Spending Way Too Much at the Store! How Do I Cut Back?>

It sounds nerdy, but it honestly helps to plan a menu. Make a list of staples - bread, milk, etc. Then mneu plan for 10 dinners, how ever many breakfast and lunches. Think of things that you can make in a double batch or cook in bulk and use for more than one meal. For instance, If I know I am making a pot roast on Monday, I just buy a huge one and some buns and plan on having pulled bbq sandwhiches the next night. So, I really get 2 meals for the price of one.

Everyone spends money differently, so I'll offer a few suggestions, hoping one helps you.
1. Save your receipts and sit down at the end of the week to highlight impulse purchases that are not food. These really can add up.
2. Do you throw food away? Then you may be purchasing too much. Consider buying smaller quantities.
3. Consider shopping once a week, and only at your favorite store. If you only shop once a month you will miss the sales cycles.
4. Improvise with what you have on hand in between shopping. That takes care of waste and limits impulse buying.
5. Try not to buy non-food products at a grocery store. These can be nearly free at most chains (CVS especially) if you buy on sale with coupons (only one visit a week).
6. Are your meat/fish portions larger than a deck of cards? That's considered a portion for an adult, although in the rest of the world that may be still be considered too large.
6. Do you buy any drinks besides milk, coffee or tea? Most of those fruit drinks, sodas and flavored waters are expensive, bad for the family and contribute to a continuous sweets cravings.
My best to you and your family.

Here is what we do. I took my bill from 1200 to 700, by

1. Going paperless (save for toilet paper)
2. Buying in bulk when on sale and freezing. I bought myself a gorgeous full size freezer
3. Couponing, couponing, couponing. Only buy things that are on sale and stack those coupons!
4 Cooking smart: butcher your own chickens, make your own stock, make soup; buy big roasts, use left over meat for tacos, sandwiches, etc. Buy cheap hams and freeze lunch size portions. Buy big blocks of Mexican cheese and mozzarella cheese, cut into portion sizes and freeze.
5. Meal plan based on sales.
6. Switch to a cheaper produce store.

We still spend a lot, but we eat very healthy (no processed foods) and my family eats shrimp and steak almost every week. We rarely eat out, so we like to have nice meals at home.

I spend right around $600 - $700 per month for family of three. I see people on this site saying they spend much less on groceries and I can't figure out how they do it either so I'm very interested in seeing the responses you get. I don't think I could do a once per month shopping trip - probably would not have enough room in the cupboards to store that much food.

I feed a family of 3, two are big eaters and two dogs on 500/month. First, I go to Sam's Club or Costco and only buy the actual DEALS!! Second, I learned how to freeze and store food properly so there is little to no waist. My family eats on the clean eating diet for the most part. Basically little to no processed foods mostly freshly cooked foods. I spend 1000/month here and there to "resupply" if sales are good enough on things. I have a master menu for my family that includes breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, dessert weather they are "ready made" (pick up from the deli) or if they are "from scratch" it's on there. Then I have a list of ingredients that I need for EVERYTHING to be made. My menu has enough meals on it that we can eat something different every night for 2months. We have some favs, like roast and turkey meatloaf that get made often. I know how much of everything I should have in my home at a time and keep them up. So, a section of my list may say:
Kidney Beans Dark LG 3cans
Kidney Beans Light SM 2cans
Canned Tomatoes LG 4cans
The day before shopping I look to see how many cans of everything I have and I buy accordingly. Now, if there is a good sale on something I will buy extra then. Like the pasta noodles I like are 2.50 a box but often they go on sale for 10 for $10, I will omit something from the list that was maybe a "bonus" or we do not NEED (if needed) and get $20 worth of pasta noodles that month, this means the next few months I do not have to buy pasta noodles! It seems like a lot of work, but really after you do the set up of the menu, breakdown of ingredients (down to the spices) and find out how much of everything you actually need shopping will be faster, easier and more enjoyable. In addition while I am shopping to keep tabs on my spending I write a "tick" you know IIII/ for 5 to keep track. If the item is 1.45 I put down 1 tick but if it is 1.55 I put two. I am typically with in $20 of my purchase depending on the amt of taxable items are purchased. Basically, run your kitchen like a store and you will save money/time and sanity! I am not a big cupon user, I just find the deals in the flyers (most of the coupons are for things I do not use), I have a deep freezer (2.5 cft) as well as a standard 20cft fridge and a 9cft drink fridge and a decent sized pantry. When I did not have a pantry (lived in an apartment) I used the "coat closet" as my pantry worked out very well! If you do not have a freezer or a membership to a Sam's or CostCo it's WORTH the 40/year and a freezer like ours runs 150-180 depending on the store.

$1000? A month? Oh my goodness. That's alot of food. I've been to Shreveport and I know food doesn't cost more than in Houston.

I meal plan. My meals are planned out for the rest of the year. That helps me not buy unneccessary items. I keep a very bare pantry and only purchase what I need for a week or 2. This helps me purchase only what I need and prevents me from buying something I already have since there's not much in there anyway.

Try cutting back your portions and eating more fiber. That might help you guys eat less, thus, not having to buy so much food.

You have a lot of responses already that include bulk, couponing and going paperless. One thing my sister did (and after you get a handle on how and where you can save) is to bring cash only (along with a calculator). When themoney is gone for that trip, it is gone. So, do your math as you go through the store determine what is really a need vs. want and go from there.
Seems like an awful lot on money for 4 people. We are three people at about $450-$500 which I still think is higher than I want. You're right, the fresh produce is killer! >:o/

I think some of it might be where you shop. I work so I only hit up about two stores a week for the things I need and then on a Saturday for our weekend food. I use to shop at Whole Foods and Dominicks or Jewel and that would cost me around $200 and up every week. I switched to Mariano's and my bill there, for the same organic and conventional items comes out to $75-$100 per week. HUGE savings as you can imagine. That's the only tip I can give since you already use coupons.

I'm not "saving" much lately either but here are some things I do:
1. Shop CostCo once a month for tp, papertowels, coffee, some frozen foods, cereals, batteries, seasonal clothes, Christmas presents, quanitity toiletries like contact lens solution, toothbrushes, etc. and snack foods.
2. Use store flyers and match with coupons to get what we need weekly - milk, eggs, smaller toiletries and meats and produce that are on sale.
3. Clothes I usually buy at WalMart, Old Navy or Kohls (30% off coupons). Mostly we buy ONCE a season and supplement at WalMart for other items.

Do you "menu plan"? I know that roasting a whole chicken Sunday and parlaying that into multiple weeknight meals is a great budget saver. Also, cooking in mass quantities, like when I make lasagna, I make two - one for that night's dinner and one whole one to freeze. Same goes with chili, stuffed shells, beef stew, etc.

Meal planning and using leftovers is our biggest budget saver.

I don't have a lot of time to be a super coupon user, so I only clip what I know we'll need/use. I don't stock up or buy things that are on sale if it's not something we normally would eat or use.

How big is your family? We spend about $160 a week for myself, and three kids. It goes up to about $200/week if my husband is in town. I do manage to buy organic milk and some organic produce by buying super cheap household stuff, cleaners, etc. Our cart contains pretty much strictly produce, organic dairy, Ezekial organic bread, juice, organic eggs, etc. I splurge on natural hormone free chicken. In other words, even with the "pricy" organic stuff, by staying away from processed stuff and meat we still do OK cost wise. I rarely use coupons since they're for processed stuff we dont' buy. I usually stick to store sales for cereals and certain items I don't but if they're not on special, like frozen berries and veggies, or tuna, canned beans, boxed organic macaroni, etc. Maybe you have more mouths to feed? Be sure your store has good prices and good regular shopper deals.

I only spend over $200 if it's well over a week between trips. We buy NO drinks aside from discount coffee and OJ (always cheapest brand), which we water way down, so it lasts a long time. No other juices, soda, snack foods etc. I do get the value pack of granola bars and cliff bars for kids if they're on sale. Again, for some items I buy, I do use the store special deal if available or skip it that week. This saves from $30-$50 at the register, otherwise I would be up to close to $250 per week. Sounds like you need to fine tune a little bit more-you're still not spending too much for food though, if you don't eat out a lot. My kids are still small, I'll be in trouble when they eat more!

Wow - I can't even imagine spending that much. I feed a family of 5 (three adults, and 2 kids) for $500/month. This doesn't include my daughters lunches at daycare, and about $50/month for "oh no's", as in "oh no, we ran out of milk". We do a lot with Costco's deals, we also base our weekly menus on the weekly ads and stock up on the regular stuff we use all of the time when it goes on sale. Having the pantry full with soup, veggies, broth, etc makes it easier on us. We buy whatever fresh fruit is on sale that week, the only fruit we regularily buy not only when it is on sale is bananas. We keep fresh salad fixings and bread on hand at all times.

We usually do one Costco run every two weeks, and one regular store run per week.

Are you throwing a lot of food away because that doesn't seem possible. What I mean is the only way I could spend that much would be an exploding pantry of excess or my kids getting stuff out and not eating it so it ends up in the trash.

Eating healthy is actually cheaper than packaged, unhealthy foods. Cooking from scratch is usually my first suggestion for someone who thinks they are spending to much on food.

I guess I am saying you need to identify where it is going first. I spend anywhere from 100 to 150 a week for a family of four.

That seems a little high to me - but it depends on what you eat and how many personal items you go through in a month. I do a lot of meal planning. I use coupons from website and in the mail, and when my Sunday paper comes Saturday night, I buy what's on sale - fruit & veggies. If fresh veggies are not on sale - I buy frozen. I plan my meals around whatever meat is on sale also, and I price match.

Also, we use our credit card for all our monthly expenses (so the reward dollars go right to our mortgage), but i had to stop because i was spending too "freely" at the grocery store this way. I couldn't figure out why the balance we pay off every month was getting bigger and bigger (most other expenses are about the same) and we went back 6 months - and it was grocery store visits. So, I use my debit card which helps me stay on track (since my husband only gets paid once a month) and not overspend.

That sounds good. You should also include the girls in their snack selection and only buy them once a month....the first month they will probably run out...the next month they will have learned from that...but, only if you stick to the plan of no more snack purchases. You probably need to find a hobby that keeps you from your extra trips!