13 ways to save money on groceries

I haven’t been to the grocery store in 3 weeks, which means I’ve been living off peanut butter and frozen pizzas the past week. We generally buy groceries every 2 weeks, but we were really busy last weekend and didn’t make it to the store. Grocery shopping isn’t on our list of favorite things to do either. I can think of a lot better ways to spend an hour. But unfortunately it’s necessary, and today is the day. Here are 13 ways to save money on groceries that can actually keep more money in your pocket!

1. Don’t shop when you’re hungry

Everyone has heard this by now. My wife and I have a horrible time sticking to this. It seems we always go in the mornings when we haven’t had breakfast. Then we wonder when we get home why we have so many pop tarts and boxes of cereal.

2. Check the Ads

Most stores will offer big sales in order to get you into their store. Identify the sale items you need, and take advantage. Just don’t get tricked into buying something you don’t need.

3. Make a List

Taking 10 minutes to write out a list before you go to a store can save you tons of money. How many times have you bought items that you already had at home? Or how many times have you been enticed by an item that you really didn’t need? Making a list ensures you buy only what you need, and nothing more. This also saves you from making multiple trips to the store to pick up things your forgot.

4. Take a Calculator

You should have only so much money budgeted for groceries per month. For my wife and I, it’s around $350 a month. This means you need to keep a close watch on what you spend. It’s very easy to spend more than you planned once you walk into the store. So keep up with all your costs on a calculator.

5. Make a Menu for the week

Decide what you want to eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner before you go. For us, its usually spaghetti, chicken quesidillas, tacos, cheeseburgers, and a meat and three one night. We pretty much have a routine and just switch up one or two meals a week.

6. Stretch your Menu

Plan your meals so you have leftovers. This always happens when you’re only feeding two. This means dinner one night, is usually lunch the next day.

7. Don’t waste food

This goes along with eating leftovers. Don’t waste food. We’re really bad about this. We throw away a lot. One study said the average family wastes 14% of the food it buys. That’s a lot of money over the course of a year.

8. Make use of coupons

This is another area we don’t do very good at. I’m sensing a theme. I read about lots of people that save lots of money by using coupons. The opportunity is there, you just have to be willing to put in the work. For more strategies, check out these tips to start saving money with coupons.

9. Shop Alone

I know alot of you moms are thinking, I wish. If you do your shopping alone you don’t have to worry about your kids or spouse leading you astray and convincing you to buy random items you don’t need.

10. Buy Local Produce

During the spring and summer take advantage of your local farmers. They often will have fresher produce, at cheaper prices. Or you could consider doing it yourself. Grow your own garden, and sell or give away what you’re not able to keep.

11. Compare Stores

Look at prices between stores. We usually find ourselves shopping at Walmart, and I believe them to be generally cheaper on most things. But there’s other stores that you can buy items cheaper at such as Aldi or SaveALot.

12. Look Down

When doing your shopping, pay attention to the items closer to the floor. The cheaper items are usually lower, while the pricier items are at eye level.

13. Buy in Bulk

If there’s non-perishable items on your list that you’re buying every week, consider buying that item in bulk. By buying in bulk you’ll save money that would otherwise be spent on packaging and advertising. Some of the items to consider buying in bulk might be peanut butter, canned goods, and ketchup.

Credits: Christian Science Monitor

How much do you really save by air-drying your clothes?

When I was growing up, my mother always hung clothes out to dry, sometimes even in the winter. Where I currently live, there’s not really a place to install a clothesline that would catch any wind at all (I could put one at the edge of our property where it would catch a little wind, but this would really disrupt the open area our children use to play). A clothesline is one thing I definitely wish to have when we eventually move to the country.

So I sometimes use an alternative solution. I simply hang up a clothesline from our laundry room over to the guest bedroom, taking up part of the hallway in our basement. On that line, I can hang quite a few clothes without a problem. It takes most of a day to air dry them – this is aided on windy days when I can open all of the windows and doors in the basement to help the process.

Given the time that this takes compared to just tossing the clothes into the dryer, is it really worth my time? Let’s run the numbers a bit to find out.

The “Saving Electricity” website reports that the average dryer uses 3.3 kilowatt hours of energy and estimates an average of 11 cents per kilowatt hour. A small load of clothes takes about 45 minutes in the dryer, so the cost of that load is $0.36.

When I hang up my own line, I can hang up about three small loads of clothes at once on it. This is on average – I can do a bit more if it’s mostly my clothes and a bit less if it’s mostly kid’s clothes, but the three loads per line is a good calculation. That means that filling up the line and letting it air dry saves about $1.08.

Is it worth it? The real question comes from how long it takes me to do it. I can string up the line in about fifteen seconds, and I can hang a load’s worth of clothes in about two minutes or so – it’s really not that hard. I probably spend another fifteen seconds opening up doors and windows to maximize air drying, so the total extra time investment for that $1.08 is about six and a half minutes.

This means that if I repeated this exercise about nine times, I’d end up devoting about an hour to hanging up laundry and I’d save $9.96. As always, that’s $10 an hour after taxes – you don’t have to take income tax out of those “earnings.”

There are a couple other factors worth considering here.

Dryer sheets

If you’re hanging up the clothes, you’re not using dryer sheets. I usually use a quarter cup of vinegar in the rinse cycle as our laundry softener, so this isn’t really a concern for us, but if you use dryer sheets, you’ll either be abandoning them (a savings) or switching to something else. I encourage you to try vinegar – it seems to soften really well and doesn’t add any smell to the clothes.

The environment

Anything that cuts down on home energy use is a good thing and dryers certainly suck down the juice. Of course, if you’re opening windows for the purpose of air flow, you might also be doing this to help you keep the air conditioning off, which is another big environmental (and financial) boon. We try to resist using our air conditioner except during the day on particularly hot days, so opening the windows here is a natural thing to encourage air flow.

To put it simply, hanging up laundry is a decent but not world-beating saver. It’s worth doing particularly if you have environmental concerns for doing so, but other factors can easily trump it (like air conditioning, for instance). I, for one, like the smell of air-dried clothes quite a lot and it’s a good, repetitive activity that lets my mind wander in creative directions while doing it, so I think I’ll continue to hang laundry on a fairly regular basis.

Credits: Husna Haq, Christian Science Monitor

Ten ways to a simple life and better money

Simplifying life is not always an easy task. While we have a lot of different technologies and conveniences that can help us simplify life, sometimes these things ultimately overwhelm us.

There has been a lot of talk in the blogosphere about how to automate or un-automate everyday tasks, so I thought I’d touch on these concepts and show how they can be beneficial in certain circumstances.

In a financial context, simplifying life can be a means to saving and making money. But how? In what ways can we simplify to lead more efficient financial lives? Let’s start with ways we can save some money.

Simplify Your Life to Save Money

Lifestyle design is a huge part of the process of saving money. Everything from the houses we choose to the electricity we use has an effect on our financial picture. For those of us who were not born rich or married someone who was rich, saving money early in our lives is of vital importance.

Here are some ways we can simplify our lives to save money:

Pay bills electronically. Why waste money on stamps? Paying bills online can also simplify your workload and save you valuable time.

Get rid of those pesky credit cards. Besides all the interest you’ll be saving, you won’t have to worry about another bill to pay! The fewer bills you have to pay the better. Also, the less margin for error you have! Credit cards can really eat away your time, money, and sanity.

Move down in house! Got extra room that really isn’t needed? Maybe it’s time to do a little minimalist living and simplify your living quarters to save some money on your payments. You’ll also probably save money on utilities by doing so.

Make simple meals at home. Buying groceries that you can use to make simple meals at home will save you lots of money. Families spend way too much money when they eat out all of the time. Enjoy a simple meal at home and save some cash!

Combine entertainment options. If you’re subscribed to cable, try canceling it for some time! Use your internet connection instead to watch movies and TV shows online!

There are many more ways to save money through simplification. It just takes a few moments of thought and a hint of sacrifice!

Simplify Your Life to Make Money

Making money isn’t always easy. Too many of us have bought into the lie that we must complicate our lives in order to make more money! On the contrary, you can simplify everything and end up making more money than you ever thought possible.

Here are some ways we can simply our lives to make money:

Get rid of non-essential things. Many of us have junk laying around that is worth something to someone. Sell it on Ebay or Craigslist. Have a garage sale. Maybe you have an old car that is sitting in your back lot that needs to be scrapped for parts (or even donated to charity). You get the idea! Non-essentials can really weigh us down and can be turned into cash.

Focus on the 20% of your clients that are providing 80% of your income. This concept helps simplify your business model while freeing up time to find other valuable clients. If you’re an owner of a small business, think about how this might improve your income.

Turn your hobby into your dream job. Taking what you love doing and turning it into work can be one of the most rewarding endeavors. Dare to dream. You can take your work to a whole new level and make more money at the same time.

Clean your workspace to be more efficient. I don’t know about you, but I often have clutter on my desk. I’ve found that by taking this clutter and organizing it, I became a more productive person! Trust me, organize your workspace and you’ll make more money through productivity.

Don’t juggle everything at once. If you have a large project that you’re working on, try to break it up into smaller parts and focus on one part at a time. This focus will enable you to get more done in a short amount of time. Increasing your productivity in this fashion will help improve your income.

What are some ways you can simplify your life to make money? What has worked for you before?

Last Thoughts

There is something to be said for un-automating certain areas of your life. In other words, becoming more intimate with your financial situation can prove beneficial. However, I believe that automating as much as possible produces a better lifestyle for those who adhere to good principles. If you’re just starting out in your pursuit to improve your finances, you may want to think about un-automating everything to ensure you understand how money works in specific circumstances.

After you have simplified your life and work, you’ll soon find that your bank account is much healthier than before. What do you do with all this money? You need a financial turnaround. Pay down your debt, save for rainy days, invest, and give! You’ll be there soon. Simplify today!

Credits: John Frainee, Christian Science Monitor