Grocery budget thread

[Violet Parr]

Okay, on the no-buy July thread, a lot of people are mentioning their monthly grocery budget. In many cases it is half of mine! We have a family of five with an infant and we spend MINIMUM $150 a week. That includes toiletries, paper towels, etc.

I'd love to know how you do it! We have a few things that are must-haves. We buy only organic milk, and we buy a lot of fresh produce. Other than that, we're not big on convenience foods, but our meals aren't fancy by any means! I think we're awfully boring, frankly!

Any tips/suggestions? What is the grocery budget for your family?

Thanks

VP

 

[vicki_c]

We spend $700-800 a month for our family of 4 (2 adults, two pre-teens) and that is AFTER about a 40% savings through couponing. I don't think $150/week for a family of 5, including toiletries & cleaning supplies is bad. Especially given the fact that you buy some organic stuff too.

There was a thread on here recently with a link to the average grocery budget statistics and we were on the high end of the 2nd lowest category (there were 4 - ranging from like a bare-bones type budget to a deluxe type budget).

If you're spending $600, I don't really think that's that bad, unless you can't afford it.

 

[disneydreamersx4]

Great post!! I would love to get the shopping list of the DISer who spends $380 a month for a family of 4, don't know how they do it
We should post our menus for a week to help each other for ideas.


We are family of 4 and we spend between $500 - $600 a month. I'm trying really hard to cook healthy, less expensive meals too like lentils/pasta one night, black beans & rice another, grilled chicken breast with romaine lettuce, pasta with meat sauce. Lunches are tuna, leftovers, pbj, grilled cheese. Breakfast is cheerios with banana, pancakes, eggs, corn muffin, during school year DD12 will have Carnation Breakfast drink. Veggies for meals are broccoli, peppers, carrots. Fruit is usually pears, apples, bananas, blueberries, watermelon, peaches. Edit - We buy milk at Costco skim $2.29 gallon, iced tea powder there too, Kirkland water bottles, Nesquik chocolate powder too.

I get toilet paper on sale, 20 rolls for $9.99 and buy Bounty paper towels at Costco, I think that 12 rolls for $18. I only buy Bounty because I can use ONE sheet for a long time. The only cleaners I buy are baking soda, vinegar, bleach, murphy's oil soap and the disinfectant wipes by Kirkland (Costco)

 

[r&kmommy]

I would barely call myself a "couponer" ... I cut out whatever is in the sunday paper for the stuff I use, and use those and whatever may pop out of the register - I do not belong to any coupon trains or exchanges. I am a brand snob only for a handful of things, otherwise I get store brand or whatever is on sale/cheapest. 90% of cleaning products and 50% of toiletries are grocery store budgeted purchases. We average $130/week. I don't think $150 for 5 is bad at all!! It basically comes down to what you can afford, and how much time you can dedicate to couponing.

Me, I don't have the energy left at nite once the kids go down to play the 'coupon game' ... now before I started staying at home with the kids, when I had an office job (exec asst at a real estate firm), I was the freaking coupon queen!!! (If you didn't know any better you'd think I slacked at my job, but in reality everyone else was SO slow at whatever they did that I always had free time because the amount of work I was given to do took me a fraction of the time as others lol!) I had 5 grocery store lists every. single. week. and coupons for just about everything I purchased...

If the time ever comes (god forbid) where we can't afford our groceries I will, obviously, go back to the coupon game... but for now we're affording just fine. That should be your aim (lol, imvho) if you can't afford your current budget then get some couponing going on... if you're doing a-ok then don't stress it.

 

[brymolmom]

Do you plan menus weekly?

If not - I highly recommend it. And figure out approx. costs for each meal. Add in drinks/snacks, etc. and then if it is ABOVE where you would like to be budget-wise- then you need to switch things up. Take out a few of your more expensive meals and substitute a cheaper meal. You might need to trade at least SOME of the fresh produce and replace with frozen for cost purposes.

 

[mistysue]

That isn't too bad for 5.

I don't know how much meat you eat, but we save a lot of money by eating less meat. I buy bags of TVP (texturized vegetable protein) an substitute that or lentils for ground beef in recipes. TVP is dried and basically looks like hamburger that is broken up into little tiny bits. I made hamburger helper with it last night (total dinner cost: ~$1.50 for four of us) and everybody loved it. It is nearly flavorless, so i just add some extra spices to things. Most grocery stores will have it pre-packaged, but if you can find a bulk food location it can be really really cheap. Where I last lived I was getting it for 29 cents/pound... which equaled a few pounds of ground meat.

I've also made chili with lentils and everybody loved that.

I get bulk white rice and that goes with pretty much anything.

We also use green beans for sides a lot because they are super cheap.

 

[MEM]

Okay, on the no-buy July thread, a lot of people are mentioning their monthly grocery budget. In many cases it is half of mine! We have a family of five with an infant and we spend MINIMUM $150 a week. That includes toiletries, paper towels, etc.

I'd love to know how you do it! We have a few things that are must-haves. We buy only organic milk, and we buy a lot of fresh produce. Other than that, we're not big on convenience foods, but our meals aren't fancy by any means! I think we're awfully boring, frankly!

Any tips/suggestions? What is the grocery budget for your family?

Thanks

VP

We have a family of four including two teenagers and spend about $600 a month as well. We don't do convenience foods and DD14 doesn't eat red meat and its still hard to get under $600. I have become addicted to couponing - if you look carefully enough you can find coupons for just about anything. I suggest you check out grocery store forums like afullcup, hotcouponworld and slickdeals.net Alot of those folks do the research for you.
You should be able to trim what you spend on health and beauty aids and cleaning products. Its harder to save on produce unless you are currently buying produce when its not in season. We buy clementines in the winter, blueberries in the spring, watermelon in the summer and apples in the fall. We don't buy any soft drinks - we make our own decaf iced tea. We make our our laundry detergent. I use my crockpot alot because I work full-time. Meat is used as a condiment rather than the main dish. I stock up on frozen vegetables. I have grown to enjoy the challenge of trimming our grocery bill without feeling deprived.

 

[thebigkahuna]

I agree with the PP's, your budget isn't that terrible!

Its been probably 3 years since I've bought a roll of paper towels. Not that it's a huge difference in my grocery bill, but every penny counts I use cloths & kitchen towels instead.
I buy Ziploc bags maybe once a year. (usually for a Disney trip!)
For storage, I use plastic containers, and I also reuse containers other stuff comes in (butter, margarine, yoghurt, cottage cheese, etc.) I can remember rolling my eyes at my grandmother when she did this -now look at me! LOL

I don't use big name laundry detergents. I have in the past, and I REALLY don't notice a difference between big name & no name (your results may vary!)
I only use dryer sheets for certain loads of wash. (bedsheets, and things that get "clingy") I get the off brand at the Dollar Tree & cut them in half (they smell wonderful (like baby powder!), but are SO strong!) I've never had an issue with a allergic reaction with dryer sheets from the Dollar Tree, but Bounce sheets make me all itchy!

I go to Dollar Tree & get brand name dish soap (Palmolive) and also get the brand name liquid hand soaps for in the bathrooms. (SoftSoap) Can't beat the price!

Oh, and I don't buy milk. When I buy meat its usually chicken, and it's in the larger packages so I can freeze some for later.

 

[bettymae1121]

You have to remember that food prices vary GREATLY over the country, the same grocery list can cost half as much in low cost of living areas. $150 a week for five including cleaning/H&B sounds great to me!

 

[Virgderon]

Hi. I am on the no buy thread. Last month I spent $251 for 2 people. The amount I saved using coupons combined with sales was $242 dollars. So, those of you that spend $150 a week on a larger family are doing great, I think.

Here is my strategy:

Nothing gets purchased except for milk and veggies unless it is on sale, including meat. We have a local Winn Dixie that features meat buy one, get one free every week. I buy that, or I go to the flea market and spend $35 on a package of meat that includes 4 steaks, 4 pork chops, 4 pounds of hamburger, 6 chicken breasts and 8 italian sausage links. The flea market also has a fruit/veggies vendor that sells bags of veggies for $1.00, I buy those or we eat frozen veggies that I buy at the supermarket for 97 cents.

I never buy things like A-1 sauce, waffles, butter, tomato sauce, cereal unless they are buy one get one free, and I have a coupon. We just eat whatever brand of cereal or peanut butter,etc. that is on sale.

If I must buy something that is not on sale, I use the register rewards from Walgreens that I save . Walgreens almost always has register rewards deals when you buy soda. I will stockpile my favorite soda when they have that deal, and use the 3 or 5 dollars register reward later if I absolutely have to have something that is not on sale.

At Walgreens, I only buy the toilet paper, shampoo, ibuprofen, etc. that is on sale. I have to use allergy free laundry detergent, and there are about 3 brands I can use. I buy whichever of those 3 brands that is on sale, preferably buying about 4 of them when they are buy one get one free.

To save the kind of money I have been saving, you can't be brand loyal, and you really have to work the sales combined with the coupons you can get .

In June I got all of the following items for free using coupons combined with sales:

Walgreens generic version of Tylenol Cold
1 tube of Fixodent denture cream
1 container of scouring powder
several pints of raspberries and blueberries
2 quarts of milk
toilet paper
numerous items where I had to buy one to get the other one free

There is more, but you get the idea. The website I use for the couponing is www.smartsavers.com. It is geared toward the grocery stores in the south.

 

[Aggiegrl]

I think you are doing really well if you are eating organics.

We spend about $400/month for two adults and one infant on homemade purees and formula. This may not sound very "budget," but the way we eat, it is.

We eat organic veggies when available and buy high quality whole cuts of meats (we might eat hamburger every other week). We usually have prime or choice steak once a week and seafood once a week.

We can afford better meat because we eat small portions and load up on veggies and salads. We try to keep our meals simple but flavorful. We are able to buy spices by the pound, so that keeps them very affordable. We buy produce in season.


Snacks for us are things like a slice of cheese or a banana, but we rarely snack. Dessert might be an 8 oz glass of chocolate milk. We don't buy things like chips, cookies, or ice cream.

We don't eat bread. I find that a lot of people buy different types of bread (sandwich, hamburger buns, etc.) and they mold or dry out and go to waste. For lunch meats, we use tortillas. They are lower calorie, stay fresh longer, and have more uses (tacos, casseroles, quesadillas).

We don't spend much on paper goods, cleaners, and toiletries. We use shampoo/conditioner lightly, and buy generic brands. I don't wash my hair every day. We use cloth instead of paper...towels, napkins, and diapers too. I clean with vinegar, baking soda, and simple dishwashing soap. I use about half the recommended laundry and dish detergent. We use Scott toilet paper (good for our septic anyways).

We stock up on sales and put meat in the deep freeze. I freeze things in portions just big enough for one meal, never leftovers. We find they tend to get forgotten and go to waste in our house.

We waste almost nothing. For instance, if I trim fat off of bacon, I save it for later and use it to make a roux for a pasta dish. Using the "smart" pasta made with chickpeas/lentils, you get good protein and a smokey/meaty flavor without using much, if any, meat.

 

[cseca]

Also understand that some places double all coupons while in my area they'd only double up to 50 cents. So that makes a bit of a difference. And like some people already mentioned it depends on your habit. Some people can get by with store brand stuff, while some can't.
I think our family saves 25-40%/week by buying sales and moderate couponing. On average abt 33%. It's not great but it's better than nothing at all.
I could never understand how people could get out of a grocery store with a cart full of stuff for $1.
Our stores here like I said, allows 1 mfr coupon and 1 store coupon and will double up to 50cents. But unfortunately the stuff that we buy rarely has coupons. If they do, it'll be for really small amt or 55cents (which means we can't double)... sigh...

And we're not those multiple stores shoppers to get the best price either. We live out in the boonies so cost of gas wouldn't make it worthwhile. So unless I can get a REALLY good price from a different store I usually stick to our regular grocery store.

I'm sure if you could go to several stores for their sales you'll be able to save more. Just a thought.

 

[sk!mom]

This conversation comes up so often.The fact is that everyone feeds their family differently and lives in areas with a different COL. I live in a low col area but there are only two grocery stores so no competition to lower prices. Some families are fine with Hamburger Helper and Kraft mac and cheese- items that are cheap and often on sale and have coupons. Others consider those foods unhealthy and would never use them.

My family of 4 eats a lot of fresh produce and lean meats. We never do canned fruit or veggies and only buy frozen corn and the occasional bag of frozen fruit for out of season fruit smoothies. I normally spend $700 - 800 per month. That includes all household supplies and toiletries. It also includes several bottles of wine per month.

I should also note that we spend another $150-$200 eating out. How much a family spends eating out should be taken into account, also. I have a friend who spends only around $50 a week at the grocery store but they eat all lunches and most dinners out. The grocery money is all household stuff, toiletries, breakfast, and a few snacks.

I'm comfortable with what we spend. I could cut it if necessary but we like to eat healthy. Heck, right now I'm spending $2.50 per day just on blueberries but these great berries won't be around for long.

 

[Virgderon]

sk!mom, you are right about regional differences. We moved to Florida from Chicago and we spend much less on fruits and veggies here. If I would have been more aware in Chicago I am sure I could have done well with couponing, but no way would I have gotten such fabulous produce at the prices I get here. The blueberries have been amazing the last 2 or 3 weeks!

 

[disneydreamersx4]

gentle "bump"

 

[charming23]

It is just my mom and I here so we average about $200 a month in groceries. We keep it low by stocking up and freezing meats when on sale. We also plan our meals based on what we have and what is on sale. We also utilize our leftovers for lunches so we rarely buy expensive lunch meat or convience lunch foods. We also limit the amount of snacks we buy and have really cut down on buying pop.

We also try and buy fruits and veggies seasonally.

 

[williamson_ja]

We have a family of 6 with 3 heavy eating teenagers. We spent around $380 for groceries last month. That's not typical for us. Usually I spend more like $450, but I wanted to put some money towards our cruise and so I really tightened things up last month. Some of the things we do are:

1. I bake my own bread and tortillas. Those are way too expensive at the store for anything of high quality and only costs me about $0.25 to make.

2. I stock up on staples when they go on sale. If something is a really good sale that I know I use pretty frequently, I buy like a dozen of them instead of just one.

3. I rarely use coupons. They don't double coupons at all where I live, so I usually don't find it worth it. I do use them on occasion, though. Our local grocery store (Smiths) had cereal on sale for $1 a box once and I found a $0.50 coupon to go with that. I bought a lot of cereal with that sale. On the other hand, I never pay full price for cereal. It's too expensive and my kids will eat through a box in a day. They can have homemade oatmeal if there isn't a good cereal sale.

4. We have chickens and therefore free eggs. They free-range so it doesn't cost anything to feed them right now. Free eggs= free meals

5. Instead of just using beef for tacos, spaghetti, or anything really- we use 1/2 ground beef and 1/2 cooked beans. Beans are very healthy, low in fat, have great flavor.... and are VERY cheap! It's good for health and budget. When i make taco salad (sort of a staple at our house) I don't use meat at all. I use beans, brown rice (bought in bulk), and corn with some tomato sauce and seasoning.

6. We grow a garden. Even if you only have a little space, you can grow a small vegetable garden. The cheapest organic fruits and vegetables are the ones you grow yourself. We have a large planter box full of fresh organic lettuce and peas right now. That is something else I don't have to buy at the store. Later in the year I will have potatoes, zucchini, winter squash, tomatoes, peppers, etc.

7. I make good use of leftovers. Instead of eating out for lunch every day, I take a lunch from home which is almost always leftovers from the night before. Tastes better than most fast food, healthier for sure, and good on my budget!

8. I make menus 2 weeks out and only shop every 2 weeks. You learn to live without things you thought you absolutely had to have when you shop like this. The more frequently you shop, the more money you are likely to spend. We also live 25 miles from the store, so we don't end up "just hopping over" to get anything. I shop very carefully for what I need, then buy only what I need for that two weeks and nothing else. That does not mean that we never get treats or fun food. I buy popsicles every shopping trip in the summer because my kids just love them and it makes them happy.

Anyway, those are a few things that we do to keep the grocery budget in check. I am one of those people who would rather keep a tight budget on those expenses that I can control so that I can do some traveling. I absolutely love to travel and that is where I end up spending my extra money.

 

[kydisneyfans]

Produce prices this summer are the lowest I have seen in years. Strawberries have been below $1 a lb frequently, blueberries .99 a full pint, raspberries $1 for 1/2 pint, and blackberries have been 2 1/2 pints for a dollar. That makes the budget easier.

As for cost-about $80 a week for 3 of us. That has changed since we eat fresher now. I'm not an organic fan.

We spend little to nothing on cleaners and toiletries and haven't paid anything for deodorant, toothbrushes, and toothpaste in 5 years or more thanks to CVS. I have to use Dial soap and Tide detergent due to allergies, both are very cheap after matching sale prices with coupons.

 

[powellrj]

If you are OK with your budget, I wouldn't worry too much about it. Mine ebbs and flows over time. Some years I am a coupon queen and make everything from scratch, other years we eat out wayyyy tooo much! Right now because of how we are living, we are basically living off the grill, so that is more expensive than the casserole times.

If I were home more, I would do a better job, but I'm not so the grocery budget isn't what it use to be. If life settles down, I will go back to couponing and scratch cooking.

 

[4HOLIDAYS]

Love these ideas-my budget is waaay more per week. DH comes from fmily still in rest bus so food is a big deal to him. Tons of fresh produce, herbs, always "good" cuts of meat, fish, seafood...I am happy when I get to use the ground beef, and chick brst. I've got to work on finding some recipes with beans and such..I use coupons, do the bogofree, generics with cleaning items,,,but these ideas would def free up more $ for Dis!