Grocery budget

[elessar78]

We budget $80/week for two adults, a 3YO, and an infant. It doesn't seem to cover our needs in anything but a very basic way, but I wanted to compare notes with others. The only thing we buy that may be out of the norm, is that we buy a good amount of fresh fruits and vegetables each week. Not sure where we sit compared to others' budgets.

[MonkeyMama]

We pretty regularly spend $500/month on food.

2 adults and 2 kids, but it's about the same as 4 adults. Bracing myself for those teen years, which are coming up fast.

I'd say we eat pretty moderately. We have lot of "beans and rice" in our diet (more ethnic foods, which are very delicious and filling), but we don't blink at eating a fair amount of fish, shrimp and meat, and alcohol. Mostly, we shop around sales to keep our costs down, and tend to makes things more from scratch. (We don't like make bread or pasta from scratch, at least not very often, but home cook most our meals and make our own spreads and sauces. This week we made fresh salsa, for example).

[elessar78]

Thanks MM.

Do you factor in non-perishable/household stuff: ziploc bags, toilet paper into your grocery budget?

Do you do Sam's Club or Costco by any chance?

[disneysteve]

The only thing we buy that may be out of the norm, is that we buy a good amount of fresh fruits and vegetables

That's what really helps keep the budget low. Produce is so much cheaper than all of the crappy processed food that many people buy. We do primarily vegetarian cooking. No red meat. No seafood. Just occasional chicken. And the more you cook from scratch with fresh ingredients, the less you spend.

[bigdaddybus]

Here is our current monthly food budget for our family of 6. (Kids ages 12,11,3,2)

$200 out to eat
$80 school lunch credit
$160 a week (x4.2) = 672 per month at the grocery store (includes all HH items)
grand total $952 per month.

We could go cheaper, but before we were budgeting we spent ALOT more.

[MonkeyMama]

Thanks MM.

Do you factor in non-perishable/household stuff: ziploc bags, toilet paper into your grocery budget?

Do you do Sam's Club or Costco by any chance?

I do include all pet and non-perishable stuff (though aside from the pet, we really don't buy very much in the non-perishable department? Yes on the TP, but no to the paper towels and plastic bags and expensive cleaning products). But that said, over the years I just figured any eating out offsets that, so that we literally spend $500 on FOOD.

Overall, we live in a higher cost region, but my impression is that produce is very inexpensive in California. So maybe the processed stuff costs more, but the basic food staples definitely do not cost more.

No Costco or Sam's - we mostly shop at Target and our high-end grocer. People all the time "Assume" this store is way expensive but we find it to have the best prices by far. But maybe we only buy things when they are on sale. I think it depends what you buy, too. Because I took my dad over there and his eyes about popped out of his head and he started scooping things off the shelves for their low prices. This is a grocery store chain that they don't have in their city 100 miles away. I took my sister over there when she visited because she is very picky and a I had a $20-off coupon to help her. She just griped how expensive it was - but only bought a lot of highly processed crap. & all name brand crap, of course. We tend to buy mostly generics. All this to say, it depends where you live and what you buy. We may revisit the Costco thing when our kids hit those teen years, but the math has never made any sense to us. In fact, our cupboards tend to be pretty bare (buy as we go).

ETA: I forgot to add that we also buy a lot from ethnic food stores - particularly spices and beans. (Spices in particular; huge cost savings not buying at traditional grocery stores).

[MonkeyMama]

I also forgot to add that we don't drink a lot of calories. Mostly drink water. I always notice this very much when friends gawk at our food budget. Well, they are drinking coffee, soda, juice, milk and alcohol with every single meal. We buy most these drinks, but maybe only once a month on the soda and juice. We aren't big milk drinkers, but we buy for cooking and cereal. You can certainly enjoy these things in moderation while mostly drinking water with your meals.

[97guns]

if you have a mexican or chinese grocery store in your city take a look at their produce prices, they are at least 1/2 off big box supermarket prices.

[Baby_nurse]

We budget $600 for 4 people, 4 dogs and all the paper goods.

[elessar78]

I also forgot to add that we don't drink a lot of calories. Mostly drink water. I always notice this very much when friends gawk at our food budget. Well, they are drinking coffee, soda, juice, milk and alcohol with every single meal. We buy most these drinks, but maybe only once a month on the soda and juice. We aren't big milk drinkers, but we buy for cooking and cereal. You can certainly enjoy these things in moderation while mostly drinking water with your meals.

You sound a lot like us, sans the pet.

[NetSkyBlue]

Buying only in-season fruits and vegetables will go a long way towards saving money. $7 for blueberries in January, when it's citrus fruit season isn't a good idea. Do you have the space/time/inclination to do some gardening? Or learn to can produce, so you can take advantage of the best sales and buy enough to last past the season?

[elessar78]

Do you guys find using coupons useful? I'm trying to be convinced into if sifting through them is actually worth the time and effort if we already look to save via sales and what not.

[Baby_nurse]

I'm a coupon lover. I stack my coupons with sales and have a small stockpile; about 3-6 months worth of items we use regularly.

[NetSkyBlue]

Do you guys find using coupons useful? I'm trying to be convinced into if sifting through them is actually worth the time and effort if we already look to save via sales and what not.

I use them, but don't often find a lot that I would like to use. Things like makeup, razor blades, toilet paper, cat food, etc, I do sometimes find. More often, I get useful coupons at Target, that print out at the register (based on what you buy?).

[disneysteve]

Buying only in-season fruits and vegetables will go a long way towards saving money. $7 for blueberries in January, when it's citrus fruit season isn't a good idea.

I avoid the out of season fruit not because of the cost but because they taste lousy. Nothing worse than tasteless blueberries. I'd rather have none.

Do you guys find using coupons useful?

Somewhat. Most coupons are for national brands of processed foods, stuff we don't buy a whole lot of. Also, more and more coupons require you to buy multiple packages of the item - 3 boxes of crackers, 2 bottles of mustard, etc. It isn't worth using the coupon if we have to buy more product than we need. So I do use some but very few. In a typical Sunday paper insert, I might get 1 or 2 coupons for products we actually use. I'd save more money if I stopped getting the paper.