If you cut out your monthly trip to the cinema and saved what you would have spent on your night out, you could significantly boost your retirement fund.

“It is surprising what can be achieved by employing a bit of what I call movie magic’,” says Esther Venter, the Executive Dean at Milpark Business School.

Venter says while it is extremely difficult to make all ends meet, and many young working people feel that there is just simply not enough meat left on the bone to save anything towards retirement, just a little bit of savings goes a long way.

A Generation Y’er regularly spends at least R100 at the movies, overpriced popcorn included. If from the age of 20 you saved the equivalent of one night at the movies each month, and assuming that the price of movies goes up by inflation each year and that your contribution increases along with it, by the time you are 55 you would have saved R650 000 in today’s value.

A nice retirement nest egg for the cost of a movie and some popcorn.