An old idea. A fresh start. The same mission.

Where it all began

I've always believed that finding a good deal shouldn't be so difficult.

We live in a world where retailers can change prices at a moment's notice, advertise enormous discounts and sell identical products under slightly different names. Yet, as consumers, we're often left wondering whether we're actually getting a good deal.

Is that television really 40% off? Was it cheaper last month? Is another retailer selling the exact same thing for less?

These should be easy questions to answer.

Years ago, I decided to do something about it.

I'm a software engineer based in Perth, Western Australia, and I've spent much of my career building software, working with large amounts of data and solving complicated technical problems.

lowerSpendings started as a side project. I wanted to build something that could collect prices from Australian retailers, identify identical products and give people a clearer picture of what things actually cost.

The idea was simple: give consumers better information so they can make better decisions.

What started as a personal project eventually grew into something much bigger.

From side project to hundreds of thousands of visitors

At its peak, lowerSpendings was attracting around 200,000 to 300,000 visitors a month.

The platform tracked millions of product listings, bringing together prices from different retailers and helping Australians find better deals.

Seeing something I'd built in my spare time become genuinely useful to so many people was incredibly rewarding.

But behind the scenes, things were considerably more complicated.

Retail product data is messy. Really messy.

Different retailers describe the same product in different ways. Product names contain inconsistent model numbers, confusing variations and occasionally outright incorrect information. Categories rarely line up neatly between stores, and prices and availability can change constantly.

Getting all that information into a database is one challenge.

Working out which products are actually the same, keeping everything current and presenting accurate comparisons is another challenge entirely.

I spent countless hours building systems to collect product data, categorise products, match listings, maintain price histories and keep the platform running.

And all of that was happening alongside my full-time career and family life.

Eventually, the amount of ongoing maintenance became difficult to sustain.

lowerSpendings gradually took a back seat.

But I never really stopped believing in what it could become.

Fast forward to 2026

A lot has changed since I first started lowerSpendings.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning have advanced enormously, particularly when it comes to understanding information, identifying patterns and helping developers build sophisticated software.

Problems that once required weeks of experimentation and painstaking manual work can now be approached in entirely new ways.

And for someone who's spent years building software, the change is extraordinary.

In 2026, I started revisiting the original lowerSpendings project, along with a more modern platform I'd begun developing around the same idea.

What I found was encouraging.

Much of the hard work I'd done years earlier was still valuable. The underlying architecture, data models, database design and lessons learned from processing millions of product listings provided a solid foundation to build upon.

This wasn't about generating a new shopping website overnight with AI.

It was about taking years of engineering experience, combining it with much more capable tools and finally being able to tackle problems that had previously demanded too much time for one person.

The progress has been remarkable.

Tasks that once consumed entire weekends can now be tackled far more efficiently. Product categorisation and matching can benefit from modern machine learning models. Development moves faster, and there's more time to focus on improving the experience for the people actually using the website.

For the first time in years, working on lowerSpendings feels less like an endless maintenance exercise and more like exploring what's possible.

And I'm genuinely excited about that.

More than just finding the cheapest price

When I originally started lowerSpendings, the primary goal was to help people find products at better prices.

That remains fundamental to what we're building.

But over time, I've become increasingly interested in a bigger question.

What if we could help people understand prices, rather than simply compare them?

Think about how we shop today.

A retailer advertises a product at 50% off. That sounds fantastic, but what does the discount actually mean?

Was the product regularly sold at its supposed original price? Has it been cheaper before? Does another retailer have a better everyday price without advertising a sale?

Without historical pricing information, it's difficult to know.

And it goes beyond advertised discounts.

Sometimes prices rise because of seasonal demand, supply shortages, manufacturing costs or changes in the broader economy.

Other times, prices fluctuate as retailers compete, clear inventory or prepare for major sales events.

Imagine being able to see not only that a product has become more expensive, but also information that helps explain why.

Or receiving useful insights about when certain categories of products have historically been cheapest.

Or being able to recognise when an advertised bargain is actually nothing special.

That's the direction I want lowerSpendings to take.

Because the best shopping decision isn't always buying from the cheapest retailer today.

Sometimes it's knowing when not to buy at all.

Building something consumers can trust

There's no shortage of shopping websites on the internet.

Plenty will tell you what to buy, where to buy it and why a particular product is supposedly the best.

But I think consumers deserve more than another list of products accompanied by affiliate links.

I want lowerSpendings to be genuinely useful, even when the most helpful advice is to wait, consider an alternative or avoid a purchase altogether.

That means focusing on a few important principles.

Transparency over marketing

A big advertised discount doesn't automatically make something a bargain.

Where reliable historical pricing data is available, I want people to be able to see how prices have changed and make that judgement for themselves.

Accuracy over quantity

Tracking millions of listings isn't particularly useful if we're comparing different products and presenting them as identical.

Product matching, classification and data quality have always been some of the hardest parts of building lowerSpendings.

They're also among the areas I'm investing the most effort into improving.

Consumers first

lowerSpendings may earn commissions when visitors purchase through links to participating retailers.

That's one way to support the cost of operating and improving the platform.

But the goal isn't to push people towards purchases just because they might generate a commission.

It's to help people make informed decisions, whether that results in a purchase or not.

Honesty about the limitations

No price comparison platform gets everything right all the time.

Retailers change prices, availability can be inconsistent, product information can be incomplete and automated matching isn't infallible.

I'm not going to pretend otherwise.

What I can promise is a commitment to improving the quality of the information, correcting mistakes and being transparent about what the platform can and can't tell you.

Trust is something you earn by being useful and reliable, not something you can simply claim.

A different kind of shopping intelligence

Looking ahead, I see lowerSpendings becoming much more than a traditional price comparison website.

I'd love to help Australians answer questions like:

• Is this actually the best price available, or just the biggest advertised discount?
• How has the price changed over the past few months or years?
• Is now a good time to buy, based on historical trends?
• Are there comparable products that offer better value?
• Why are prices increasing across a particular category?
• Are there signs that prices might rise or fall in the coming months?

Some of those questions are relatively straightforward to answer with good pricing data.

Others are much harder and will require additional research, data sources and careful analysis.

I don't have all the answers yet, and I certainly don't want to pretend that I do.

But having spent years working with large datasets and building software systems, I find those challenges fascinating.

The opportunity to turn enormous amounts of messy retail information into something genuinely useful for everyday people is what makes this project so interesting to me.

Why I'm sharing the journey

One of the things I want to do differently this time is be more open about what happens behind the scenes.

lowerSpendings is an independent, founder-led project. It's not a giant corporation with hundreds of engineers and an enormous marketing budget.

It's something I'm building because I believe it should exist.

And I think there's value in sharing that process.

Through this section of the website, I plan to publish more than just announcements and shopping guides.

I want to explore interesting pricing trends, examine whether major sales events actually deliver meaningful savings, explain some of the technology behind the platform and share what we're learning from the data.

Sometimes that might mean digging into a surprising price increase.

Other times it might mean investigating whether a popular product really is cheaper during Black Friday.

And occasionally, it might mean talking about the challenges of building and maintaining a platform like this.

My hope is that the content becomes useful in its own right, not simply another way to attract visitors.

If the data reveals something interesting, I want to share it.

If it challenges a commonly held assumption about retail pricing, even better.

An old idea. A fresh start. The same mission.

When I look back at the original lowerSpendings, I'm proud of what I managed to build.

It reached far more people than I ever expected, taught me an enormous amount about software engineering and retail data, and demonstrated that there was genuine demand for better shopping information.

But I also know there was so much more I wanted to do.

Technology has finally reached a point where many of those ideas feel achievable without needing a huge team behind them.

And after spending years working on software for other people and businesses, there's something particularly rewarding about returning to a project of my own.

One where I can experiment, solve interesting problems and hopefully build something that makes everyday life a little easier for people.

There's plenty of work ahead.

The platform will continue to evolve. There will be challenges, mistakes, improvements and probably more than a few unexpected discoveries along the way.

But the underlying idea remains exactly the same as it was when I first started.

People deserve access to clear, reliable information about the things they buy.

They deserve to understand whether they're getting a good deal.

And they deserve tools that work in their interests.

That's why lowerSpendings existed in the first place.

And that's why I'm bringing it back.

An old idea. A fresh start. The same mission.

Helping Australians spend less, understand more and shop with confidence.

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Thanks for reading, and welcome to the next chapter of lowerSpendings.

Michael Leaney
Founder, lowerSpendings
Perth, Western Australia