Little Ways to Save Big on Groceries
Jan 23, 2025 02:37PM ● By Debra Caffrey
With the start of a new year, it’s a good time to turn over a new leaf in many ways, particularly with finances, budgeting, and how we run our household. For any New Year’s resolution to stick, it not only takes a lot of repetition, but also the awareness that change comes in many tiny increments, not all at once. I think this is true when it comes to cooking, groceries, and food budgeting; many folks know there are ways to cut costs, but the overwhelm prevents them from even trying. If that’s you, you don’t have to think in extremes. Here are some very small adjustments you can start with to get a control on grocery costs and feel empowerment rather than overwhelm.
· Track Your Expenses: If you aren’t logging every dollar you spend on what goes in your mouths each month, you might be grossly underestimating costs. Track food expenses for one month, including all coffee, takeout, and restaurants purchases. The numbers might just frighten you enough to commit to cutting back on convenience.
· Cook Dinner with Lunch in Mind: Double or triple cook a meal you’ve planned so that you and other family members can also eat the leftovers for lunch the next day. You can also “batch cook” on a day when you carve out some time, making several servings of a recipe that will serve as lunches for a couple days in a row. This will add up to big savings.
· Go Meatless: You don’t have to be plant-based to benefit from occasional plant-based meals. Not only is it healthier to center a meal around legumes and other proteins and veggies, but it is drastically less expensive.
· The Freezer is Your Friend: Don’t be afraid of frozen fruits and veggies – they are actually usually healthier than fresh and can be used in a variety of ways. Buy meats in bulk family packs, then break down the package into smaller baggies ready to use for each meal. Finally, you can freeze leftover homemade pancakes and waffles for easy future breakfasts, breads and rolls, and even soups and spices.
· Use Your Calculator: Most people would assume that the item with a sale sign is the option to grab, but you need to shop by unit price – what the product costs per unit, like ounce or gallon. This might take a little math, but that slightly smaller bottle of ketchup might actually be cheaper per unit than the larger one on sale.
Finally, keep in mind that there are no magic answers when it comes to spending less on groceries and food, but that it’s about a bunch of tiny habits and changes you can start practicing to improve your budget. The two biggest foundations of grocery shopping savvy are to not only commit to meal planning, but to also inventory your kitchen and try to plan around what’s already at home. Good luck!