Hey kids!
Long time! It's been BUSY around here. I've had a request for my best tips for cutting down household/grocery expenditures, and am thrilled to be sharing! Stay tuned for more posts--apart from this series--as I try to catch up on all of the great deals, coupons, and dumpster/street finds from the last little while!
*****************
I am going to present these tips in a series, with one tip idea per post, with plenty of details, math, examples, and motivation per post.
Take them one tip at a time, even if I put out a few of them a day. You DON'T WANT TO GET OVERWHELMED!!!
BABY STEPS!!!
Tips for Beginners!
1. 3-6-12 Month Rule: When your grocery store advertises a great deal on one of your staple products, purchase enough for at least 3 months. If it is an item that you use regularly, you will likely have cycled through it all in 90 days, just in time for it to come on sale again!
💖 Bonus Tip!
Certain products will hit their best prices at certain times, based on seasons, events, or when they are going to be most popular. *For instance... Chocolate Chips, Brown Sugar, Powdered Sugar, Cake Mixes, and Frosting all hit their absolute lowest prices leading up to Christmas. Check their expiration dates and get as many as your family will use by that date. Be realistic. DON'T GET CAUGHT UP IN THE EXCITEMENT OF THE DEAL!
"But I don't have space!" "I don't want to stockpile!" Well, this is totally understandable. I have a very small home and have recently embraced minimalism. What this comes down to is creativity and more importantly, how badly do you want to save money?!
Get rid of all the dusty crap under your bed or your kids' beds. Slide your cases of frosting under the bed skirt. Just don't forget you put them there!
Okay! Not frosting! 💁 How about something like GREEN BEANS?!
**The Math! 👀
1 can of green beans: regularly $.89- $1.00.
Sale price: $.39 each.
Say you use 3 cans per week. In three months, you will use three cases of beans, or 12 cases in one year. If you only buy them when you do your weekly shopping--at full price--you will spend around $100 per year on green beans, plus tax.
Now, if you're willing to clear out all of Junior's under-bed cobwebs and broken toys, and buy 3 cases of green beans every three months, you will spend just $56 + tax per year!!! It adds up!!!!
👌This applies to almost every household product (excluding perishables). Don't want to fill every nook and cranny with canned goods and bottles of fabric softener?! No problem! Just pick a couple of items at a time to stock. Even doing that will provide significant savings.
***Example: 💬
Take your green beans--that's about $50 in savings per year or $250 in 5 years.
Now add to that something like deodorant. I scored Sure brand deodorants for $.19 each with coupons during a sale. These same products are regularly around $2.69 each. They store for a LONG time and take up very little space!
***The Math: 🙋
Let's say you go through two deodorants per month. That's about $.50 after tax with the coupon deal, and about $6.00 per year.
At regular price, you're paying about $70 after tax for your hygiene. That's a cool $64.00 added to your savings!!!!
"But I don't want to clip/pay for/ask neighbors for coupons!" No problem!!! Let's say you just wait for a good sale and get 6 months or a year's worth of deodorant then!
The Sure deodorant was on sale for $2.19 each, a savings of $.50 over regular retail. With 2 needed per month, let's buy our year's supply by NOT eating out this whole month. We'll pay about $53 + tax for our year's supply. That's STILL a savings of around $17 for one year, $85 for 5 years.
So far, just with sale-grabbing and stocking these two items, we've put $67 in the bank this year. 💋
Now let's add a bigger ticket item to make it more exciting!
Toilet Paper!!!
I found a great deal on Quilted Northern 6 packs of Double Rolls for just $3.50 at Fresh Market a few months ago. I also had $1.50/1 coupons that I used on them, so I paid $2.00 per package.
I saw that same package at the store today on a crappy sale for $6.99. Let's say I skipped that other amazing sale because toilet paper takes up a lot of room, or I didn't have a lot of coupons. Okay, well, everyone's been wiping their butts and now we need to go shopping!
💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩
Let's say we use 4 of these packs per month. Hopefully no one gets diarrhea... At this "sale" price, we'll flush $28 + tax per month, or around $336 + tax for a year, down the toilet.
If we had bought them at the super cheap coupon price, we'd have spent only $96 for the whole year!!
"No coupons!!" No problem! 💃
If we had just bought them at the awesome sale price, we'd still have spent just $168 for the year's worth of clean bums! That's HALF the amount we'd have spent on the crappy sale price!!!
So, our year's savings so far, with NO COUPONS, just sale-grabbing, is now $235!!! Fun question:
How would having an extra $235 help you and your family??? An extra car payment? A night at a fancy hotel to rekindle the magic with your lover? Or a fun new dress and shoes?! 💅 💑 👸
👉So the important thing is to grab 3,6, or 12 months worth of items that you USE REGULARLY when they are on a really great deal! 👈
**These kinds of items will often be shown on the front page of your circular or placed near the entrance or main thoroughfares of your grocery store.**
If you are already out of the necessary item, yes, you might have to go out and pay full price right now, and that just stinks. 💩💩 But as soon as you see that awesome sale price, STOCK UP! It's worth it!!!
***If you can hold off on something, do!!! And wait for that great sale price! 💪
If you consistently sale-grab, you will never run into this problem again.
PS. That $235 in savings for one year adds up to $1,175 over 5 years.... extra house payment anyone?? Or mini vacation?? Or even better, invest it in a high-yield account and earn some interest! Retirement will be here before you know it! 💀
💣Final word for today's post:
Start small. Take it one step at a time! Start with one or two items. Take an hour and clear out under the beds and make room before you bring home your cases of green beans so that you aren't overwhelmed when you get them home!
Long time! It's been BUSY around here. I've had a request for my best tips for cutting down household/grocery expenditures, and am thrilled to be sharing! Stay tuned for more posts--apart from this series--as I try to catch up on all of the great deals, coupons, and dumpster/street finds from the last little while!
*****************
I am going to present these tips in a series, with one tip idea per post, with plenty of details, math, examples, and motivation per post.
Take them one tip at a time, even if I put out a few of them a day. You DON'T WANT TO GET OVERWHELMED!!!
BABY STEPS!!!
👶👶👶👶👶👶👶👶👶👶👶
Tips for Beginners!
1. 3-6-12 Month Rule: When your grocery store advertises a great deal on one of your staple products, purchase enough for at least 3 months. If it is an item that you use regularly, you will likely have cycled through it all in 90 days, just in time for it to come on sale again!
💖 Bonus Tip!
Certain products will hit their best prices at certain times, based on seasons, events, or when they are going to be most popular. *For instance... Chocolate Chips, Brown Sugar, Powdered Sugar, Cake Mixes, and Frosting all hit their absolute lowest prices leading up to Christmas. Check their expiration dates and get as many as your family will use by that date. Be realistic. DON'T GET CAUGHT UP IN THE EXCITEMENT OF THE DEAL!
"But I don't have space!" "I don't want to stockpile!" Well, this is totally understandable. I have a very small home and have recently embraced minimalism. What this comes down to is creativity and more importantly, how badly do you want to save money?!
Get rid of all the dusty crap under your bed or your kids' beds. Slide your cases of frosting under the bed skirt. Just don't forget you put them there!
Okay! Not frosting! 💁 How about something like GREEN BEANS?!
**The Math! 👀
1 can of green beans: regularly $.89- $1.00.
Sale price: $.39 each.
Say you use 3 cans per week. In three months, you will use three cases of beans, or 12 cases in one year. If you only buy them when you do your weekly shopping--at full price--you will spend around $100 per year on green beans, plus tax.
Now, if you're willing to clear out all of Junior's under-bed cobwebs and broken toys, and buy 3 cases of green beans every three months, you will spend just $56 + tax per year!!! It adds up!!!!
👌This applies to almost every household product (excluding perishables). Don't want to fill every nook and cranny with canned goods and bottles of fabric softener?! No problem! Just pick a couple of items at a time to stock. Even doing that will provide significant savings.
***Example: 💬
Take your green beans--that's about $50 in savings per year or $250 in 5 years.
Now add to that something like deodorant. I scored Sure brand deodorants for $.19 each with coupons during a sale. These same products are regularly around $2.69 each. They store for a LONG time and take up very little space!
***The Math: 🙋
Let's say you go through two deodorants per month. That's about $.50 after tax with the coupon deal, and about $6.00 per year.
At regular price, you're paying about $70 after tax for your hygiene. That's a cool $64.00 added to your savings!!!!
"But I don't want to clip/pay for/ask neighbors for coupons!" No problem!!! Let's say you just wait for a good sale and get 6 months or a year's worth of deodorant then!
The Sure deodorant was on sale for $2.19 each, a savings of $.50 over regular retail. With 2 needed per month, let's buy our year's supply by NOT eating out this whole month. We'll pay about $53 + tax for our year's supply. That's STILL a savings of around $17 for one year, $85 for 5 years.
So far, just with sale-grabbing and stocking these two items, we've put $67 in the bank this year. 💋
Now let's add a bigger ticket item to make it more exciting!
Toilet Paper!!!
I found a great deal on Quilted Northern 6 packs of Double Rolls for just $3.50 at Fresh Market a few months ago. I also had $1.50/1 coupons that I used on them, so I paid $2.00 per package.
I saw that same package at the store today on a crappy sale for $6.99. Let's say I skipped that other amazing sale because toilet paper takes up a lot of room, or I didn't have a lot of coupons. Okay, well, everyone's been wiping their butts and now we need to go shopping!
💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩💩
Let's say we use 4 of these packs per month. Hopefully no one gets diarrhea... At this "sale" price, we'll flush $28 + tax per month, or around $336 + tax for a year, down the toilet.
If we had bought them at the super cheap coupon price, we'd have spent only $96 for the whole year!!
"No coupons!!" No problem! 💃
If we had just bought them at the awesome sale price, we'd still have spent just $168 for the year's worth of clean bums! That's HALF the amount we'd have spent on the crappy sale price!!!
So, our year's savings so far, with NO COUPONS, just sale-grabbing, is now $235!!! Fun question:
How would having an extra $235 help you and your family??? An extra car payment? A night at a fancy hotel to rekindle the magic with your lover? Or a fun new dress and shoes?! 💅 💑 👸
👉So the important thing is to grab 3,6, or 12 months worth of items that you USE REGULARLY when they are on a really great deal! 👈
**These kinds of items will often be shown on the front page of your circular or placed near the entrance or main thoroughfares of your grocery store.**
If you are already out of the necessary item, yes, you might have to go out and pay full price right now, and that just stinks. 💩💩 But as soon as you see that awesome sale price, STOCK UP! It's worth it!!!
***If you can hold off on something, do!!! And wait for that great sale price! 💪
If you consistently sale-grab, you will never run into this problem again.
PS. That $235 in savings for one year adds up to $1,175 over 5 years.... extra house payment anyone?? Or mini vacation?? Or even better, invest it in a high-yield account and earn some interest! Retirement will be here before you know it! 💀
💣Final word for today's post:
Start small. Take it one step at a time! Start with one or two items. Take an hour and clear out under the beds and make room before you bring home your cases of green beans so that you aren't overwhelmed when you get them home!
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