Shopping-Monthly vs Weekly or daily (merged)

belfastgirl23

I do a monthly big shop on the internet. This covers all cleaning stuff, mineral water, orange juice, milk (longlife), tins, cereals, flour, cheese, big bag of potatos etc. So it's basically all the heavy stuff that's a pain in the a** to heft home and all the longer life stuff that can be around for the month. It will also include fresh stuff for the first week to ten days. usually comes in around £50-£60. then I do a weekly top up which mostly comes in around £15 although sometimes up to £25 depending on whether someone's coming over for dinner etc. And there's the odd pop to the shop in between. I indulge my M&S tendencies once in a while too. Generally comes in around £170 for the month for two of us.

emma_lewis84

Hi all!
BF gets paid tomorrow and i'm feverently writing my shopping list, mum is coming over tomorrow so I'm making use of her car and we're going to asda to do a big shop!

I would like to spend ~£100, and (hopefully) have that last us all month...is it possible!?! Can it be done?!

More importantly, what do all you MSEs do about fresh fruit and veg towards the end of the month?!

Thank you in anticipation - you guys always amaze me with your wisdom!!

Cheers, Emma xox

Willowx

I do that quite regularly however, I buy fruit/veg every couple of days at the market near where I work at lunchtime. I don't know if you can do anything like that though. For every thing other than fresh fruit and veg it works a treat as long as you plan your list before you go.

Willow

angchris

i do a monthly shop as well, last month i spent just under £100 for the 3 of us. i buy loads of veggies they prob last 2/3 weeks or so in the fridge, then for the remaining week/2 weeks i use frozen or tinned veg and fruit. i also buy enough milk for the month and freeze it, saves popping out and spending £20.

emma_lewis84

angchris wrote: »

i do a monthly shop as well, last month i spent just under £100 for the 3 of us. i buy loads of veggies they prob last 2/3 weeks or so in the fridge, then for the remaining week/2 weeks i use frozen or tinned veg and fruit. i also buy enough milk for the month and freeze it, saves popping out and spending £20.

I agree! I want to shop for a month - otherwise, if I pop out for milk, I will buy lots of other unnecessary things!!

Zazen999

I grow my own.

Skint_Catt

Never tried this but thinking it might be a good idea - trouble is I don't have a lot of freezer of fridge space, so might have to run both down for a month or two before I start! Will be keeping an eye on how you do.

csarina

I have done this for years, the key is to have a menu list and then plan what you ned to buy for the month except for fruit and veg. If you have a big enough freezer you can freeze milk, as long as you remember to take it out before you want it to allow it time to defrost.

Each month I do a freezer audit and then work out what else I need. I check the 'cheapie' shelf stuff thats going out of date, like meat, chicken sausage etc which can all be frozen. I do grow a lot of stuff on the allotment during the year and buy what fruit and veg I don't grow from the market.

I also make my own bread, we like it better than shop bread and I make bread twice a week as well as bake scones cake biscuits etc.

It might be a good idea to plan a fortnightly shop for a couple of months and then go onto the monthly shop, but good luck, you will find you save money in the long run..............

Pink.

Hi emma,

There's an earlier thread with some advice on shopping monthly that may help so I've added your thread to it to keep all the ideas together.

Pink

minibudgetgal

Just done my first monthly plan for March! Used to spend in around 500 quid a month at Tesco, and looking to halve it over the next three months. Have a huge backlog of food all over the place, freezer, cpboards etc! I have got a list of nonperishable stuff that I am going to order through Tesco online, and then I am going to allocate £25 each week for fruit, veg, dairy from the market and the milkman.
Will let you know if it works.