Shrinking Your Grocery Budget--How to Get Started

I have had many people tell me that they've started using coupons combined with sales, but that they still aren't noticing a difference in their grocery budgets. They are still having to buy the same amount of food each week for their meals, so they aren't able to cut back.

I thought I'd share how I have been able to shrink our grocery budget, and hopefully this might help some of you as well. For those of you who have successfully been using coupons for some time and have been able to shrink your grocery budget, this post might not apply to you. Each family's needs are different, so what works for one family might not work for another family. If you are just starting out though, I think it helps to have some sort of idea of what has worked for others.

NUMBER 1: To me this is THE MOST important requiremnt to see your grocery budget shrink. You need to sit down with your spouse (or by yourself if you are single) and really discuss what your grocery budget should be for the month. This is not where you want it to be...this is realistically where it is. Based on your last few months of spending. You might think, "I've heard of people only spending $30 a week, so I'm going to make that my budget." Let me tell you that you cannot start out at $30 a week...people who are only spending that much have been budgeting and stockpiling for weeks (sometimes months) to get to that point. You might get there one day, but you cannot start there and realistically be able to feed your family a healthy/balanced diet. As an example for this post let's pretend that your weekly grocery budget is $100 for a family of five (of course this will differ based on your family's size/income/etc).

Once you know how much money you have set to work with, I suggest sitting down and writing out a meal plan...this might be for a week/2 weeks/etc. Typically I write out a meal plan from Monday to Sunday. BEFORE you write out the meals that you would like for the week, I STRONGLY encourage you to look through your freezer/pantry and see what items you already have on hand. If you have a lot of pasta and ground beef, you can work those items into the meal plan that you will be creating for your family. After checking your pantry go through store ads...you might find that chicken and rice are on sale...again, you can then work these ingredients into your meals. Once you have looked through your pantry and the ads, NOW it is time to write out your meal plan for the week. If you write out your meal plan FIRST then you will not be getting the best deals for the week.

This is what my weekly meal plan looks like for this week:
(Note...I only include suppers on my meal plan since lunches are usually leftovers and sandwiches)
Monday: Chicken Fajitas and Spanish Rice
Tuesday: Baked Ziti and Vegetables
Wednesday: Leftovers and Sandwiches (We have to rush out the door to church when my husband gets home from work, so most Wednesdays are very simple)
Thursday: Chicken/Vegetable Stirfry
Friday: Chicken Sandwiches and Mac and Cheese
Saturday: I leave this blank since we usually eat with my in laws. Otherwise Saturdays are another easy Sandwiches/Leftover day.
Sunday: Roast, Carrots, Potatoes, Rolls

After you have the list of meals down, you'll need to make a grocery list of every item that you will need to prepare your meals. Don't forget to shop from your pantry before heading to the store. Take your list into your pantry/freezer and mark off all the ingredients that you already have on hand to prepare your meals. If you have already taken inventory of your pantry and used those ingredients to create your meal plan, you should be able to mark several things off of your list. Don't forget to add items to your list for breakfasts, lunches, and snacks.

Your goal is to now buy every item that is left on your list for the LOWEST possible amount...this might be done by using coupons, shopping sales, buying store brand products. By making a conscious effort to do this you will be amazed at how much you can save. Remember, we are pretending that we have $100.00 to work with. After shopping out of your pantry and buying the remaining items on your list for LOWEST cost you can find, you might be able to find all of the items for $85.00. What should you do with that remaining $15.00...shrink your grocery budget down to $85.00? The answer is NOT YET!! Whatever money you have left after shopping for your family's weekly needs should be used to STOCKPILE items that are at their rock bottom prices...store sales combined with coupons. You might only have an extra $5.00 left for the week...or you might have $20.00. Whatever you have left you should use!

$5.00 doesn't sound like much, but you can often find pasta for under $.50 a bag when you combine sales with coupons...using $5.00 you can stockpile 10 bags of pasta. You can often find cereal for around $1.00 a box...using $5.00 you can stockpile 5 boxes of cereal.

When you first start doing this, you might not notice a huge difference. I encourage you to stick with it...keep making meal plans, keep shopping from your pantry/store sales, keep trying to get items that you need each week at their rock bottom prices. DON'T adjust your grocery budget yet!! Each week take the extra that you have left after shopping for your weekly needs and stock up on items that are way on sale. Your grocery budget won't change, but I can guarantee that you'll notice your pantry and freezer filling up.

Each week when you make your meal plan and shop from your pantry first, you'll be able to mark more and more items off of your grocery list. Your NEEDS from the grocery store will dwindle to almost nothing. Do you remember my meal plan for the week that I listed earlier? I just finished making my list of everything I NEED for this week (including breakfasts, lunches, suppers, and snacks for a family of 5)

Here's the list:
-soy sauce
-hamburger buns
-potatoes
-onion soup mix
-bread
I should be able to buy all of those items for under $10.00...the rest of my grocery budget can be used to continue stockpiling items that I find GREAT deals on!

If you are just starting out, I encourage you to give this a try for 4 to 6 weeks. At the end of that time, you should be able to COMFORTABLY start cutting your grocery budget. When I did this for my family, I did not cut everything back at once...after 6 weeks I was able to cut $20.00 off our weekly grocery budget, after another month, $40 more, and a few weeks later an additional $20.00. Now we are spending $80.00 less each week and we have MORE food in our house than we ever had when I was spending that full amount at the store!

I know this post is long, but I have had so many questions from people about this topic, so I decided to share what worked for our family. Hopefully some of you will give this a try and notice a difference soon!

If some of you have been able to successfully shrink your grocery budget, you can leave a comment below sharing how you did it...I'd love to hear some new and different tips!