If it seems as though you never have enough money to consistently save some of it for emergencies—consistent, regular deposits out of every paycheck that go straight into a savings account—perhaps it’s time to consider that you’re handing over your savings to restaurants, drive-thrus, diners, and coffee shops. Think about it.
No matter your lifestyle, I am confident that with the right strategies, you really can reduce the amount of money you’re spending on food.
More Time Than Money
If yours is a single-income household struggling to survive in a two-income world, keeping food on the table and the bills paid can be quite a challenge. The good news is that time is on your side. The one not working outside the home has the time to plan, track sales, and cook in order to keep household food costs at rock bottom without sacrificing quality.Multiple stores: All grocery stores and supermarkets have tremendous weekly sales. And they announce these details in their weekly flyers in print and online. Grab the sales from a number of stores.
Eat the sales: Buy only loss leaders and items that are on sale. You won’t starve, and you'll have a huge variety of food items to choose from—and in every department.
Little Time, Tight Budget
For dual-income families with kids, time becomes an especially valuable commodity. Kids are in school plus all of their extracurricular activities. Then there’s church and weekends filled with sports and just playing catch-up to get ready for the next week. You don’t have time to visit every store to take advantage of a variety of sales.Pick a store: Your best bet is to identify the grocery store or supermarket in your area that is known for having the lowest everyday prices, then stick with it.
Get creative: Plan menus around what’s on sale in that store each week.
Picky Eater, Dietary Restrictions
You have the time and the skills to cook at home. The problem is making meals that actually taste good given the long list of ingredients your picky eaters will not touch. Or you need to produce menus and dishes that match someone’s dietary restrictions, otherwise known as “doctor’s orders.”
eMeals.com: This meal-planning site offers variety and flexibility, allowing you to pick the recipes that best fit your needs that week. eMeals.com can’t go so far as to cook dinner for you, but it gives you a plan and creates a shopping list so you can shop yourself or skip the grocery store by sending your shopping list directly to Amazon, Walmart, Kroger, Instacart, or Shipt. Then you choose pickup or delivery.
More Money Than Time
Young professional DINKS (dual income no kids) often, for whatever reason—insane work schedule, enrolled in graduate school and working full-time, crazy commute, you name it—do not have time, much less the desire, to shop for groceries beyond running in to pick up a six-pack of Red Bull and chips. And they’re the first to admit they lack the basic skills to prepare it if they had the time to shop for it.Because they see themselves as having more money than time, DINKS routinely default to the most expensive eating style of all—restaurants, fast food, diners, and drive-thrus—and not because going out again for the 12th time this week is particularly enjoyable. It’s a necessary burden to avoid starvation.
Home Chef: Home Chef is not for every lifestyle. But for a family of two adults with, say, two kids, this is the only meal delivery service I would consider. It is neither expensive nor unreasonable, and that is saying a lot coming from your humble columnist who loves to cook, has time to cook, and lives within one mile of Costco.
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