Easy Ways to Save Money on your Grocery Bill

The price of groceries has been steadily going up on just about everything. There are some easy ways though to help save you money on you and your family’s food expenses without giving up nutrition or flavor. These tips can save you anywhere from $50 – $100 or more each month.

Before going to the grocery store, make a list! It sounds simple, but many people forget to do so and either buy too much or forget key ingredients to their meals or sometimes even both. Make your list to include what you want to cook and eat for the week or even two weeks. Then start making a new list from the time you get back on staples that you are running out of and new meals you’d like to cook. Sticking to the list saves lots of money in the long run because you won’t be buying more than you need and your food won’t go bad.

Coupons are a very smart way to save money on groceries. Coupons come weekly in the newspaper and you can also find them online for free (you just have to print them out) from places like CouponSurfer.com, CouponMom.com, CoolSavings.com and many others. Coupons can save you anywhere from 25cents to over $10 on some products. There are also some stores that double or triple coupon savings if the coupon is fewer than 50 cents or $1.

Start buying the value priced or store brand foods. It is almost always cheaper to buy the store brand foods rather than the name brand food. Unless you have really good coupons, try out the value priced option and start saving anywhere from 50 cents to over $5 per item.

Don’t buy the prepackaged meals – cook the meal yourself! A 4 serving of frozen lasagna can cost $8+ but if you cook it yourself you can make 8+ servings of lasagna for that much money. Same goes for canned soup, pizzas, sandwiches, and many more. Start cooking your own meals and you’ll see the savings add up quickly!

Discount food stores offer the best values for grocery shopping around. ALDI for instance, sells a gallon of milk for under $1.50 in most places and loaves of bread for under $1. Their vegetables and fruit are also great quality and very reasonably priced. If you don’t want to shop here for everything, those staples alone will save you big money on your grocery bill.