For the fact that we live one
of the things we cannot stop doing is eating, that is why the total amount of
money in every home is more than 70% and never stop, because no one can survive
without feeding. That is why making a good budget for food and food related
stuffs is necessary. it's true that
money spent on food budget every
year in every home is huge but to know how to do it right is one of the best thing to discover in life. the following
are ways to conquer food budget.
One of the things that take
some getting used to as a senior citizen is living on a fixed income. And even
if you have a healthy retirement, investments, a 401K plan and Social
Security benefits, when you stop
working, your income comes out of that nest egg which is a diminishing
bucket of funds. So anything you can do to protect your money and economize
means your money will last longer, be there for you when you have an emergency or be available for fun
things which is what retirement is all about.
·
If you are able to continue to prepare your own food, you
are already well ahead of the game because one big expense for any budget is
the food budget. And if you are buying food
for a spouse, older children still at home or you are helping to raise the
grandkids, you can see a food budget that can get out of control. So it pays to come up with some tips for how
to slash that food budget but do so in away that does not hurt the quality of
food you eat or feed your family.
·
Economy begins at home and continues at home and end at
home as well. So you can do a lot before you even go to the grocery store by
learning to use everything you buy. An
investment in some quality storage units
so you can keep leftovers fresh or keep fresh vegetables or fruits on hand will
help you eat everything you buy and cut
down on waste. In fact, if you like to
garden, you can even take the organic
waste such as coffee grounds and apple cores and make your own compost
which can go into your garden to grow
your own food next spring.
·
But the key to saving money at the grocery store is to be
a smart shopper. Remember that grocery
stores stock lots of items that are made
to appeal to people who want convenience over low prices. So you can save a lot of money by avoiding
fast foods, frozen foods or “TV dinners” and buying the ingredients to make
your own meals every day.
·
Being a smart shopper also means knowing when and where
to shop and how to find the good values in
food and grocery supplies at the store.
Some core principles of smart shopping are…
1.) If You Can Buy
In Bulk – do it. Most items are cheaper at
the unit cost level if you buy larger quantities. So if you can buy and store more food at
once, you can take advantage of those savings.
When you buy in large the seller will be pleased to give you a price
skip because you have shown a great interest on what he has to offer.
2.) Avoid Impulse
Purchases. Stores carefully place items that
are appealing so you will buy higher priced items. Work from a list and stick to your list. You
must not be fooled by seductive advertisement and confusing adverts of products, you need to
know what you want and stick to it with determination, this is because we are in the world of extorting(the
act of getting things from someone in a tricky way), most adverts today will only promise what they
will not do, though not all of them are like this but many of them are like this, what you need to do that saves
the situation is to have your 'map of purchase' with you and never go out of it direction.
3.) Slice
Your Own Cheese. Pre-sliced
cheese comes at a higher price. Buy a
good cheese knife and buy cheese in blocks and slice it yourself. In fact slicing
your cheese yourself rather than buying pre- sliced cheese by yourself is a way
of having a fun time while preparing your dishes. Consider doing it yourself
will save you more cash because if you even do it by yourself you will able to
cut it to your size taste .i.e. how small or big you want it to be.
4.) Buy Fresh
Produce. Fresh foods are not only better
for you, they are cheaper. Just as you can
never compare early morning weather (which is always cool, calm, serene,
soothing and lovely) with afternoon weather that is hot, so also you cannot
compare fresh food stuffs with other ones (dried or preserved), because it's at it raw(new), at
this time it's fresh with fresh nutrients, minerals, natural content and natural taste at its best, that is why you
should consider buying fresh food, even apart from been a means of saving money.
5.) Know Your Town. Each grocery store has certain categories
they do best at outselling the others.
Know what stores are good with produce, with meat and with everyday
savings and create your shopping lists accordingly. You need to know this
because you will also be able to save some bucks on every spending you will
make, that is why you need to do so.
6.) Know Your Store. Each week,
your store marks down certain items in preparation for the weekend. Routinely they will slash the prices of fresh
meat to get rid of last week’s supply in preparation for the higher priced
specials for this week. If you know when that stuff hits the shelves, you can
score big savings and freeze what you buy to use over the next few weeks.
• Know your items. Learn
your price points of what is a good price for each item on your list. Try to buy under those price points so your
budget is controlled.
• Buy store brands.
• Use coupons.
• Leave the grandkids home.
Children will add dozens of items to your shopping cart and slow you
down. Leave them out of the picture and
you won’t have to buy their impulse items and the trip will go faster too.
By being a smart shopper, you
can stretch your food budget and see an impressive savings on what you spend on
groceries. And that helps you stretch
your retirement savings which means a longer more prosperous retirement and one
that is more worry free as well. And
that is worth the extra effort.
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