Getting Ready!

Okay the moment you all have been waiting for has finally arrived. I now tell you how I find the deals. This week there are tons of deals out there, it's just too bad I don't have enough in my budget or pantry to do them all. I will break down what deals I am doing this week store by store, but first we need to decide on a budget.

I try to stick within a $50-$75 dollar weekly grocery budget. Most of the time, I tend to stick to $50, but this week there are things I need to get that are not on sale. When calculating my costs per store, I tend to round up just to be on the safe side.

Now many have asked how do I plan my lists. Do I just buy things that are on sale only, or do I make a weekly menu and buy according to that. Well I do not make a weekly menu, I tend to buy things on sale and stock up on things that are really, really, cheap or free. At first this may seem hard for you to do, but as time goes by you will find your pantry full of things that when you feel a whim to cook something new, you already have the ingredients. The method I use is great for stock piling for food storage. Right now I have enough canned tomatoes to last my family at least 6 months!

As you get going, you will notice that certain foods during certain times of the year are on sale weekly and you always have coupons for them. An example for this is canned soup. Last Sunday I got my first Progresso canned soup coupon. And this week at all the major grocery stores close by, that soup is on sale. During the fall and winter months I tend to stock pile on soup. Rob loves to take the soup to work and I usually can get it for just pennies a can. Whenever a product starts going on sale frequently, then that is usually the time to start to stock pile up for the times when the price rises again. I find this very true around the holiday times. I tend to stock up on baking items and condensed soups since they are always on sale and I always find great coupons for them.

There are some foods that are almost weekly on sale. Cereal is a prime example. I can for the most, part buy my cereal for $1.50 a box or less weekly. I'm talking about name brand cereal too, not generic. This week at Kroger and Tom Thumb I can get cereal for under a $1.50 a box using their sales and coupons I have. Shortcuts and Cellfire also always have great cereal coupons you can use on top of the regular coupons you have.

Produce takes some time to figure out what is a good deal and what is not. There are stores that I tend to like their produce better than others. Albertsons is a store, for my opinion, that tends to have decent produce; while Wallymart I think does not. I try to buy produce that is in season. If it's in season, then the cheaper it will be. As you continue to shop different stores, in time you will know what prices your celery, garlic, carrots, etc are at each store. So when you need more celery you will know which store has cheaper celery or fresher celery, which ever you prefer.

The same can be said about buying produce that is locally grown. Farmer's markets can have good deals on fresh, locally grown produce. With farmer's markets, you always know that what they have is in season. Now with farmer's markets you need to do some research and make sure the produce comes straight from local farmers and not from other farmer's markets farther away. If it comes straight from the farm to the market, then the cheaper it tends to be. Spring, Summer, and even Fall are great times in my region to take advantage of farmer's markets.

Now there are some things that are basics to have in any pantry, but usually it is hard to find coupons for these items. For those, I tend to buy in bulk. Examples are eggs, cheese, butter, bottled water. In another post I will get more in depth about buying in bulk.

When going grocery shopping I try to make an individual list for each store with what I want to buy and what coupons goes with which items. I also have the final price I expect to pay on the list too. I stick the coupons with the list, fold it up, and put it in my coupon sorter. When I check out at the stores, it is very important to pay attention to the prices as it is being scanned. If you have any questions on something, don't be afraid to speak up. Usually the checker is nice and will tell you if the discount is taken off at the end or not. If you think a mistake is made, then politely ask her to check it out. After you pay, check your receipt to make sure it all looks to be in order. If something was charged too much or discounts not taken off, then double check to make sure the mistake was not on your end. If a mistake was made by them, go to the customer service and have them look at it. For the most part, very seldom are there problems that I had to go to the customer service and have something fixed, but you never know when that time may come so it pays to check your receipt.

Now when looking at your fliers, read the fine print. Make sure you buy the items on sale at the right stores or on the right days for the sale. Especially read the fine print on any sale that has you buying 4,8,or10 items and get a certain amount off your final price. There tends to be a limit on how many items you can buy. For example at Tom Thumb this week, if you buy 4 specially marked cereals or fruit snacks, then you will get $4 dollars off your bill. Now in the fine print, it tells you which cereal and snacks, what sizes, when the sale starts and ends, and the limit to how many items you can buy on this sale. Which for this sale is a limit of 20 items. Some sales want a minimum purchase before you can get that item at the sale price listed. Tom Thumb coupons tend to have a $10 minimum purchase in order to get that sales price. Like this week, they have Mr. Clean cleaning supplies on sale for $2.49. Now if you read the coupon, there is a limit of 2 items at this price and before you get that price, you need to purchase $10 in goods. Some people may think it's hard to reach the $10 minimum, but it actually is not if you are buying other things at the store. The item on the sale also can be applied towards that $10 minimum. This week I have no problems hitting the minimum since I'm buying cereal, milk, bread, and a couple of other things. Just to let you know, since that Mr.Clean coupon is a Tom Thumb coupon I can put my $1.50 coupon off of 1 on top of it, which will make me only pay $1!

Tomorrow I plan on going to my stores and buying my items. Hopefully in tomorrows post I can give you the ins and outs of how I figure out what I paid for those items. I plan on having visual aids to help you see what your receipts can look like.