Grocery Shopping on a Family Budget – 5 great ways to save!
Grocery shopping can be a headache – especially if you are on a family budget - but you may be able to relive your financial issue much easier than you think! Staying in a family budget for groceries is not only feasible, but it can be trouble-free if you follow these five great ways to save.
Decided on a Budget
Sit down with your spouse and decide on a reasonable grocery fund for a specific time scale. For instance, say the two of you decide on grocery shopping every two weeks spending $200. Cost may vary depending on the size of your family, but you should try to stay in a budget that is $500 or less per month (yes it is do-able).
Coupon Cut
Whether searching online for the latest coupons on www.grocerycoupons.com, or checking the Sunday paper – coupons can save more money than you think. According to grocerycoupon.com, families can save up to $60 a week using useful coupons! The key to saving is to only use coupons that are relevant to your family’s needs. Many times families waste their money buying items they do not necessarily need simply because they found a coupon for it such as: “Buy two bars of soap and get one free.” Another precaution is to look out for is the dreadful spending coupons like “Save one dollar on three boxes of cereal.” When first reading the coupon the dollar may seem like a good save, but now the initial box of cereal you had planned to buy turned into three unnecessary boxes that will end up going stale (unless you are a family that eats a lot of cereal of course).
Plan Ahead
In addition to making a list, you should be sure to use a current grocery store ad in planning your meals. Try your best to never pay full price for your grocery items. Most stores will rotate their sales on a regular basis. Keep track of the store where you shop most often. If you notice that they have a sale on an item you buy regularly, then buy enough to last until the sale comes back. For example, say a grocery store tends to run their spaghetti sauce for $0.99 every 4-6 weeks. Buy enough to last for at least a month. Don’t forget to compare ads! If there is an item at another store at a better price, have your spouse stop off on his or her way home to pick up that item.
Limit Purchasing Processed Foods
Try your best to buy very few processed foods; “raw foods” (flour and milk vs. pancake mix for example) cost far less and go much further than processed foods. For example, making a pot of soup from scratch in the Crock Pot rather than buying a small can of soup can cost the same price and yield far more portions, not to mention it is much healthier (canned foods tend to be high in sodium). Even snack foods can be limited. A big bag of popcorn kernels and a bottle of oil will cost far less than a bag of chips or packs of microwave popcorn. Like mentioned before, it will yield far more portions too.
Freeze, Freeze, Freeze
Get yourself a good ol’ freezer (if you don’t already have one)! Watch for sales on meat. For instance, many grocery stores conduct a meat sale about once a month, whether the meat is chicken, beef, or pork. Buy enough to last until the next sale comes again. Throw it all in the freezer and thaw when ready to prepare. Freezing meat is 100% safe and immediately preserves the freshness of the meat upon frozen. Say the expiration of the meat was a week away upon purchase and then you decide to use it three weeks later; the meat is still in perfect condition. By freezing meat immediately it after its purchase, you are halting the meat from aging; therefore, the expiration date then becomes irrelevant. So stock up and save.
