OK, I don’t think I’m going to blow your mind here but I did want to tell you about a change I made a few months ago to my shopping habits that’s saved me some money!
I used to go shopping on a Friday night after work and in theory, I would buy everything we needed to get us through to the following Friday except for a mid-week mini shop for fruit and veg where we needed it.
The problem was that we’re all at home for most of the weekend and with a fridge full of food we were more likely to snack – not only on treats but on things like carrots (Miss Frugal loves carrot sticks), yoghurts and juice. I was also more likely to experiment with recipes by adding in different things and trying variations of what I was planning.
Obviously this could have been fixed by being stricter with what we all ate and cooked over the weekend but I don’t like to make an issue about food – Miss Frugal doesn’t eat enough as it is and her brother is a fussy eater so if he’s eating that’s a good thing.
So I decided to change my shopping day to a Monday!
Not a huge change admittedly but it does mean that the food I buy usually lasts as long as I need it to and by the time it gets to the weekend, my little snack seekers find themselves snacking on food that I would need using up anyway.
It’s worth thinking about how you could shop smarter to see if you could save money just by changing a habit or too, changing the day we shop is just a small change but it’s saved me an extra trip to the shop each week to re-stock!
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Image credit: Shutterstock, beeboys
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This is a tricky one. We do our shopping on Saturday mornings and I agree, a lot of it does disappear over the weekend. But when we've done a shop early in the week instead, we tend to have run out by the weekend, and have to do a top-up shop anyway. I think that your way would definitely save money though!
I started shopping online with Morrisons and bought a delivery pass – it has changed my life! (Mrs M/Madamding again!)
Now Sebby has started pre-school a couple of mornings a week, I shop then – so much easier!!
Hmm interesting. I shop on a Thursday and we have got used to it. It works for us and as I meal plan, we don't scoff everything at the weekend!
I love shopping on a Monday morning, the shops are generally empty and you have fresh produce as everything has been brought in overnight. I have found that I spend less also when doing my shop on Monday morning as I can plan clearly for the week, as you say.xx
Cool little trick there! Isn't it amazing the difference it makes just to switch days?!
That's a great idea. I agree it's not good to make an issue about food with children.
Interesting. I don't think it would make that much difference to us as we don't tend to snack. I used to do a top up shop on a Monday though and found it quite handy after the weekend. Sadly the shop I went to closed and whilst I could go elsewhere, that shop fitted into my day better, so I switched to Thursday.
Also if you go shopping after 5pm you find the best reduced bargains and most of them will freeze so you can use them whenever you need them 🙂
That's a cool little trick. And it frees up time on Friday night, which is always better for the weekend!