10 Ways To Save Money On Groceries

It is with much envy that I read posts and comments from American bloggers who list ‘cutting coupons’ as a leading way to save money. However, as other Australians will identify… we don’t get coupons of any serious calibre downunder. The best we can hope for in coupon country is a special on drycleaning and buy one get one free Big Macs.

So, with that in mind I thought I’d share 10 ways my household saves money on groceries.

For background, my younger brother is 6′8″ and with an appetite to match. During my university years, one of my chores around the house was to do the grocery shopping and cooking for the family. When I moved out of home, I “budgeted” (more on why that’s in inverted commas another day) $100 a week in groceries for myself and never really gave serious thought as to whether that could be any less and basically spent whatever my limit was (and often more). Today, my fiance and I spend an average of $75 a week doing our grocery shopping, which covers breakfast, lunch and dinner for two adults for six days as well as household goods like cleaning products and toilet paper. 

Without further ado, here’s the list (in no particular order):

1. Shop at markets / co-ops – this is perhaps the biggest single reason our grocery expenditure is so low. Whilst they don’t enjoying the buying power of large supermarket chains, market stalls don’t have the overheads of them either. Better yet, their produce is generally sourced locally so you’re supporting local farmers and getting fresher food. As an added benefit if you live in my area your Vietnamese will improve exponentially too!
2. Make a list – on Saturdays, my fiance and I sit down at the kitchen table (whilst he is doing number 3 on this list, generally) and I write down the days of the week on a piece of paper. We work out what days we’re doing what – eg. he’s at a work dinner on Thursday night, we’re visiting his folks on Tuesday night, Monday I have a work lunch, Friday we’re going to an engagement party and on Saturday morning we’re having breakfast out with friends. . With this sort of little ‘calendar’ in place we can plan our meals out to minimise wastage. I’ve heard many people argue against this strategy with the claim “but how will you know what you feel like eating?” or “what if I want to do something spontaneously?”… the answer is simple. Put meals on the list that you like. You don’t have to necessarily follow exactly which meal which day, but you’ll be able to do your shopping knowing you have enough for the week… and if all else fails, see tip number 7. Once you’ve got your meals written down, check your pantry and your fridge and write down all the ingredients you don’t have. You can do this around the other way too – check your fridge and pantry for anything that’s nearing expiry and create a meal around that to use it up. 
3. Read your junk mail – this is pretty easy for us, as my fiance is a big fan of the stuff. The premise is simple, if you have convenient access to several supermarkets, read the junk mail and work out where the discounts for the stuff that you buy is this week. This only works if you don’t have to go out of your way to get to said supermarket as with fuel prices these days you could end up seriously eating into your savings if you travel too far. 
4. Buy home brand – alarmingly often, the ingredients in home brand alternatives are identical, if not more nutritionally sound than their brand-name counterparts. There are always exceptions to this rule, so read the labels carefully. This is particularly true for basics however, and the ‘You’ll Love Coles’ range even has organic options that are cheap, nutritious and flavoursome. Some great stuff to try if you’re in doubt is: flour, sugar, salt, organic dry spaghetti, organic corn chips, canned tomatoes (although check the tomato content), bottled water, clingfilm, cotton buds and cup noodles. Just don’t buy home brand toothpaste. Take it from me.
5. DIY - making your own stuff from scratch can save you a small fortune in actual cash, although it does depend on two major variables: 1. your ability to cook / prepare food and 2. the value you place on your time. Things like sorbet, doughs and pastries, tomato paste and curry paste are actually deceptively quick and simple to make. My dad is a huge advocate of homemade museli. The cost per item produced will inevitably be a fraction of the cost of something premade… and better yet you can control exactly what goes into it so you’re not consuming uknown additives and preservatives.
6. Grow your own – for many people it’s not particularly practical to run an orchard, a vegetable garden and a farm from their back yard. However things like herbs take up a small amount of space and are one of those things that you’ll rarely get through a whole bunch of before they go limp and you throw them out. Moreover, at the markets a few weeks ago a bunch of coriander (not in season) was $3 at the cheapest stall. Later that day at Ikea we saw whole plants for $2.80.  Growing your own can be cheap to get started and make a fabulously positive impact on your weekly grocery expenditure (as well as reducing the amount you throw out)!
7. Love your freezer – it took me a very long time to convince my fiance of the benefits associated with freezers, but we’re getting there. The benefits of freezers are twofold – 1. it can often be cheaper to buy things like meat in slightly larger quantities and then break them up into consumable portions and freeze – we break it up into 250g lots and bag it up so it can be defrosted as we need it 2. you can put things like bread in the freezer to get longer life out of the packet and enjoy fresh bread every day. This is particularly true if you’re only using it as toast anyway – it can be toasted from frozen! Even perishables like stock can be frozen into ice cube size for use later.
8. Embrace your flaws – all the above considered, there’s no point buying fresh stuff from the market and so forth if you’re just going to let it sit in your fridge or pantry and go bad. So with this in mind if you’re just not the sort of person to be disciplined about your usage of food then make sure it has a good shelf life. For me, this means that I know from years of trying that I’m not going to cut up fruit to put on my cereal every morning on any sort of consistent basis. I shudder to think how much fruit I wasted over the years intending to cut it up and just plain running out of time. I’ve learnt from this and instead buy tubs of fruit already cut up that I can keep in my fridge and spoon over my cereal in the mornings. It has a life of about a ten days after opening and is quick and easy for me to use.
9. Look for other ways to get discounts – back in the day, being a shareholder in coles myer would get you a % discount on your grocery shopping. Not anymore. However, I work for a large Australian company that I’ve recently been pleased to discover offers a discount on gift vouchers for major supermarket chains. Et voila, buy the gift voucher and you get an instant 8% off your groceries. Happy days. Do some investigating and find out if your social club, sports club or anything else you’re a member of has such an arrangement. If not, perhaps it’s time you got your negotiating shoes on and found out if this is something you can organise!
10. Price check – we’ve had it drummed into us for years that the bigger the packet the cheaper the product will be per unit. So theoretically a six pack of a product will be cheaper per item than buying individually. This is not always true. The Australian government has recently implemented a legislation that will require supermarkets to disclose the price of products / unit. eg. 30c/100ml – until then, and even then – make sure you do the math and work out if the product you’re buying is actually the most cost effective option. 

So, whilst $75 per couple a week might not be achievable for you, chances are you can examine your grocery habits and find some fat in there (no pun intended) to get your bill down!

If you’ve got any further tips, please feel free to email me or tweet them – www.twitter.com/moneypennyme.

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