October 2011 Grocery Challenge

tessie_bear

hi....went to costco yesterday to buy a mini cooper (toy) and ended up with 2 chickens and x4 4 pinters of milk which was useful

we have got chilli for tea and sausage and mash tomorrow...might pop to lidl tomorrow and see what is cheap....steadily usung up the freezer food but quite a lot left....fancy making cornbeef hash over the weekend at some point

we need to buy a new boiler and rads so will be £4000 poorer when that is done so will be making food stretch

take care tess

trulymadlyhannah

Please can i join and set my budget for October at £130. This is for 2 adults and 2 children, and includes cleaning, household, nappies, baby milk and all food. I have done a big monthly shop for £68.10 so only need Milk, Bread, Fruit, Veg & Nappies. Luckily we have enough baby milk for this month. Have 2 children in nappies so i will need to save £20-£30 out of my remaining budget for Nappies... but going to have a look at the cost of reusable ones today!

My first grocery challenge as my mortgage company are insisting we come off interest only and start full repayments as we have used all our "interest only quota", meaning an extra £210 payment on our mortgage!:eek: Probably a good thing in the long run!

Looking forward to being inspired by your ideas, already planning to buy some frozen leeks to make some fish & leek pies this month

Hannah

valerie57

Hi all. I am new to this but have been reading the posts for September and the OS threads and feel inspired by the support and practical advice. I have just taken early retirement and am ashamed to say that I don't really know how much we spend on groceries, cleaning products etc. We have both been working flat out and I have concentrated on getting us healthy HM food rather than costing it up. OH is still at work and I would like him to take early retirement too. In order to do that I need to reduce our outgoings significantly. So, an end to lurking on these threads. I am taking your advice that for the first month you should not be too challenging. I am going for £400 for the month and expect to reduce that loads over time. Here goes.....

Gorgeestwo

Hi everyone

Had to pop to the local shop this morning to get some salad and bits for tea this eve, managed to spend £5.71 off to add to my sig.

Hope everyone is enjoying this lovely weather :j

looie

helen jelly can you put me down for £100 for October please.

I went slightly over budget last month so I am going back to my usual budget amount With christmas fast approaching it should make things a little easier as I want to start putting some things away

slbhill

Could I be put down for £150 for October please :beer:

A bit more than last month to allow for visitors staying at various points. I'm hoping to come in under though, as I'm away a few times as well. It's going to be a complicated month one way and another!

Did first big shop last night - £42.64 including enough choccy biccies to last even us for most of the month! They were BOGOF at MrT & thanks to the grabbit thread I had a rummage & found some of the packs were 100% extra free. So ended up getting 9x4=36 bars for the price of 9 in one case :T

Then quickie to Superdrug today - 10 razorblades for £9.49 instead of 5 for £7.49 at MrT.

Hopefully nothing more needed for a week or a bit more.

ms_night_ryder

In need opinions please, I want to buy loo roll, lidls are doing charmin xxl 24 pack for 6.99 is this a bargain? I think it is, but would be nice to hear from others.

cheers

ragz_2

I'm in for £450 again please, managed last month's with £25 to spare but want to try again before I cut the target.

Spiggle

Hiya!!!!!:hello:

Thanks Zippy, Pink, rosieben and helen jelly for your stalwart efforts to keep us all on the straight and narrow. :A

Please would you put me down for £270 for October Helen please? Thanks in advance, you're a star. :kisses3: I'm upping our budget a bit this month as we massively underspent in September but will need a large online shop and possibly some cat food near the end of this month.

I don't know where the year has gone! :huh: I haven't managed to keep up with the threads for the last couple of months but I resolve to try in October, honest.

We have a huge number of newbies and now not so new newbies that I've missed welcoming recently, so welcome all newbies.:wave:

I'm not sure if the following will help any of you but here goes anyway ...

I hope my fellow regulars won't mind me posting this again but it may be of some help to all the enthusiastic and excited people joining us. I believe it has helped others in the past. So here goes:

We all have different budgets that suit our households. The most important thing to remember is that you set yours according to your needs and finances. It can take time to get to where you want to be too so don't knock yourself out if you go over in the first few months. We are here to support each other and it is not a competition.

I thought it might help to outline where we've come from and the top tips I've learned.

When we started in March 2010 we had spent in excess of £600 in the previous month. :eek: This had to stop, (there's only me and him and our two beautiful black cats) something which thankfully my OH completely agreed with so I have been lucky that he has been on board from the start. He gave me his debit card voluntarily and I still keep hold of it until he needs to get something for the home. At the same time we set up a system of pocket money (pm) at £15 each per week which doesn't count towards the GC and which we can each spend as we wish with no comebacks or complaints (there's a song lyric in there somewhere!). OH predominantly uses his pm on his beer and I ferret mine away mostly. :rotfl:

The next step was to set up my own spreadsheet which is absolutely simple onto which I put all spends so that I have a continuous running total for the month and for the year. We initially set our budget at £280 per month and brought it down to £240 where it resides for most of the year it is occasionally increased to allow for extras e.g. Christmas to £260.

The important 'tools' we found greatly helped and continue to do so now are:

Stocktake cupboards, fridge, freezer - make lists and ensure that the older products get used up first. You'll be amazed at what you find squirrelled away and it will help with your shopping list as you'll realise that you don't actually need so much.

Before you go shopping check staples - running out of milk, bread, butter, etc often leads to going into a shop for one thing and coming out £20 lighter. Always check these and if they'll run out tomorrow buy them the same time as getting other things.

Always make a shopping list and stick to it - the supermarkets (sm) try every which way to get us to spend so having a list and strong resolve is the only way to beat them.

Keep every receipt - and then note it down on your spreadsheet/spend diary so that you always know where you are.

When tempted, ask yourself do you NEED it or just WANT it - now this advice goes with two things. Firstly, the things you see in store when shopping that APPEAR to be bargains - if you hadn't planned spending the money then its not a bargain. Secondly, the sm send us loads of vouchers for £X off a spend of £XX - if you had no NEED to spend £XX then have you SAVED anything???

Use my supermarket to compare prices (limited to four of the biggies) - The site may be used to actually do an online shop at whichever of the big four offers the best value or, if you have the time and sm availability, to make up lists for visiting each of the stores so that you can purchase all you need at different stores thus getting the best possible value. (I'd add, do a 'shop' virtually on this site and take the list you create on it with you, whichever one you shop at, it will help keep target prices in your head and allow you to spot bargains. MrM is not included but you can do a virtual list on their website so you know what you're going to be spending.)

Always have a list - this is just as important when shopping online as shopping on foot.

Use Approved Foods online (with a list!) - if you don't mind out of date things (ood) or you can search for only in date items. The only drawback is storing the goods as far as I can tell. Oh, and watch the delivery as it's done on a scaled charge for weight so keep an eye on it. You can of course do an AF order with friends, family, colleagues or like minded neighbours. Other GCers use Big Br*nds 4 Less too.

Invest in a breadmaker - we have saved so much by making our own bread. The prices in the shops are extortionate for bread these days. There's loads of advice on this thread and others in the forum on this.

Use the recipe lists - always posted at the front of a new thread. There are fantastic, tasty, healthy and economical recipes to use on them and there are a number of other threads on the forum such as Weezl's that will help you to eat well on a budget.

Shop locally - the local greengrocer (or preferably market but I don't have one ) is usually cheaper as an option for fruit and veg (f&v) than the sm. Often the prices may look the same but when you look at the quantity for the same price the greengrocer will be cheaper. The same goes for the local butcher. Often you will have far more variety of meat available, advice on how to cook a particular meat can be offered and there is (for me at least) no comparison in terms of quality. We buy our huge FR eggs there and I'm yet to find an equivalent FR egg in a sm at the same or lower price. Obvioulsy if you have your own chicks/know someone who has chicks you can get them even cheaper again.

Grow your own - it's quite simple to grow some f&v at home even if it's only in pots on the patio. There are also supportive threads on the forum for this.

Cook your own - making meals at home from ingredients is far more economical, often tastes better than shop bought and is probably far better healthwise.

Meal Plan - this is something that others can advise on as we don't do it. I have a tremendous capacity for eating the same food over many days but presented in slightly different form. For example, we could buy £7 worth of brisket from the butchers and eat it as pot roast for a couple of days, sliced for sarnies, sliced with a salad, chucked into a casserole or shredded up and fried as crispy beef.

Don't waste food - either only make what you need or use any leftovers for other meals/creations or freeze it for another day.

Withdraw the cash you want to spend - and keep it in a separate purse. This can be particularly effective as you have the money in front of you reducing rather than spending with plastic which is so easy to lose track of. Very useful when you first start out.

Don't go to the shops to browse - this can only lead to pain and hardship!!!

Keep posting and reading the thread - there really is no better supportive, wise and inspirational place to be! I think I saw that somebody mentioned forgetting to read/post. I get around this by using the Advanced button to post, below the window where your text is displayed you will see Additional Options. In the Thread Subscription box use the dropdown to select either instant email notification (this is what I use) or daily email notification before you submit your latest post. Then you will get an email into your inbox from which you can click to the thread to see what others are saying.

Always remember the sm is not your friend - it wants to profit from you and take as much of your money as it can coerce out of you!

So, there you go as a starting point. Others on here will offer tremendous advice on meal planning. And don't forget, the only silly question is the one you didn't ask!

I hope that may help someone.

See you tomorrow after I've declared on September.

Take care,
Spigs

mrs-moneypenny

can i join in, i've declared in the sept thread an overspend of £48.97

want to go for an attempt of £400 for October

need to read the thread properly but have to say thank you to spiggle for such brilliant advice