Money Saving Mom®

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.

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Guest post from Chrissy of Littles and Laundry

I am a frugal mama. Don’t get me wrong, shopping is one of my favorite things to do – I be shoppin’. But most of the time… I be window shoppin’. 😉

Since becoming a stay-at-home mom, I have spent a lot of time researching how to cut down on our grocery bill while still eating (mostly) healthy, whole food.

Are you looking for some ideas to shrink your grocery bill? In my experience, here are the things that have helped us most:

1. Limit meat.

Especially when you buy the organic, free-range stuff. We eat meat but it’s definitely something we cut down on to cut costs.

Consider using it as a condiment instead of centerpiece to your meals. Foods like beans and lentils, quinoa and the like are great sources of protein at a fraction of meat’s price.

2. Make friends with potatoes.

Baking potatoes, sweet potatoes, whichever kind you like. Potatoes and delicious and oh SO cheap!

We like to use them in a variety of ways: Baked (maybe with vegan chili on top), chopped and as a side dish, or homemade potato soup. French fries, anyone?

3. Have a Fiesta!

I find when I’m cutting down on costs we eat a lot of Mexican-style dishes. It’s just very affordable to make meals like enchiladas, tacos, etc. When in doubt, make it a Taco Tuesday!

4. Shop at Aldi or Walmart.

Aldi and Walmart meet our week to week needs best and at a great price. I usually check Aldi for everything on my list first, and whatever they don’t have I get at Walmart.

5. Meal plan, meal plan, meal plan.

I used to make a meal plan and then I wouldn’t even follow it. Not the best use of my time right? However, now I refer back to my meal plan often to remember what I’m supposed to be making for dinner that night.

It really helps me to not use ingredients I purchased for one meal accidentally on another. It also gives me the option to prepare dinner in the morning since my plan has already been thought out for me. No more 4:30pm “uh-oh-what’s-for-dinner” freak outs!

6. Grocery shop once a week.

This one can be tough (and I don’t always stick to it) but it really does help keep costs down.

If you run out of something, consider substituting a couple of ingredients for clever alternatives. There are great cheat sheets on Pinterest in subbing one ingredient for another.

One of my favorites? If you don’t have 1 cup buttermilk, sub 1 cup almond milk or the like with 1 TBSP of apple cider vinegar! Now you can go make buttermilk pancakes. You’re welcome. 😉

7. Eat oatmeal for breakfast.

Oatmeal is cheap and healthy, it fills you up and did I mention that it’s cheap?!  I like to add almond milk, cinnamon, blueberries, and ground flax to mine. Delish!

So there are some ideas to shrink your grocery bill. I hope they help!

Happy grocery shopping!

Chrissy is a Jesus loving wife, boy mom and coffee lover. She blogs over at Littles and Laundry. Her heart is to encourage women to bloom in motherhood and homemaking.

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