Feeding yourself and your family is the most important thing you must do. Without food, we won’t survive. But at the same time if you don’t have the money you won’t have the ability to buy the food you need. When you are careful with your supermarket shopping, you can get more for your money. You’ll find that you have enough food to feed your family (and you might even have something left over to give to your kids to help them learn about money).
If you are careful, you will find that you can buy extras to help you get by. Here are a few tips to help you to be able to put food on the table when things might be tough, or you are expecting a rough time ahead.
Shop With Coupons
Although couponing is not as popular in the UK as it is in the US, it is still a thing to do. You can get some of your shopping cheaper, if not free. If you are a savvy shopper, you can also use coupons on products that are on offer to get them even cheaper.
If you have a baby, you can usually get coupons from places like Emma’s Diary or Pampers. Whereas if you use hygiene products you can get coupons from websites like Always or Tena. Some newspapers have coupons that you can use in the supermarket and MacDonalds always have coupons in the Metro newspaper for a cheap meal out.
Use Shopping Apps
You can get some great shopping apps to help you with the cost of shopping. Apps like Shopmium get you to buy products to try out and then you get either a partial or full refund. This is paid back to your PayPal account. So next time you go shopping download apps that will help you get free or heavily discounted product.
Some apps also have shopping vouchers or coupons. You just open your phone and scan it at the till to save some money.
Yellow Sticker Shopping And Clearance Shelves
Yellow sticker shopping is very popular. It is the food that would be wasted at the end of the day and you can buy it for as cheap as 90% discount. To get the cheapest yellow sticker foods, you need to shop about 7pm. Then the food is greatly reduced. Some supermarkets sell bread for 10p a loaf, and you can easily freeze it. You can buy yellow sticker foods earlier in the day, but it is reduced less in price.
Clearance shelves are usually an area in the shop where you can buy discontinued products. The shops want to get rid of them fast and they reduce them greatly in price, but they still have a long expiration date on them.
Loyalty Cards
Sign up for as many loyalty cards as you can, because they all offer freebies and discounts for the shops. But do not worry about having to carry the cards around, because you can add them to your mobile phone. Then you always know where they are and will never forget them.
All loyalty cards are different, some offer discounts around the store for people using a loyalty card. Whilst some offer vouchers for you to go shopping with. You can save up your ‘points’ and do a big shop or spend them as you go. They are usually free to have, but if you end up buying a loyalty card, you get that money back when you buy shopping for the first time.
Buy Products In Bulk
It has always been known that it is cheaper to buy a bigger product than a smaller product. But it is also cheaper to buy larger quantities of food than it is to buy smaller quantities. Look out for 3 for 2 product offers. Or look for buy one get one free. If you see these offers, then stock up as you will save some money.
Many people also shop at wholesalers like Costco, where you can buy 12 of the same product at a cut price. But to become a member, you need to own a business. You end up paying more up front but will save money in the long run. You just need to make sure that the products have a long date on them, if you are buying them in bulk. You do not want it going bad before you eat it. It is not such a bargain then, is it?
Buying in bulk means you can manage to make a trip to the supermarket once or twice a month. This then cuts down on your spending because you always see other nice things that you want to buy and try. You do need to make sure that you have the space to keep the shopping though. It is no good buying in bulk and then putting it away and forgetting where it is.
Spending Money On Other Things
Cutting down costs at the supermarket, means that you can spend money elsewhere. Saving money whilst you shop, might mean that you can put money on the electric meter. We do live in sad times where people are choosing between eating and keeping warm. But hopefully these creative supermarket shopping tips to save money will help you.
