So this week I decided to do my shopping at Food Lion. They were having a promotion where if you spent $50 you got a $5 coupon to use next week. I also had some coupons from FL that I needed to use up and I also found that you can download coupons off their website. So armed with my coupons and my grocery list, off I went. I decided to try going on Sunday night as opposed to Monday morning because then I could leave everyone at home and it would give me less to do during the school day. It ended up being the best time to go to this particular store! Everything was marked down. Huge Manager's Specials were everywhere! When all was said and done, I ended up spending $212.51 but I won't need to buy any meat for the rest of the month, including lunch meat. They had chicken reduced for quick sale, pork roasts 1/2 off, turkey lunch meat for 1.53 a package, and tuna 5 for $5.00. I was also able to purchase 3 blocks of cheddar for $4.00 since I had a coupon and it was on sale. Fruit was on clearance and I was able to buy quite a few for .29 a lb. Anyway, I think I did pretty good. My next grocery bill should be very low. I'm making banana bread for breakfast tomorrow and I froze the other ripe bananas for smoothies.
I'm trying to reduce my bill by half and maybe the next two weeks will be low enough for me to meet my goal for this month. So far, I've already been lower for each week. What's so neat is that I've been making this a challenge instead of a burden and it's really made a difference in my attitude. I've been researching and trying to use my money the best I can and I can see a difference. I think this will be something that I can only get better at the longer I do it.
Blessings,
Lisa
10 comments:
Lisa, you are doing great in reducing your grocery spending. I know I could do better, but not sure I want to "work" so hard at it right now. You might inspire me! Keep up the good work.
Lisa, GREAT job! I'm still trying to learn my Walmart (ugh), Kroger and Food Lion. None of them are very, uh, well stocked, imo though! I'm going to check out the Kroger in Roanoke soon, because I'm betting they have a larger, newer store . . .
Debbie,
I probably wouldn't have decided to work on this if we hadn't had such a bad month of bills last month and this month. Sophia's medicines are costing us $50 a piece and she's on 2, Jon's meds are costing us the same and he's on 3, my prescription is needing filled and it'll cost close to the same and the littles are sick and needing 2 over the counter meds right now. In other words, our grocery bill is going toward medicine right now. Whew, it's expensive!
Kristine,
I've found FL to be hit or miss too. We have one that close that's in a better area and has a little bit better selection. I like earning money for shopping though and if I had had some kids with me, I would have broken up the groceries so that I could have gotten 4 $5 coupons yesterday.
We have a local grocery store that has $10 coupon days on Thursdays. If you spend at least $50, you automatically get $10 off. They used to have actual coupons for this, but apparently people were taking them to the other stores in town and getting them to honor them (I never would have thought to do that!!) so they just made it automatic so that people had to shop with them.
Great job Lisa. Is this $212 for a week or two week period? Trying to figure if I'm in the ball park with my numbers....I think I am. We eat a TON of fresh produce and have to avoid a ton of stuff in the grocery store, so I still think that I'm doing o.k. but I remember the days of $250 for two weeks and cringe. LOL
Well, $212 is actually less per week than we normally spend but a lot of this was meat that we will be able to stretch out for at least a month. We also eat a lot of produce, organic milk, and eggs. I don't buy a lot of processed food, due to allergies and FG. I would say that most of my budget goes to milk and produce with meat, grains, and eggs coming in second.
Good job! We are shopping tomorrow and hope to spend a minimum to make up for last week. Then use up things that have been hanging around for awhile.
They give out free bread and vegetables at our homeschool co-op and that will be a huge help too. I probably got $25 worth of stuff for free on Tuesday! I guess it varies week to week but even getting this some weeks will be a great asset to budget lowering.
That's great Jodi! I'm hoping to only spend around $50 this week too. We'll see if that actually happens.LOL
Sounds like you are learning a lot and doing great finding bargains. Congrats! I wish we had manager's specials here. I never run into any. Kathy H
Sounds like you're on a roll.
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