We’re kicking off the year with an 8-week Cut Your Grocery Bill Challenge. I’ll be sharing a weekly post here every Thursday with a task or challenge for you to complete/focus on to help you weak, improve, or overall your grocery budget.
My hope is that we can all work together to crowd-source new ideas and fresh inspiration to be more thoughtful and intentional in our grocery budgets + hopefully save some money and instill some practices and principles and habits that will continue to save us money throughout the rest of the year.
Last week, we talked about setting up a grocery budget. If you haven’t completed that challenge, be sure to read last week’s post and follow the directions. That’s the most important first step in cutting your grocery bill.
Week #2: Recognize Your Roadblocks
This week, we’re going to talk about what might hold you back from success. I think it’s important to acknowledge those things that might make it difficult to succeed. Not so that we’re dwelling on the negatives or letting them be excuses, but so that we can not be surprised by potential roadblocks and can anticipate them and come up with creative solutions.
For instance, maybe you need to eat gluten-free, you have other allergies, you live out in the country, you don’t have a lot of time to invest in grocery shopping, you don’t have many stores that offer deals, etc.
Think through what might hold you back from succeeding. Be honest. What immediately jumps to your mind as pushback when you think of setting up a grocery budget. Why does it feel daunting or difficult?
My hope is that by assessing this ahead of time, it will make it much easier in the long run. Plus, I’m hopeful that by people being willing to share honestly their struggles and potential roadblocks in the comments on this post, others will be able to share ideas and encouragement if they are in a similar situation or have been in a similar situation. Let’s all encourage one another with ideas and inspiration!
I had two packages of sausage in the freezer that I’ve gotten recently in a great sale + an onion and some cabbage I’d gotten on sale. I chopped it and sauted it…
And it made for a yummy dinner this past week! You could also add potatoes or serve over rice, but I had neither, so I just made do with what I had — which is the name of the game around here!
This Week’s Grocery Shopping
I went to a different Kroger store this week than usual. I decided quickly that I wasn’t a fan of it. Not only did they not have as a great of a selection of markdowns, but they also didn’t have good signage. A number of the weekly digital deals weren’t marked with signs.
And then, when I got out to the car, I was thinking about how my total was more than I was expecting it to be. I started looking closely at my receipt and realized that multiple items were price-marked incorrectly. They had sale signs on them from last week’s deals… but the sales weren’t still running. So I paid full price or significantly more than I thought I was going to pay on 6 items due to this — which is why my total was higher than I thought.
That said, I’ve gotten so many great deals at Kroger over the years and it was partially my fault for not looking at the ad or paying closer attention and just trusting the signage. So I decided not to go back and ask for money back — because I had Kierstyn with me, I was already out to the car with all my groceries loaded in, and I needed to get home.
But let this be a good reminder of two things: 1) Not every shopping trip is an amazing experience. You win some, you lose some. But you’ll never win if you don’t try. 2) I should have checked the ads and checked the prices more carefully as they rang up today. I usually do, but I didn’t pay as close attention today.
If you’re interested, you can see my full grocery shopping trip video + all the prices I paid in the video here. (I totally spaced and forgot to get a picture with all of my groceries laid out!)
Our total was $86 for all the groceries in the video, so we are $14 under our $100 weekly grocery budget. I’ll roll the $14 over to next week.
Week #2 Project: Recognize Your Roadblocks & Share Them
Are you in for the Cut Your Grocery Bill Challenge? If so, I’d love for you to leave a comment and let me know what your roadblocks are when it comes to setting up and sticking with a grocery budget.
If you have a few minutes, I’d love for you to read through some of the other comments and reply with ideas, suggestions, or encouragement you have for some of the commentors who are struggling. Thank you, in advance, for helping to give others practical ideas for making the most of their situation!
