Grocery Shopping budget thread

westcoastscot

Interesting and valid point Valk-Scot - our spend is pretty much everything - we do "stock up" in that I have enough for a month-6 weeks - go shopping again when we're out of stuff. I do try and keep a store-cupboard but find we eat pretty much everything I buy. I do such a huge shop when I do go that it would be difficult to get much extra. My list changes from month to month, but we pretty much eat the same things so everything comes around eventually.
I only use basic cleaning items - dry dusting etc - as we have allergies to anything that smells. Also we're dairy and egg free (although I don't think that makes much of a difference price-wise for the way we eat as I've "invented" recipes that we all eat that are the usual day-to-day fayre, and i've always cooked from scratch).
The biggest issue shopping-wise for me is choice - particularly fruit/veg and particularly in the winter. Prices are shocking also. I do try and grow some but the weather often beats me :-)

Long_tall_sally

I don't know what it "should" be But I know that mine is too much & I wish I could get it lower! There are 2 adults & 2 kids full-time, one who has diabetes and Coeliac disease so needs snacks for school before p.e. lessons etc and gluten-free food is not cheap plus OH's two sons (aged 20 & 18) also come a couple of times a week for dinner. Have always had a target of £450 per month but as you can see from my signature, very rarely achieve this! This is for food, cleaning stuff and toiletries & we probably all have pretty big appetites.

grandma247

I probably spend around £100 a year on the very basic dry staples such as rice, pasta, flour,herbs and spices and pulses. I usually get them around the time of Ramadan because the prices are very good then.

At the moment I spend around £40-£50 a week for three of us but some of that will be to put in the store cupboard.

I do not buy set things each week apart from milk and fresh fruit and veg because I try to make use of offers in several supermarkets and buy as much as I can afford at a good price. It has taken a few years to develop my system but it works for me and I rarely pay full price for anything.

You have to be on your toes all the time to keep ahead of all the supermarket tricks.

Pink.

As this thread has dropped down the board I've added it to our existing one so that you can see what other Old Stylers budgets are.

Pink

westcoastscot

Thanks Pink, didn't know we had an existing thread - looking forward to reading it

elliegirl

Thanks for your replies. I think what I struggle most with is the youngest two, 13 and 10 yrs. One won't eat any meat except ham and lamb. No mincemeat so spag bol and Shepherd pie etc is out. Sausages is a no no. Also she wont eat veg, will only eat the frozen mashed potato or oven chips. The other one really only eat chicken. It is a nightmare come dinner time doing different meals. None of us can stand any sort of tinned or frozen veg, but fresh veg seems to go off really quickly nowadays. The 13 yr old has school dinner, but all she really eats there is pizza slices so I am trying to think of different meal ideas to try and improve her diet.
P.S all my kids ate fresh veg, meat, fruit ect when they were little, but as soon as they started school it turned into a nightmare. Actually only one of my kids eat what I call a healthy diet.

kizzie_nikita

I can't believe how much some people seem to spend! We spend £80-150 max a month of food for 2 adults!

FairyPrincessk

Two adults and both fairly big eaters. We both work out a lot and both have fairly high metabolisms--plus, I make a big effort to keep us very healthy with lots of variety, lots of fresh fruit and veg. So, that said this could be lower.

We spend about £70 three to four times a year on a supermarket order. We then spend about 30-35/week at aldi/picking up milk etc. This doesn't include our booze budget, but does include most other things like washing liquid, toilet roll etc.

At the moment, I would like to focus on getting a stockpile built up again (we moved over summer) and reducing our costs on the non-food items like toilet roll, soap etc.

We were eating a bit more cheaply last year, although it hard to quantify how much as OH had one dinner and one lunch from his parents at the time. However, I've been making an effort to get 7 (not just 5) a day, and to up our protein intake as we both were feeling quite lethargic and were always starving between meals. I think this has been effective, but the budget did go up when I started that.

For a month this works out between 135-175 on average.

FairyPrincessk

elliegirl wrote: »

Thanks for your replies. I think what I struggle most with is the youngest two, 13 and 10 yrs. One won't eat any meat except ham and lamb. No mincemeat so spag bol and Shepherd pie etc is out. Sausages is a no no. Also she wont eat veg, will only eat the frozen mashed potato or oven chips. The other one really only eat chicken. It is a nightmare come dinner time doing different meals. None of us can stand any sort of tinned or frozen veg, but fresh veg seems to go off really quickly nowadays. The 13 yr old has school dinner, but all she really eats there is pizza slices so I am trying to think of different meal ideas to try and improve her diet.
P.S all my kids ate fresh veg, meat, fruit ect when they were little, but as soon as they started school it turned into a nightmare. Actually only one of my kids eat what I call a healthy diet.

It strikes me that it might be time to get your kids involve in the budgeting/shopping/cooking process. I know it must seem complicated enough already, but perhaps start slowly and get them to collaborate to budget, plan and cook one meal month. Give them a budget for that meal and then have them find recipes they can agree on and manage to cook, cost out the ingredients and prepare it. With supervision! I wouldn't necessarily sell it as teaching them how much work goes into this, but that might be a nice side effect. I know I was a lot less fussy when I started cooking for myself. Most of that was just that I was able to find ways of preparing foods I didn't previously like in ways that I preferred. I also learned to eat some cheaper things I didn't like so I could splurge on more costly things I did enjoy.

Of course if they're already involved just ignore me:)

bridgemant

I'm shocked and stunned by how little you all seem to spend on food.

Our family of 2 adults and 3 kids (1 of whom eats school dinners 5 days a week), spend on average £120 per WEEK in the big supermarket (this is for food, cleaning and toiletries inc. nappies for our 2 year old) with approx £30 per week going down the local shops for bread and milk etc.

THAT'S £150 PER WEEK APPROX £650 A MONTH!!

I'm doing something seriously wrong here!!

Time to reveiw this methinks!