November 2012 Grocery Challenge

Still in October until the 1st (and not doing well ) but can I go for £260 for Nov this is an increase of £20 from last month but we have an extra adult to feed for 10 days and also its a 5 week month for us. Hopefully wont need the extra but its there to fall back on if required. (she says crossing everything lol)

Nice to see new people on here :wave: - hope you manage to spend less than you are doing at the moment.
Hope everyone has a good Nov and manages to keep more money in your purse. Good luck.

john2009black & stafftopets - wow thats some going hope you both manage to make substanial reductions in the figures.

Could you put me down for £200 in November please?

john2009black wrote: »

Could I be added for November, we have recently been cutting down our costs but Groceries is the big spend. We spent £648 in September for a fimly of 2 adults and 2 children (oldest is almost 3 youngest is 8 months). I was thinking of setting a limit of £400 a month to start.

I didn't realise how much we spend until i sat down and worked it out. Its 2 pounds cheaper than our rent. :eek:

Does any one with a family have a shoppping list they could send me? Just trying to get an idea of what others are doing.

Thanks

stafftopets wrote: »

May i join you.......

First month of challenge so i am going for £300 for the 2 of us and house rabbit.
Added up last month's spend on food nearly £800!!!!!:eek: what did i spend it on as i have a lonely freezer and cupboard.

Determined to have more control this month as it is a five weeks till payday.:o

Welcome john2009black and stafftopets. I spent the same as you in November and December 2011 and my signature shows my generous budget, even now (but 50-60% of what it was). DS (20) has recently moved out and so this month looks really healthy but it hasn't always been so and I have struggled sometimes. Rather than tell you what to do or what to include or what to buy, it might help if you read the first couple of posts by Zippychick - there is some excellent advice there.

It took about three months for me to really start learning on here - I wrote a list and stuck to it - that helps a bit but it was my weeks where I used up some of the Suffolk siege supplies I had accumulated that things started to make sense. Then I only bought the ingredients I needed and now I have a separate 13th "month" for stocking up. I check the printable coupon thread and I stock up when things are really cheap (bogof, 3 for 2 with 1 coupon per item or YS - that's yellow sticker or reduced items). I still buy some brands but I also buy some value things and I bake my own bread and biscuits.

You have to work through what works for you. Best advice is to do a full inventory of all you have in (including any stashes of items - some on here have loft insulation made of toilet rolls, just by way of illustration) - and identify why you buy what you do (habit, standing list, can't resist, bored browser, bargain hunter - we're all here somewhere) then try to combat the behaviour.

I won't go on - just really do try some of the excellent recipes and do what works for you. My thing is chopping up bendy veg and freezing it to add to soups, stews and bolognaise. I stretch the quantity with lentils, grated veg and oats and it all tastes lovely but half the price it was...

Best of luck and well done for entering the challenge - keep reading and posting and feel free to ask.

SL

£200 for me again - I get paid weekly and husband gets paid every 4 weeks so this is how we always have £50 per week and a 4 week month