Grocery Shopping budget thread

lil_me

JUST FOR INFO - Several areas are getting the pilot of free school meals for primary school age children, ours is one of them http://www.lgcplus.com/news/free-school-meals-councils-named/5001362.article just incase people

Our budget is all over the place at the minute, haven't really kept a strong hold over it since prices all shot up. I need to and will use the spending of others to 'inspire' my decisions and cutting back. Holidays can be the complicated time, but my meal planning when we are away (caravan) is improving.

OrkneyStar

OrkneyStar wrote: »

2 adults and 1 toddler (19 months, with increasing appetite), and 1 cat.
Last year averaged about £40-45 per week all food, cleaning, toiletries, pet food.
This year we are averaging about £45-50 per week. Although I am watching the pennies we will likely not spend much less as DS eating more and prices increasing too! (ETA we have also now gone 100% disposable from 95% real nappies- various reasons, so that adds a bit on too).
We live on an island so only have Lidl, Tesco, Coop and local shops, so can be a challenge sometimes.
x

Just to say, this budget is no longer accurate.
As predicted we are now having to spend more, despite deciding not to go 100% disposable (we only use them at night) and getting the real nappies back out!
I still like being money savvy but simply don't have the time or energy to do everything from scratch!

lushlifesaver

Personally I spend around £30 at the start of each four weeks (I get paid then rather than monthly) which goes on any needed cleaning supplies, meat for the month, anything I need which is not fresh (e.g tins, pasta, rice and any alcohol if I think I'll drink it etc) and the first week or so worth of fresh foods (lots of veg, fruit, milk, bread, yogurts) I then spend around £5 a week on bread, milk and fruit/veg. So that's an approximate spend of £50 or each four weeks but it goes up and down....

Edit to add: this is just for me although I cook for and/or with friends once or twice a week

thegrimreaper

this has been really interesting to read for me, i am moving out soon and had budgeted 150 quid a month for just me on my own to live on food and cleaning/hygiene etc, i thought this was a bit of an ask before reading this but now i think it should be easily obtainable! cant wait to find out!

trinity_bleu

I'm struggling to keep to £90 a week for me, OH, DD (2) and 4 cats ! I cook 90% of our main meals from scratch and thought I was doing quite well. Am depressed now ...

meanmarie

Have managed to get my monthly budget down from €350 to €290 per month over last couple of years for 3 adults and a six year old....OH knows nothing about budgetting and is not interested so I have made a rule that if he insists on buying sirloin steak, shop bread and other stuff that are not within my budget it comes from his personal spending money, same goes for any alcohol bought. I suppose that because of this arrangement we do ok on budget, which includes cat food for 2 kittens and all cleaning products. YS food is very scarce here, not worth considering.

Marie

Desperate_Housewife_2-2

I have been trying to keep to 250 a month for food and it seems to be working. I find it cheaper in the summer as I grow some veg and we tend to eat less meat. I save some money every month for xmas food shopping and find that there are loads of bargains at that time so fill up the freezer.

Things are getting much more expensive now and I am finding that my storecupboard is running low!

Aldi is good for fresh fruit and veg and I like sainsburys basics. I have found a cheap shop that sells 2 litres milk for 1.09 so fill up the freezer on payday with milk.

I look out for whoopsies and out of date stuff, Monday is a good day, I dropped lucky on some ripe bananas today and made a banana cake.

vodkachick68

I am finding this thread very interesting. I try to stick to £70 per week for 2 adults and 2 kids (13 & 9) Though lately i have struggled to keep to this budget due to price increases. I always go shopping with a list and try to stick to it,and i religiously meal plan for each meal. I might start going to my local butchers for meat as they do 3 packs of pork chops/lamb chops/chicken thighs for a tenner. I would love to have a decent farmers market where i live,but unfortuntely i have to use the supermarket. My friend spends a whopping £500 a month :eek: on her grocery bill for 2 adults and 3 kids. She cannot see how i do mine for around £280. I am currently trying to convert her to meal planning and shopping around.

boredjellybean

eek - looks like I my need some help here, I used to have a food budget but in the last few years I seem to shop whenever & all sense of budgeting has gone out of the window

I spend far too much on food each week/month & would like to get things back in order, I also end up wasting too much food

I see that I need to make a new budget & also plan meals better & be stricter at following this but how much does everyone budget? I know its a personal thing but is there a rough rule of thumb?

We are a family of 5, 2 adults & 3 small children

Any help & tips gratefully received

BB

Rummer

The easiest thing to do is collect your receipts for a months to see what you are spending and what your spending it on. Then meal plan, write a shopping list and stick to it.