Guest post from Gerri of Maple Planners
Saving money wasn’t really anything I ever thought about until we became a one-income family. Both my husband and I are computer engineers and we made a good income, so I never gave second thought to budgeting.
It wasn’t until our little one came along and I was home for maternity leave that I first thought about trying to save money. After a break of nearly a year, I decided to stay home with my child and began looking at money-saving tips to keep our finances under control.
After writing down our expenses for a couple of months (I never kept track before), I was shocked to find that we were spending around $400 every month on groceries! Well, that was enough to make me start thinking about taking action in our spending department.
I am glad to report that our expenses have been under control since then, and we have been able to save around $150 on groceries every month! Here are some of the tips and tricks I utilized to lower our grocery bill:
1. Compare Prices
Comparing the prices of different items across different stores has probably saved us the most amount of money. I use Crystal’s Price Book to write down the price of the most-shopped-for items in our household. It also helps me figure out if the sale advertised in that week’s flyer is actually saving us money or not.
This is how my price book works. Let’s say you buy 4 boxes of cereals every month, usually for $3.94. You end up paying $15.76 monthly. Every few weeks, the price drops to $3.44 a box and you pay $13.76 per month. When you buy cereal every time the price is reduced you end up saving $2 per month.
Similarly I compare bread, sugar, cooking oil, frozen vegetables, etc. at a variety of stores for different dates. It may not be a huge savings per item, but believe me, when you add up the amount for major items, the saving can be significant by the end of the year. We were able to save right around $70 per month just by comparing prices.
2. Stock up on Sales
I watched as my sister bought in bulk from Costco, but the thought never occurred to me!
However, after our family grew, I started stocking up on non perishable items like sugar, bread, cereal, ice cream etc. I saw significant savings of $25 with this change.
I sometimes use coupons on top of buying in bulk and end up saving even more.
3. Plan Weekly Meals
Before we started meal planning, we would buy whatever we saw in the aisles of the supermarket. For example, I would buy an extra bag of potatoes, not realizing there is already one lying in the corner in our pantry.
When I started our planning our weekly meals, I had to write down the menu for each day of the week. That led me to track down everything in our pantry, fridge, and freezer, and then make a grocery list.
This system helped me save more than $40 per month that would most likely have been thrown away or wasted (rotten vegetables and fruit).
4. Avoid Prepackaged Food
You might be tempted to buy that cute packing of pre-cut apples and melons, or the snack size mini Oreos, but you end up spending too much money as opposed to buying whole fruits or family sized packages.
We ended up saving more than $40 when we stopped buying prepackaged food.
We are glad that we were able to come up with a system that helped us save money without compromising our lifestyle and the quality of food we consume.
Do you have any other tips to save money on groceries?
Gerri is the owner of Maple Planners, where she creates all kinds of different printables for home management, planning, and entertaining. When she’s not busy creating printables, she loves hanging out with her family and friends.
Jen says
Great ideas! I think another side benefit of having a menu plan is that there is less impulse buying as I’m in the store less often. I go once a week and buy the things I need at 1-2 different stores. Another tip that helped me when I started was the advice to not make an extra trip to a store for sale items unless I was going to be saving at least $5. Now I aim for savings of at least $10. Great to go to different stores to save on sale items, but it took me awhile to remember that I was spending extra time and gas to do it.
Jodi says
Sometimes drugstores beat supermarket prices. This week eggs are .99 at Walgreens, and I find cheapest prices on milk at CVS. I make it a point to buy produce in season, at the cheapest price.
Kariane says
For us, knowing what a good price is helps us to save a lot of money (not every sale is a good one, and stores like Costco aren’t always the lowest prices): http://everydayintentionalliving.com/budget-tip-know-your-prices/
We also buy things at the end of the day at the Farmer’s Market. Not only does it support local farmers and get us ultra-fresh produce, but at the end of the day we can often get things discounted (the farmers want to sell everything so they don’t have to carry it back home).
Jenna Reeves says
I am always trying to save on groceries. It’s just my husband and I but I was still spending around $400 per month. We try to eat clean and don’t purchase pre-packaged foods. It’s frustrating that it is so much more expensive to eat healthy! We both pack our lunches for work so that does save quite a bit. My husband hunts and fishes so we do get meat from that. We also purchased half a hog which was great. It was wonderful meat and we really got a lot for the price we paid. Best of all, we knew where the meat was coming from, the farm next door! All of that has saved us on buying meat at the store. We are possibly buying a cow to butcher as well so I have been trying to save money and make room in our freezer buy seeing how long I can go without buying groceries. I know it’s only the 9th but I have only spent $12 this month, making one trip to the store. I had to buy a gallon of milk, yogurt and fruit at the store for lunches this week. I am hoping to save $200-$300 this month by eating up the food we have at home!
Gerri says
Saving $200 – $300 is also my next goal Jenna. We are trying to grow our own garden this summer, which will help us save more money on grocery shopping.
Monica says
I agree with your tips and I am a little OCD about #1. 🙂 After a while (as I’m sure you know) you will just know what a “good” price is. I would also add 1)going to the store as few times as possible and 2) go alone to the store with a list. I’m writing this after my teenage son accompanied me.
Gerri says
Me too Monica. I am crazy about my price book. It’s like my wallet now. I never leave the house without my little price comparison sheet. And you are so right about the few trips and going all by yourself to the store. I try not to take along my 4 yr old or my husband when grocery shopping lol!
Stephanie says
We buy as much as possible at discount grocery stores, you know the kind that has close dated products and overstocks. We live in a small town and those kind of stores are far away, in fact a 3 hour drive. But whenever we have a reason to be in the bigger city where these stores are, we definitely stock up! Last weekend we bought 15 dozen eggs for $7.99, and I have gotten to where I won’t pay more than $1.00 a box for cereal.
Gerri says
Wow! You got yourself some really great deals Stephanie. Less than a $1.00 for a cereal box and $7.99 for 15 dozen eggs. That’s really awesome. You have budgeting under control! More power to you 🙂