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Tips To Start Saving Money At The Grocery Store Today
If you’ve ever looked at how much you spend monthly at the grocery store you’ve probably gotten sticker shock. Especially if you have kids like I do things add up quickly!
I wanted to cut back on this massive expense but I didn’t want to resort to just eating beans and rice for every meal. I’m a steak and potatoes type of girl J
Here are my 3 tips to minimize your grocery expense while not sacrificing the good stuff! I think the unspoken rule is don’t go to the store when you’re hungry so I’m making sure that I’m throwing that in here too, eat a snack!
Tip #1 to start saving money at the grocery store today – Utilize What You’ve Got
I believe the statistic is that most Americans have multiple thousands worth of food in their pantries, fridges, and freezers. If you’re like my family we have 2 fridges and 2 freezers! That can be a gold mine! When I started trying to achieve this I made a list of EVERYTHING that I had. It’s amazing the stuff you’ll find.
Tip #2 to start saving money at the grocery store today – Meal Plan
Meal planning was a life changer for me. Now some get much more detailed about meal planning than I do. What works for me and my family is that I have a dry erase board on the fridge and I come up with seven dinners for the upcoming week. That’s the extent of my planning, I don’t set specific meals for certain days, I need the flexibility but if that works for you and your family do that too! I do plan seven meals for the week but we typically only eat 4-5 nights at home. Most weeks we eat at a restaurant one night a week, we also have a leftover night at least once a week. Being completely transparent there’s a fast food night in there too! Now you might be wondering what meal planning has to do with saving money at the grocery store, I promise I didn’t get off track. Once you have your meals planned out make your grocery list off these meal plans. Don’t forget to utilize tip 1 and don’t add things to your list that you already have. The bonus part of this tip would be to plan your meals around what you already have so you have to buy even less.
Tip #3 to start saving money at the grocery store today – How Many Options Do You Have?
So, when I first heard this principle I kind of got defensive. If you’re feeling that please hear me out! You might be able to use that list from tip 1 but I found that I needed a separate list. Most of the stuff from the first list for me was dinner options/ingredients. Now make a list of all of the breakfast options you have in your house. I included things like scrambled eggs and toast on mine and recommend you do the same because it’s a true gauge of what you have. I’m betting you were shocked with how many options you have. With that list, you’ve got a couple options with how serious you want to be, how much you want to save. Set a limit on how many options you want to have as a family or individuals. I had to do each family member because we don’t eat the same things! If you want to save a ton set a lower number. With that don’t buy more at the grocery store until you’re out of what you got! You can and should do the same things for snacks, desserts, and lunches too.
Start applying these tips so you can start saving money at the grocery store today!
YOUR ACTION STEP FOR TODAY – Choose one tip and start implementing it today, then I would love for you to connect with me on social media. I want to hear what you are working on and if this has helped you!
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2 replies to "Tips to Start Saving Money at the Grocery Store Today"
Hi Aimee! These are some great tips!
When I had graduated college I decided to be extremely frugal to save up and invest as much as I can before starting a family and food is such a huge part of our budget. When I first did this, I found that I could last a whole lot longer than I expected with what is in my fridge, which is totally supported by your first tip!
Secondly, I decided to get a Costco membership (even though there’s only two of us) and meal prep while buying in bulk! So now, rather than making meals, I cook two-three types of veggies, two types of carbs, and two-three types of meats. This way we can interchange the dishes and it keeps it somewhat fresh and new! Plus now our meals are only $1 – $2 per person per meal! I love meal prepping! Highly support this second tip!
Do you mind explaining your third tip a little more? I wasn’t sure I followed exactly, but great tips overall!
Hey Grace,
Glad that you found them helpful!
So for the 3rd tip – how many options do you have.
What that means is to utilize the list you create from everything you have pantry and fridge etc (that you should have created with tip #1)
Break it down into categories. Typically I do Breakfast, Snacks and Lunch/Dinner. (I do lots of leftovers or simple stuff for lunch so it doesn’t need it’s own category for me)
So for Breakfast, how many different options do you have to eat? Set a limit on how many options you’ll have, depending on how much you want to save you can narrow it down to 1-2 easily for Breakfast – like cereal or eggs. Once you finish what you already have in the house – only replace 1-2 options for Breakfast. You can do the same for snacks as well.
Dinner I keep a rotating schedule of 6 weeks worth of food so that one isn’t quite the same but if you stick with your Meal Planning you tend to do it automatically ????