapest bottle costs three to four times the homemade equivalent.

How do you make ice tea at home that actually tastes right?

The classic Swiss profile — think of the ice tea everyone grew up with — is black tea, sugar, and lemon. Per litre:

1. Steep 3 black tea bags in 500 ml hot water for 5 minutes. Remove the bags — over-steeping causes bitterness, not strength.
2. Stir in 2–3 tablespoons of sugar (25–40 g) while warm. That is still less than half the sugar of most bottled versions.
3. Top up with 500 ml cold tap water and the juice of half a lemon. Chill.

Cost per litre: about CHF 0.22 with Lidl or Aldi tea and sugar. Peach version: add a sliced ripe peach during the warm phase — in July, Swiss and Italian peaches cost CHF 2.50–3.50 per kilo, so one peach adds about CHF 0.50 per batch. Cold-brew variant for the laziest weeks: bags in cold water in the fridge overnight, zero heat in the flat — which matters during a proper heat wave week.

Is homemade sirup worth the effort?

For flavour, clearly; for money, it depends on the fruit. The rule: homemade sirup wins when the flavour base is free or in glut. Elderflowers in late spring cost nothing but a walk. Mint from a balcony pot is effectively free all summer. Lemon sirup from promotion lemons works out around CHF 1.20–1.60 per litre of concentrate — half the shop price. Berry sirups only beat the shop when berries are at their seasonal low or self-picked.

The basic method is the same for all of them: equal parts sugar and water heated until dissolved, flavour steeped in, strained, bottled. A litre of concentrate makes 7–8 litres of finished drink and keeps for weeks in the fridge. If you have children at home over the school holidays, a sirup bottle plus tap water replaces an entire crate of sweet drinks — the same substitution logic as homemade versus store-bought snacks.

One caveat in fairness: shop sirup at Aldi or Denner is already cheap per finished litre. If nobody in the household enjoys making it, buying concentrate and skipping bottled drinks captures most of the saving with none of the work.

What does the switch save over a full summer?

Putting the numbers together for a family of four drinking about 2.5 litres of cold drinks a day from June through August:

• All bottled, branded: ~225 litres × CHF 1.80 = CHF 405
• All bottled, discounter house brand: ~225 litres × CHF 0.97 = CHF 218
• Shop sirup + tap water: ~CHF 0.55/litre = CHF 124
• Homemade ice tea and sirup: ~CHF 0.28/litre = CHF 63

The full switch saves this family over CHF 340 in a single summer — and even the half-measures save CHF 150–280. There is a bonus saving on the side: fewer PET bottles to carry home and return, and a fridge that is not stacked with packaging. If you drink your ice tea at the Badi rather than at home, a filled 1.5 L bottle from your own fridge beats the kiosk price by CHF 3–4 every single visit — we run those numbers in the Badi day food budget.

Sugar, tea, lemons and sirup concentrate all appear regularly in the weekly Aktionen, and that is where Eini comes in: the algorithm tracks real prices across Coop, Migros, Lidl, Aldi, Denner and Aligro and puts the ingredients on your list when they are cheapest. Download Eini and make the summer drinks budget a one-time decision instead of a daily one.