Financial Planning | Jun 26, 2010 | 0 Comments

How I Saved Money at the Grocery Store

Today, I was reading some other PF blogs and I found a good post by John Frainee at ChristianPF.com (“7 Ways to Save Money Grocery Shopping”). He talks about some of the ploys the grocery stores use to entice you into spending more of your hard-earned money that you wanted to.

Keeping along the lines of his post, I thought I’d share the one tactic I use that saves me money. And I encourage you to comment below to share your grocery war stories or money-saving tips.

In John’s article, he pointed out one of the things I tend to enjoy at the store—free samples. Between Costco and Sam’s Club on the weekend, I can get a nice meal. All of those free samples intoxicatingly calling my name. He recommend avoiding them and I agree. The “reciprocity nature” inside of us will naturally tempt you to buy the item being sampled even if you don’t need it.

He also talked about stores within stores and avoiding those too (#4 of 7 on his list). Anyone else guilty of buying a Starbucks on their way out? How about on your way in so you have your favorite drink while you shop? I admit it. I’m guilty.

What I Discovered One Day

So one day I’m in Costco with the family and we’re checking out. We have all this stuff and the bill makes me want to faint—I hate spending money usually.

Next thing I know, we’re back at the store again buying stuff. Wait a minute. Did we not just go and spend enough to buy a vehicle? What happened?

Turns out we bought all sorts of stuff we really didn’t need to live on and not enough of the stuff we really needed. It’s just so easy to impulse buy—and if you do this at a place like Costco, you’re going to really get hit in the wallet.

Even when we had a list, it still happened. And looking at some of the items and prices I realized that the savings weren’t alway there. In fact, we were just compounding the problem by buying more. Of course, we did save on other items. But the main problem wasn’t the item cost, but our buying habits.

The Change I Made That Saved My Life

Okay, maybe it didn’t save my life directly, but by making this change I was able to cope with the price owed at the register.

Rather than doing a massive buying spree every week or two, I started going to the store every couple of days (sometimes daily).

And instead of trying to imagine every possible need we might have in the future, I was only concerned about that day and the next. No more browsing the isles of financial doom. I was in and out of the store in minutes.

We are now less likely to buy what we don’t need and it’s rare to have a “you forgot to get that” moment. We also reduced buying goods that end up spoiling and costing us money, pointlessly (something that used to happen often). And our overall monthly grocery bill is lower.

If the grocery store is on your daily route or close to where you live, I encourage you to give this a try. Go into the store and ask yourself what you (or your family) needs today and tomorrow. Buy that stuff and leave. You may find it ideal to shop in 3-day patterns.