Budget backfire...

[rockundergirl]

I thought it might be fun to share stories about when we had all the right intentions.. but our frugal natures backfired on us!

Mine...
Last year my stepfather told me about his friend from PA that sells whole cows.. basically instead of buying your beef at the supermarket ,, you buy a whole cow and have it butchered. Doing it this way makes it sooo much cheaper ( in theory), and since i have a huge deep freezer I was very excited to try this out. First i have to borrow a pick up truck that gets about 10 miles to the gallon because.. well a cow is very heavy and my honda accord I had at the time was not going to do the job. Then I come to find it costs about 200.00 dollars to have a cow chopped up and packaged.... ya know what... ( I say to myself... ) "I"m still ahead of the game.. I'm going to have meat for 8 months ! " So now I'm driving a stick for the first time in a long time... and the stick is a little different in a pick up truck... so i keep stalling out .. and having to pull over .. so a cop pulls me over and I get a ticket for obstructing traffic... 120.00 dollars. I get home withmy cow meat.... open the deep freezer... feels kinda warm.... So yeah ... Had to have it repaired... 225.00 dollars... So my plan.... prob cost more than just buying the meat at the supermarket.....

 

[timmac]

Well, I'm definitely sorry to hear about all the troubles you've had! Though it seems like many of them aren't due to the cow itself in this case.

For what it's worth, and hopefully this helps ease the sting at least a little bit... when you buy a side of beef from a place like this, you're usually not just doing it for the savings (which sometimes, it's actually not), but also for the quality of what you're getting. Typically the farm-raised beef that is usually purchased in this manner is (arguably) a higher quality product than the commercially produced stuff you buy in the grocery store.

To be clear: I'm not attempting to preach organics or vilify modern food production, just pointing out that there's some difference in the actual product.

 

[rock_doctor]

Some times you can't win for losing... You get points for trying.

 

[mrodgers]

For what it's worth, and hopefully this helps ease the sting at least a little bit... when you buy a side of beef from a place like this, you're usually not just doing it for the savings (which sometimes, it's actually not), but also for the quality of what you're getting. Typically the farm-raised beef that is usually purchased in this manner is (arguably) a higher quality product than the commercially produced stuff you buy in the grocery store.

Not only this, but you also have to watch whether it is a farmer or a butcher and if butcher, if it is his herd or shipped in. We have 2 places which both are fantastic and far better than supermarket meat (anything is better than supermarket meat really, horrible flavorless garbage...) One butcher even though his is far superior to a supermarket, still ships his meat in. The other we (family, not me personally) use as just a butcher as my father-in-law has his own cows, but this other butcher raises and sells his own cows. We know they are rotationally grazed naturally on grass.

My father-in-law works for the PA agricultural department and tours farms all over PA. Even going to a butcher you can still get beef that was raised standing at the feed trough feeding on corn and chemicals. You can also go to a butcher and still end up with imported beef, the same tasteless crap you get in a grocery store.

My mouth is watering just thinking of the steaks I get from my father-in-law and I just finished eating a pretty big lunch.

 

[elainesj]

what a story! well...u tried

and yes, it's happened to me before.

 

[amy-momofthree]

We do this too! It costs up front but think of all the times you will go to the grocery store and not have to buy meat!!

It tastes so much better too!!

 

[CAFarmerGirl]

Geez...where to begin? The pigs we bought to raise and butcher? The cow we bought to milk for the pigs and ourselves?

I was in awe and heaven yesterday at Winco looking at all the cheap, processed food.

And here I am today making mozzarella and ricotta and praying they are edible (last ricotta went to the pigs)!

 

[karice2]

We have a farmer's market that will do that as well. We don't have to buy the whole cow though. We can get a half or a quarter.

I will be doing this next spring. My deep freezer is full with all the cool stuff i got using coupons. I will use that up to get through the spring and then have additional space in the spring.

 

[iheartdisney]

I'll bite! I was staying with my folks in Pensacola in '09 during the "get in free to WDW on your birthday" promo. So since my mom and my DS's birthdays are within 4 days of each other we said SURE!! And since we all had FL resident season passes, we could all get in for free- mom and DS would get their giftcard for the price of the ticket.
The day before we left, I figured out that we were spending $450 in hotel fees, at least $100 a day in food, $300 in gas for less than $200 in "free" gift cards.

Not to mention that was the trip from Hades, where each day for the first 3 days one of my children was projectile vomiting (because it just isn't natural for 3 children to get sick on the same day, right?!?) and Shades of Green was rehabbing the rooms directly under us, which involved using an impact hammer every day from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Hey, but mom got some more Disney Star Wars toys and DS got some more potatohead pieces and a Mickey Bear. That was sooo worth it!

 

[bumbershoot]

OP, it still comes out as a savings, because you would have needed to fix the freezer no matter what. This was just the situation that let you know it wasn't working right.