[#1]

Being really nosey here!

What's your grocery budget for a week/month/however you calculate it? How many people are you feeding? What else is included (pet stuff, household, cleaning products)? Do you stick to one supermarket or do you shop around at different places? Where do you shop?

Feel free to answer any or all of my nosey questions 

[#2]

Being really nosey here!

What's your grocery budget for a week/month/however you calculate it? How many people are you feeding? What else is included (pet stuff, household, cleaning products)? Do you stick to one supermarket or do you shop around at different places? Where do you shop?

Feel free to answer any or all of my nosey questions 

[#3]

Ok here's mine. Background - before we got our act together we were spending £650 a month at the supermarket, eating out more than once a week and buying lunch every day, I also bought breakfast most days too on my way to work. When we were paying off our debts we had a budget of £90 a month, back in those happy days when food was really cheap! Now the budget is £180 for 6 months of the year and £200 for the other 6 months of the year.

On a £200 month I buy hay for the buns which costs £32. The £180 pays for all meals for two people and two rabbits. I'm at home, DH takes his lunch to work. We eat out maybe once a month that might come from this budget or we'll budget for from general cash. We mainly shop once a week at one supermarket, Booths. Every so often we'll go to one or more of the local bakery, greengrocer, Home Bargains, M&S, the Co-Op or Sainsburys. Once or twice a year I put an order in to an online shop for toiletries, I buy other pet stuff from the local indie pet shop. 

[#4]

Hi Sam,

we don't actually have one as such but after your post Oh and I were talking about it and decided we need to have something better in place than our current system. OH does most of the shopping and always manages to get great bargains.

Jillxx

[#5]

Average household spending per month for me is about £170 to £200. That is just catering for one but includes what I pay for pet food plus things like cleaning materials, toiletries  and allows for a medium glass of wine each night. I don't budget too closely these days. When family visit they stay for at least a couple of days so my bill can double or triple over that time. I try to stagger the extra cost by getting one or two items extra for the freezer/larder.

What is quite frightening is how much more expensive it can be living alone than living as a couple. Bargain large packs of veg for example are hopeless as it goes off before it can be used.

Other scary thing, when late H and I were first married our weekly housekeeping was £8. That was actually quite extravagant but we were both working full time  and quick  (more expensive) meals were needed if we were to eat before midnight.

hugs and muffins

Tabbs

"been there, done that , got the t-shirt!"

[#6]

Good news Jill, hope your new system works out for you. 

Ikwym about pack sizes of some things Tabbs. Most of the stuff in my freezer are little bits of things that we bought but the pack was too big. We often buy individual things or small packs but there are times where it's so expensive to do that we buy the bigger pack and put half, or more, into the freezer as we just wouldn't be able to eat everything in time otherwise. 

[#7]

We spend about £220 a month on food and household products; that's everything including toiletries.

There are two of us and we're both vegetarian, but what I save on not buying meat I spend on buying chemical free cleaning products, washing liquid , toothpaste and toiletries etc. After many years of being chemical free, we're both a bit alergic to anything else now, so we see this as one of our little luxuries.  Neither of us drink so there's no alcohol and we have no pets.

This necessitates a roughly monthly shop in the local healthfood store, and weekly, we buy fruit and veg form the market or the farm shop and top up with anything else form Sainsbury's.  We stick with Sainsbury's as I think of them as the less of the other evils plus itsmost convenient to us travel wise.  We  collect the loyalty points and when our microwave gave up the ghost recently we had enough points in the bag for a new one.

[#8]

x-Sam-x Well done for changing your lifestyle so successfully and for making such great savings.

I'm really interested to know what were the main sacrifices when you had to drop from £650 a month in the supermarket?  What we you buying that you don't buy anymore?

[#9]

Hi Maid,

I'd be interested to hear what cleaning products and toiletries you use if you don't mind sharing. We're not chemical free, my main thing is to buy things with no animal testing (can't really be a rabbit lover and buy stuff that's tested on them!). We use Bio D and Method products for round the house, oh and astonish oven cleaning paste *love*. We buy Faith in Nature toiletries as they don't test on animals and it's a British company. We buy "normal" toothpaste though, just from the co-op as it's BUAV and my dentist said it's the best type for my teeth. 

I forgot to say that we do go to the healthfood shop too but less than we used to as I get some things from Home Bargains now that save a bit of cash and our supermarket sells a good range of nuts, seeds etc. 

In terms of what changed when we cut the budget, pretty much everything. We stopped throwing food away which was a biggie. Stopped buying disposable things in the main - no foil, kitchen roll, tissues, clingfilm, facial wipes, cleaning wipes etc. Started cooking more from scratch rather thatn buying convenience and processed foods, jars of cooking sauces, ready made things, ice cream, biscuits and snacks, carbonated drinks etc. Now we do have a box of tissues for when we have guests, no-one wants to use a second hand hanky! And I generally have some kitchen roll for bunny purposes, but we only buy a couple of packs a year. 

Other than I had to learn to cook properly I don't see it really as being a sacrifice, I don't miss much, if any of the stuff we used to buy. We'd already slashed the budget when we gave up eating meat which saved us even more. DH started making his own museli mix and stuff like that. We don't buy cheap stuff in the main, our supermarket sells a lot of local produce and we like to buy that (we don't have a market) but because we're buying ingredients instead of food it saves a lot of money. 

[#10]

Hi

I spend around £40-45 pounds a week on shopping, there are 4 of us plus 1 cat. We are very frugal, DH and the boys eat meat sparingly, I am a veggie, we don't drink or smoke and I buy bargains for things like washing up and laundry, cruelty free wherever possible. I use Ecover a lot, although Asda's own washing up liquid is cruelty free and very good. My lads both work so sometimes will eat lunch before work or sometimes they will buy in town. I am trying to discourage this as bought lunches are so pricey.

We intend to use Asda after Xmas as Morrisons annoy me with their creeping price increases. But their £30 Xmas vouchers are too goo to refuse so we will use them u at Xmas and then will use Asda for our main shop. I use a steam cleaner round the house, this does away with the need for floor cleaners, window cleaners and wipes.  My oven is one of the new pyrolytic ones that cleans iteself (and it really does) so I never buy oven cleaner. I am never been one for wearing make-up or having lots of toiletries so I buy whatever is cheapest and animal friendly.

[#11]

Hi Bumfy,

Thanks for sharing.

DH and I were talking about it a little while ago and neither of us think we are frugal anymore so it's nice to hear from someone who is. We could save more money by buying own brand toiletries and switching supermarkets and things like that but at the moment I don't want to for various reasons. I think we're going to knock the budget down a little bit next year, we'll see.