winning the grocery store game part 2

Feeding a family on a budget is not an easy task. In part 1 avoiding the impulse buy we covered the added expense that can happen when you get caught up in impulse shopping. Part 2 is all about shopping the sales and planning menus around sale items.



What's for dinner? The answer usually lies in what's on sale this week.

Combine the sale items with a well stocked pantry and you have the ability to feed a family well on a small amount of money.

It is hard for me to create a meal using ingredients bought at full price. The bargain hunter inside of me comes out screaming and kicking.  A big portion of feeding my family on a budget is not paying full price. These are some of the tricks I use to keep the family happily fed.     


1. Know the sale cycles and buy multiple items to last until the next sale. It is typically 2 months between good stock up sales for most items. For example, my local store gets pasta on sale with those deals that go something like this... Buy 6 save $3 with your card.  It can lead to substantial savings. This last sale the pasta ended up being 49 cents a piece. I bought 24 of them. It cost me $11.76. The everyday price for this particular pasta was $1.39, I saved 90 cents a package which made a total of $21.60 saved. With pasta on hand I can make casseroles, pasta dishes, soups, salads etc.  I also use pasta from the pantry to make our Homemade mac and cheese for a quick lunch.

If you notice, the pasta is rarely on sale at the same time as the pasta sauce. They do this on purpose. Most of the time you will pick up the pasta on sale and then buy the sauce at full price to go with it. You can outsmart them. Buy the pasta when it is on sale, and few weeks later when the sauce is on sale stock up on it. I have learned to pick up each of the individual pieces for a meal when they are on sale. Very rarely (if ever) do I pick up all the things for a complete meal in one shopping trip. This little trick alone saves me tons of money.

It takes some time to build up a pantry, but the results are worth it. You can begin by setting aside a small portion of the grocery budget every week to add to your "Stockpile fund" When the deals come along you will have some money set aside to take advantage of them.

2. Get to know your grocery ads.  Grocery stores often plaster a good deal on the front page of the ad trying to get you into the store, once they lure you in, they snag you with an impulse buy which we have already covered in part 1. So, now you know how to avoid being caught by their snares, be sure to check out those front page deals and use them to your advantage.

Let me tell you a little secret.... I have come to find out that the best deals are not always so easy to see. I have been surprised as I have looked at the ads and found gems hidden in small print in the middle pages of the grocery ads. Be sure to check out the entire ad not just those deals that are being "sold" to you on the front page in large print.  I used to just glance over the ads and often would miss those hidden gems. It is worth my time to check out the entire ad. Once I have seen the ad and gone over it, I make a list highlighting the deals. Once I have compiled a list of the good deals, I put a star by those things that I may want to stock up on if the budget allows.


3. Combining sales with coupons can lead to great savings. This is the only way to coupon. This is the way the great couponers have made their mark. Couponing can turn everyday sales into super sales.  I always check the ads, then I check to see if coupons are available for the items on my list. With coupons that you can print at home, and companies that allow you to load coupons right to your shoppers card, there is no reason to not take advantage of coupon savings. There are also coupon apps that you can use on your smart phones. You do not need to be a total coupon freak, but having a few couponing skills can really pay off for you.

A full cup is a great online resource for knowing if there is a coupon available for products that you want to buy.  You can use their advanced coupon search to see if there is a coupon available.  I also use grocery smarts as a couponing source. Many of my local stores are listed and they make it easy to find the coupons that go with the ads. Knowing what is on sale and what coupons are available to match can really save you money. The time spent is well worth it.


So, spend a little time, get out and learn some new skills. Make the advertised sales work to your advantage. With a little time and effort you will be putting money back in your pockets. 

What are your best tips for stockpiling and finding sale items?
Leave a comment below so we can all learn.   

winning the grocery store game part 1

It seems like feeding a family is getting to be more of a challenge everyday. With soaring food prices and shrinking budgets how can you win?


This is part 1 in a series of how to win at the grocery store game, be on the lookout for more posts coming up soon.

 

PART 1:  AVOIDING THE IMPULSE BUY


Grocery stores do what they do very well!  They have a way of enticing you buy more stuff than you came in for. How many times have you made a run to the store for basics like bread and milk only to come out with six bags of groceries in hand?  It can be a real challenge to get in and out of the store without getting caught by impulse purchasing. After all, you usually have to go clear to the back corner of the store to buy milk, So grocery stores try to distract you with cookies and other things to go with your milk. The grocery store is designed that way to entice you to impulse buy, but I  have some tricks that can really help see the traps before being caught in them.



1. Do NOT go to the store hungry.

You may have heard this before, but I will tell you again. Do not go to the store hungry it spells disaster. It is plain and simple, the grocery stores are set up to trap hungry customers. They count on many of us being hungry when we walk into the store. When you go in hungry you are more likely to make the impulse purchases. From the time you walk in the store, they are enticing you and playing off of your hunger.  Everywhere you turn there are foods ready to be opened and eaten nearly before you get out of the store.  To the hungry, the smell coming from the bakery almost picks you up and carries you away to a dream land of soft sugary clouds. The deli smells wafting through the air entice you to buy. When you are not plagued by hunger pangs, it makes it so much easier to pass up the temptations and stick to buying only what you came for. You are less likely to toss in a package of cookies to go with the milk.


2. Know your prices

Grocery stores have a way of enticing us with sale prices that are not very much of a sale. It seems like if they have a big banner that says SALE in big letters people will buy it. The stores have a habit of lowering the price of a product by only a few cents and putting it out in a prominent place. Doing this leads people think that they are getting a real bargain. It is not always so.  I have actually seen where they have raised the price on a product and put in a prominent place with a "SALE" sign and people are piling up their carts. 

Watch out for the sales that advertise 3 for $5 or 4 for $10 or other such things.  These can be real traps. They entice us to buy more than we need. We see something on sale 3 for $5 and how many do we put into our cart? You guessed it, three. Do you really need three?  Then this poses another question, do you have to buy all three to get the deal? The answer is usually no, but check your stores. It will usually tell you right on the sale tag.

10 for $10 is really popular in my area right now.  My Father got caught in that trap. He ended up buying seven items more than he really needed in order to make up his ten items. He ended up buying things that he didn't even want and justified it by saying that the grandkids would enjoy it.  A word of caution here: Drugstores and convenience stores usually do make you buy in the quantities advertised. (The tag will usually indicate that singles are at full price)  Read the fine print.

This stuff really works!  Let me tell you a true story about my brother. He had a store he frequented. They had some candy that they kept near the register (a place that traps many) This candy sold for a dime a piece. He would often pick up a few pieces and enjoy them as he went out the door. One day he noticed they had changed the prices on the candy, it was now labeled as 8 for $1. He inquired of his friend who worked the cash register about the change and why they had raised the prices. His friend looked perplexed, " They did, they raised the price!" he exclaimed. He hadn't really noticed the price being higher, in fact he though they must have lowered the price by the way people had been acting. He had noticed that more people had been purchasing them, in fact they had been flying off the shelves. As they continued talking the cashier had noticed that people were also buying in groups of four and eight.  A lesson was learned by both of them that day. (Amazing isn't it.) 

 
3. Watch out for big displays  

End cap displays (the end of the isles) can be detrimental to a budget. It is those prominent places where an item that is not really on sale can take off and sell like crazy. When I find myself picking up something from these areas I have trained myself to ask the question "Do I really need this?"  I have also trained myself to go down the isle and check it out. Usually I find a better deal by going down the isle and looking, for example a larger size may only be a few cents more and a much better deal.

The truth is that the big food manufacturers pay to have their product displayed and sold to you. Product placement is big business. The products that are prominently displayed are not always the best deals, but are the one that they want you to buy. A lot of impulse buying happens here.  Another trap, Eye level placement. You are more likely to buy things that are at eye level. Placing a product at eye level is big deal that leads to many sales for the large companies. They pay big money to keep their products at eye level to tempt you. You can save a lot of money by avoiding the products at eye level. So, look up, and down, not at eye level, and watch out for those end cap displays.



These are just a few of the skills I use to avoid overpaying at the grocery store. 

What are your tricks for saving money on groceries and avoiding impulse shopping? What advice do you have for other shoppers?  Please leave a comment below.