Grocery Madness
First off, I am going to state up front that this week I needed to buy a special CFL bulb to fit in a weird fixture we have. This CFL bulb set us back $7.44 plus tax, so the madness that is our failed grocery budget is not completely the fault of food. It is still madness though.
Anyhow, on to the insanity. I spent $92.52 this week, $55.55 at Aldi and $36.97 at Walmart. My normal budget is $75/week, but we’ve made some extra purchases of sale items at Dollar General and Kroger this month, so really, my budget for this week was supposed to be around $65. Ha. I was just hoping to stick to $75 but that didn’t happen either. Ah well. I think I will start saying to myself “This is money that could go to debt reduction” every time I go shopping ;).
However, I really didn’t stray that far from our list. A little bit, but not overly. I just put too much stuff on the list I guess. Random and assorted impulse items were:
~Caesar salad in a bag marked down for quick sale $0.69
~the eternally tempting herbal iced tea $0.98 (note to self, stop shopping hungry, walmart had craptasic free samples this week. I can’t eat maxi pads.)
~Doritos. They looked really cool in the bag, they are two flavor chips in one bag! They are for my spouse. He was happy. Marital harmony and all that 
$2.50
So $4.17 total. Only 4.5% of my total spending. So *that* aspect is not too bad. I can’t tell if the Doritos were taxable or not, factoring in the tax on the iced tea adds $0.05 to that total.
For the new readers to the blog, I have a little pact with myself. When I spend money frivolously (cash or debit, I don’t use the credit card anymore), I then pay my credit card an amount equal to the frivolous amount. Another meaning to the “paid twice” aspect of my blog name. With the groceries, I look at the impulse items and determine if they fit into the overall scheme of our week’s shopping or not, and then snowflake the “not”. The caesar salad became lunch for me today, and it was one of the least expensive lunches I could have, so it passes. The doritos were for the spouse and I would have gotten him generic ones anyway if not for the lure of the cool two flavor in one bag name brand. These were on sale but still about $1.00 more than generic. And the iced tea was just me not being able to resist it. So $0.98 plus tax. I’ll just call it $2.00 even for the both of them. Capital One will be getting a $2 payment tomorrow morning (I can only pay once every 24 hours and I paid the big amount last night).
Seriously, I only have around $85 left in my grocery budget for the remainder of the month and there are still two shopping weekends left….. now it is just a question of how much I’ll end up going over. Ugh. I’m starting to believe $75/week was hopelessly unrealistic. I think last month I managed it by using up a whole lot of my pantry stockpile, and having my parents visiting the first week of July (they took us out to eat a lot). I’ll just have to reevaluate again at the end of August.
~J
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August 12th, 2007 at 11:19 am
I’m going to try the ‘gift card’ method of grocery budgeting. I’m going to buy a gift-card in the amount of my weekly budget, and then when I do groceries, take nothing with me but that card. Then I CAN’T overspend. I’ve read about people doing that quite successfully, but I’ve not tried it yet. We’ll see how it works!
August 12th, 2007 at 11:23 am
Good luck! That sounds like a great plan!
I don’t think I am to that point yet, because I haven’t quite figured out what is actually realistic spending for our family of 4. There is probably a little more I can cut but some things you need. Like toilet paper. lol
So we’ll see. The tracking and reporting has really cut down my frivolous spending though. I think the first week I tracked this closely the impulse % was somewhere in the high 20s. Oops! Heh.
August 12th, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Hey! Found you through blogging away debt, and I just love your blog! Your honesty and number-crunchiness make me smile!
Anyhow, I was going to tell you about www.grocerygame.com. I don’t use it anymore, but it’s using coupons and sales combined and the results, after a few weeks, are amazing. Your grocery budget goes up a little at the beginning, just because your stockpile is growing, but after that, $75 a week would be far more than you need. I’m not sure if you’d tried it before, or if it’s even available in your area, but it’s such fun, and the deals are amazing.
Anyhow, thanks for your writing! Love it!
August 12th, 2007 at 2:44 pm
I have heard of the grocery game but I have never checked it out. I am wary of stuff I have to pay to join. lol. I looked and they have one store listed in my area. I might check it out since you can cancel any time and see what it could do for me.
Thanks!
August 12th, 2007 at 7:30 pm
I don’t use the grocerygame.com, but I do something along the same thing. I check the weekly sale ads. If something is on sale that I know we are going to us (ie: ground chuck at .99/lb) I’ll buy as much as I have room for (we have an upright freezer)and can afford that week without going over grocery budget. Sometimes, if I’m under budget, I”ll put that little bit aside for loss leaders.
To be honest though, since I started playing that game, it seems like the stores have wised up and are not offering things that I would use. (oh yeah, they can read my mind LOL). Most of the loss leaders have been pre-packed food that I wouldn’t normally buy, so I’ve been unable to stock up.
I’m hoping with cooler weather coming, the stores will start offering good meat items for sale again. Seems like during the summer, the LL are fruit and beef ribs.
August 12th, 2007 at 7:42 pm
I do do that. At least, for the store that is almost across the street from us here. I look at their circular and get random things I need there if they have a good price.
Which is why I have almost 30 2-liters of Diet Mountain Dew in my garage. The spouse, he drinks 2 a week at work. Heh. I stocked up when they went on sale for $1 each. Which is how I ended up with ice cream… well, it was only $1 too. I still came out way ahead. lol
The beef on special was 70/30 though and I don’t buy that stuff. Ah well. Was real cheap though.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
It sounds like you’re at least trying to stay within the $75 budget…even if you’re not totally reaching the goal, think about how much you are saving by trying to reach that goal…
August 13th, 2007 at 12:22 pm
True true. I do remind myself of that. I was just hoping to be closer to budget this month than I ultimately am
August 14th, 2007 at 10:38 pm
I use the Grocery Game too. I was wary at first, but it’s only $1 for 4 weeks. And you can cancel if you don’t like it (for some people it just doesn’t work well for them). I’ve used it in 2 states now, and it’s worked great for us. I could check the fliers, walk the aisles of the stores looking for the unadvertised deals and compare coupons, but I have 3 kids. The grocery game is a huge time(sanity) saver. I have friends who do all the couponing work on their own (and it can be done) but I know they miss out on unadvertised deals, or have to make multiple trips to the same store because they learn about a good sale after they shop. I get it done in one trip. I don’t mean to sound like an ad, but it’s truly a good company and well run program.
But if you are interested in doing it yourself, there are TONS of websites and forums to help you do it (and they are free). One I visit is hotcouponworld (especially to learn how to get cheap Pampers at Target).