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I know this will vary from state to state, so listing your area and number of people in your budget would be helpful in your response.
What do you consider to be a reasonable monthly budget for groceries? (# of people?)
How do you accomplish this goal?
How do you cut back if you need to?
Does anyone purchase organic/dye-free/preservative-free foods and manage to keep expenses down? We have two kids on the Feingold Diet so there are definitely expenses with that.
Thank you! This is one of my main areas of frustration and I really want to reduce our expenses at the store.
We have a family of four, plus two dogs. We live in NC. The spending has been all over the place lately, but last month it came to $1700 and I had a small heart attack. I would really prefer to see it around $600. Is that even realistic? I don't know. We haven't ever budgeted this before, but it is one area I really want to reduce expenses.
We do have to send school lunches every day with our children, for their diet. Plus buy approved snacks. Those tend to add up. I can make a lot at home, and we have a dehydrator that we just got, so I am definitely looking for ways.
I absolutely cannot stand to grocery shop, and my husband has a relationship with the store about 4-5 times per week for this and that. And it all adds up.
We recently changed our grocery budget to $125-150 per week for five people. Have only done it one week so will see how that works out long term. I have a huge stash of non perishable type foods, but prefer fresh. This is sustainable for quite a while since I'm also pulling food from my stash. I will also be continuing to add to the stash as I see good deals.
I highly recommend going to the various grocery stores you visit and making a comparison price list for items you buy. One year I compared Sam's Club, Wal-Mart, and the local grocery store. Sam's was too far of a drive for a weekly trip, but was great for stocking up on basics like flour, sugar, butter. Wal-Mart was not the low price leader and I'm not going to do 'homework' so I can give them my money. Plus, Wal-Mart meat and produce were awful. I found out my local grocery store consistently had the best prices on many items and had better meat and produce.
I live some place else now from when I did the above comparison. I did my grocery shopping at Kroger on Monday. Tuesday, I specifically went to Costco and looked around. I found broccoli, onions, potatoes and a couple of other items to be less expensive at Costco. Kroger has generic canned goods so I can find a better deal there. I'm on the fence on the meat. I have only bought bacon and turkey at Costco. Bacon was good and a better price. I wasn't a fan of the turkey. Since Kroger is closer, it may be easier to buy fresh meat during weekly sales there. I'll be shopping at Sam's club for my basics but only make a few trips a year when I run out of flour or sugar or other basics. Another grocery store in town has better deals on half and half and milk. We may shop there occasionally instead of Kroger.
Aldi's food is an economical choice, but we have taste preferences so I only have a few items that I'm willing to buy at Aldi's.
We don't look for organic food so that isn't a concern for us. I worry about future diabetes so I don't eat as many starchy, high carb/sugar foods as a lot of people. I do prefer to not use as much processed food. I use canned goods sometimes to make specific recipes. I usually don't add salt to the recipe until the end when I have had a chance to taste everything.
For the average person, even trying to be frugal, the cost of drinks and snacks doubles the grocery budget. Eating or ordering out a few times a week doubles it again. That's how your $65 a month suddenly becomes $65 a week.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lycos679
What are you eating? I spent a bit more than $65/week.
Never more than 2-3 ounces of meat at a meal, usually organ meat. No processed convenience foods at all, except the obvious things like mayo or bread.
Breakfast, a handful of cold cereal with milk. Twice a week, eggs or french toast.
Lunch, maybe one slice of leftover pizza and a tomato, or a sandwich made with one slice of bread.
Main meal, a small piece of meat, some potato, rice, etc., and a cooked vegetable that costs less than a dollar a pound, like onion, carrot, broccoli, green beans. Or else a pot-roast, half-pound of meat and lots of veggies, lasts four days.
Snacks, I bake my own crackers, with a piece of cheese, or some tortilla chips dipped in refried beans. I bake my own cookies.
Nothing to drink, ever, except tap water. Buying what you drink is a budget buster.
We spend about $400-$500 per month, although that includes many non-food items that can be typically purchased at a grocery store. Additionally we spend about $100 eating out. There are 2 adults here.
Jim develops respiratory problems when anything cow dairy crosses his lips, although we haven't tried goat etc dairy products. We do spend the time on reading labels for lower sodium, lower sugar contents etc. and find that we buy most of our groceries in the "organic/healthy" section. Is it truly better, I don't really know but that's how he wants to shop so I let him go that direction. Plus he does the shopping while I'm still working. Very little of our diet comes from prepared/processed foods, excepting bread, condiments and the like. Fruit is generally our snacks.
Coffee is one area that we spend a bundle on. We easily go through 1# a week and it might be more. It is probably 10% maybe more of our food budget. We like the dark roast espresso type bean, which is often $12 per pound or more.
We spend about $250-275 per month for my household on groceries (2+baby). That includes the occasional trip to Costco to stock up on certain items which includes some non-food items like diapers, TP, paper towels, etc.
We maybe spend about $100/mo eating out, although that varies (a lot less now with a baby).
We spend about 250.00 per month for a family of three. We do this by being very self sufficient and the fact we grow a large amount of the food we consume. As a single father, I find it important to prepare meals from scratch with our family sitting down and enjoying meals together despite the rat race around us. We take advantage of sale items and store any excess harvest. Grocery shopping is a family event with the kids shopping for items for the recipes they have chosen for a two week period. We try not to make short, in between trips, to the grocery because this adds, most of the time, unnecessary cost to the food budget. We do not buy any highly processed food and try only to buy wholesome natural foods. We utilize a lot of local markets with fresh foods that are in season. We also buy in bulk from many online sources. If something becomes too expensive we just switch to something else. Convenience foods are usually not on our menu. We take the time to search sale items and change our menu according to the foods we can find at better prices. We also save by putting the labor and time into preparing food instead of pre-prepared , convenience foods off the shelf. There are some months we fall below the 250.00. I realize our family may not be the typical American family but this is how we do it.....
For the average person, even trying to be frugal, the cost of drinks and snacks doubles the grocery budget. Eating or ordering out a few times a week doubles it again. That's how your $65 a month suddenly becomes $65 a week.
Never more than 2-3 ounces of meat at a meal, usually organ meat. No processed convenience foods at all, except the obvious things like mayo or bread.
Breakfast, a handful of cold cereal with milk. Twice a week, eggs or french toast.
Lunch, maybe one slice of leftover pizza and a tomato, or a sandwich made with one slice of bread.
Main meal, a small piece of meat, some potato, rice, etc., and a cooked vegetable that costs less than a dollar a pound, like onion, carrot, broccoli, green beans. Or else a pot-roast, half-pound of meat and lots of veggies, lasts four days.
Snacks, I bake my own crackers, with a piece of cheese, or some tortilla chips dipped in refried beans. I bake my own cookies.
Nothing to drink, ever, except tap water. Buying what you drink is a budget buster.
$65 is on the low side just for what I need in maintenance calories. I need between 3K-4K cal depending on where I am in my training cycle. If I add in going out food and drinks my budget goes up to $600 (I have a gf). If I cut lower than that I feel like crap, suck in the gym, won't recover in between workouts, and behave like a teenage girl with PMS. Even ignoring my needs, it doesn't look like you are even getting 1200 Kcal.
May be operator error but I could not get to actual menus.
The link went to .pdfs for various months showing how much they estimate by week and month, not actual menus. They have it for family size and by person, for four cost ranges.
for example, for one single person living alone, over 50, per week, add 20% to the following:
Yes, you can feed a family on a shoestring. I have done it. But why do it when
you can enjoy food and the company of people you care about?
I guess if you have to. I enjoy food and am cooking as hobby as much as a necessity (as sort of a creative outlet), but want to also be somewhat frugal with this.
Another food budget number Ive seen comes from the various ALICE studies done by state United Ways. As part of the project they come up with various household survival budgets
For Indiana, for single adults, the food cost is $170/month
For Michigan, same, the food cost is $196 Month.
I know this will vary from state to state, so listing your area and number of people in your budget would be helpful in your response.
What do you consider to be a reasonable monthly budget for groceries? (# of people?)
How do you accomplish this goal?
How do you cut back if you need to?
Does anyone purchase organic/dye-free/preservative-free foods and manage to keep expenses down? We have two kids on the Feingold Diet so there are definitely expenses with that.
Thank you! This is one of my main areas of frustration and I really want to reduce our expenses at the store.
We have a family of four, plus two dogs. We live in NC. The spending has been all over the place lately, but last month it came to $1700 and I had a small heart attack. I would really prefer to see it around $600. Is that even realistic? I don't know. We haven't ever budgeted this before, but it is one area I really want to reduce expenses.
We do have to send school lunches every day with our children, for their diet. Plus buy approved snacks. Those tend to add up. I can make a lot at home, and we have a dehydrator that we just got, so I am definitely looking for ways.
I absolutely cannot stand to grocery shop, and my husband has a relationship with the store about 4-5 times per week for this and that. And it all adds up.
Awesome thread. Our budget has been all over the place, but we are averaging around 600 a month, family of 7.
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