Reducing the grocery bill - week 3

I'm almost there.  This week I've managed buy all of our groceries for just over $156.  That is a reduction in our weekly grocery bill of approximately $90 - not to mention the money we used to spend at the bakery on the weekends.  If I continue to do this for a year, I will have saved at least $4,680! That could grow to over $25,000 if I invested the $90 saved each week into an online saver account for 5 years!

We are still eating a healthy and tasty variety of meals and yummy snacks.  This kids are (mostly) cleaning their plates each night.  The Thinker (and sometimes The Engineer) often have nutritious leftovers for lunch the next day. We haven't noticeably cut back on the quality of any food or non-food products.

Tips for saving money on groceries

Here are some of the things that have helped me along:

• The Simple Savings website was where I started. After reading some of the forum members tips and successes, I began to think that it might, in fact, be possible to feed our family of five for $150 each week. There is a small membership fee to gain access to the Savings Vault (tips) and forums, but as I mentioned in Reducing the grocery bill, I saved the membership fee on my first week's shopping. They also have a free newsletter which is worthwhile if you'd like to check it out a bit before buying a membership.
  


• I have started baking again. The kids snacks now often consist of fresh fruit and homebaked goodies. I no longer buy biscuits, muesli bars and pre-packaged snacks.
  


• On a similar note, I make a lot of our food from scratch. This is something that I had been doing since the kids were born - I didn't like the idea of not knowing what additives, preservatives and who know what else, were going into their little tummies. Recently though, I had begun to slip into the habit of buying jars of pasta sauce or Chicken Tonight type things, purely for the convenience of them. Convenience costs.
  


• I have started planning out our week's menus before I go shopping. This means I have a structured list when I hit the shops. It also means that I can get all our groceries in one hit and not make any extra trips to the supermarket where I would be tempted to buy more than I need. An added benefit is I find it easier to keep track of leftovers. For example, if I have planned roast chicken on the weekend, I know I can use the leftover for enchilladas later in the week.
  


• I plan at least one vegetarian meal each week, sometimes two.
  


• We recently had an Aldi store open nearby, so I get whatever groceries I can there before hitting the other larger supermarket. I still like to get our meat from the local butcher and fruit and veg from the local greengrocer. Even before I began really trying to reduce our grocery bill I estimate that I saved at least $40 for each trolley of groceries I bought at Aldi.
  


• Last week I reviewed my grocery receipts to see where the money was really going. The results were a little surprising and I found I was able to save quite a bit more without much effort.

Now that I've almost reached the magical $150, I'm encouraged to try and save even more. I hope you are encouraged as well.

Next week I'll post some links to some great blog resources about saving money on groceries.