Breaking the Budget Grocery Shopping - Whee!
Yes, indeed, the grocery budget is taking a beating with the ever-increasing prices on staples here. But that’s not what this post is about. Yesterday when I shopped I totally broke the grocery budget, and it wasn’t solely because of rising prices. I found a clearance sale I could not refuse and spent about $50.00 I wasn’t planning on taking advantage of it. I’ll recoup that (and more) but it will take months for that to happen. But I was so excited once I got home I reconsidered leaving some behind and went back to clean Kroger’s out…
So, that first. My spouse eats these high protein/low carb snack bars as part of his diet. Depending on his mood and how many snacks he eats a day, he goes through anywhere from 5-8 of these a week. Last night at Kroger (not where I usually buy these, Walmart has them in bulk much cheaper) I came across a “Manager’s Special” on the individually sold ones of these bars for $0.50 each (usually $1.59 each). They might be discontinuing them, I don’t know, but the bulk boxes of 5 at Walmart are $4.77 so this is a substantial savings over my usual price, almost half in fact. I checked the expiration date and they don’t expire until October… so I bought about 60 of them.
So that was $30 I wasn’t planning on spending right then. And the poor cashier had to ring each individually because apparently at Kroger they have to punch in some code first for Manager’s Specials… I felt bad a little bit. But not really. Then, when I got home, I thought more about it, and went back to get the rest. So I bought close to 40 more (with a different cashier, who honestly looked like he was going to cry) and in total, spent about $50.00 I was completely not planning to. But I feel good about it. May’s grocery budget however - completely blown.
I spent $144.31, exactly $51.00 on Balance bars of some sort, and the rest on everything else. Which means I spent $93.31 on everything else, a little over $1 under my $95 budget. My son has to bring snack this week to school, so my budget was $95 not $85. So, I didn’t do badly. And I have a LOT of balance bars for my spouse - months worth.
The other interesting thing about groceries this week - I had my meatless chicken nuggets, which were on sale for $2.50, ring up at the regular price of $4.09 at Kroger. Kroger has a scan-right guarantee that if something rings up incorrectly, they give you the item free (or refund the purchase price if you notice afterwards, which I did). So I got $4.09 refunded (I brought the receipt in when I went back for the rest of the Balance bars). So, actually, I spent $140.22. :)
An expensive but a great week! I like when I can take advantage of deals on things. That’s one of the great benefits of being more in control of our finances now - I can figure this out and absorb it into our budget and be okay. Oh, and my spouse says they are in “outdated” packaging and that is why they were marked down he thinks, the Balance bars have new packaging now that looks different. Or something. Whatever, they were very cheap. 
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May 11th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Wow! 50 cent balance bars is an awesome deal. I will have to snepoke around looking for if they really are being discontinued and I can find them cheap! Yum!
May 11th, 2008 at 6:51 pm
I check my receipts constantly because you never know when you’ll get overcharged. I took advantage of Kroger’s policy a couple days ago when I got charged $4.29 for blueberries when the sign said $3.49. I had gone through self-checkout and noticed I got overcharged immediately. Brought the receipt right to customer service and got $4.29 back! Nothing like free blueberries!!
May 11th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
That is an awesome deal! But do you worry about your DH getting sick of them? Should you stash some of them somewhere so he doesn’t realize how many he needs to get through? lol
The 50-too-much grocery thing happened to me too last month. I assumed you had the same issue I did, but I was wrong. In my case, it was because I stopped shopping at the regular supermarkets and started shopping at the Aldi-type places, which don’t have things the regular supermarket has, like socks, or pens, or art paper (required for kids for school), or bird feed or brand name ketchup or decent feminine hygiene products. So when I finally went there after about six weeks, I went a bit wild. I don’t think any money was “wasted”, but the total bill definitely freaked me out, lol.
I am trying to find a good balance between the “Aldi” type place and the regular supermarket, I’m currently trying 2 “Aldi” type weeks and one “supermarket” week and one “whoops I never made it to the supermarket today” week. Of course sometimes my kids say I need X, yesterday, and that messes things up, but I’m working on it. I don’t track my budget as closely as you do though, and I don’t want to, I just know what amount per month I can’t go over.
May 11th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Great deal on the balance bars!
I need to pay better attention to my receipt, because I’m usre some things have slipped by me.
May 11th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
See my spouse… he never gets sick of things. He is extremely picky but once he likes something he likes it whenever all the time.
And it is actually three different flavors, just a whole bunch of each of them. 
I do usually watch my receipt as they ring things up, but all the Balance bars were totally distracting me so i didn’t notice the mistake til I got home.
May 11th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
I love Balance Bars… been eating them for years and am not sick of them. That’s a great deal on them. I assume that you have some float or savings that can absorb the overage for the next few months. My spending plan has many items that are listed as what I tend to spend on average rather than what I always spend, so I know if there’s a good deal on something that I need or was going to buy anyway, I can still cover it. This is almost like giving myself a short term loan.
May 11th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
What a great deal! I love finding those, too.
When you do something like this, do you adjust your budget in the future (e.g. take $5/off per week for 10 weeks)? When I’ve taken advantage of great deals before, I’ve not always adjusted my budget in later weeks, and it always gets me later.
May 11th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
@ Shana - I plan to take $5 out of my budget every week for 20 weeks - the bars should last 20 weeks and I used to spend $5 a week on them. This is my theory. I am hoping it works! With food prices continually on the rise though, I don’t know if it will bear out.
May 12th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
You might want to freeze at least some of the bars. I have wasted too much money in the past when I bought a bunch of such bars and then stopped eating them for one reason or another. Freezing would probably halt most decay.
May 12th, 2008 at 7:48 pm
haha, sounds like a great deal for you but not the cashier!
It’s always the best feeling to grab deals like that