Every week Really Simple Money brings you 10 great money-saving tips. Today, we focus on how to cut your grocery bills when you do your weekly supermarket shopping.
And don’t forget to keep sending us yours. We’ve already sent off one bottle of bubbles. Now it could be your turn! Catch our tips on Facebook.com/reallysimplemoney
Here are our saving tips to cut your grocery bills:
- The oldest supermarket trick is to place products at eye level because eye-level is buy level. The products that stare out at your face will be more expensive than alternatives placed at your feet. Food companies pay supermarkets to have their products placed at eye level. Always look down for cheaper alternatives. It will save you money.
- Avoid buying pre-chopped produce – they cost more. It is far more economical to buy carrots and celery and chop them up yourself.
- Always use unit pricing to compare value for money. Check the unit price for 100 grams and choose the cheaper option.
- Avoid products with a celebrity face on the package. An alternative product will be cheaper as the food company does not have to pay royalties to the celebrity.
- Some supermarkets sell blemished fruit and vegetables at a discount – head for that aisle. A few blemishes may make the fruit look uglier but they still taste delicious.
- Avoid individually packaged foods. The little bags of cheese and crackers may look for tempting for school lunch boxes, but you will get more for your money if you bought a full-sized bag and divided it up yourself.
- Shop alone, people who shop as a couple tend to put more things in the trolley.
- Why stick to branded washing powders, shower gels and cleaning products. You will make a big saving if you scale back and buy home brands instead. After all, many of the products are made at the same factories.
- Avoid big supermarkets if you need to top up a few things. You are better off in a small supermarket as you can slip in and out of the store without succumbing to temptation to stock up on more things.
- Last-minute temptations such as lollies and chocolates are located near the checkout counter to entice bored and tired shoppers – stay strong and don’t give in to an impulse buy.
Now here’s a few more of yours…
Ingrid Keegel: Pay an extra $10 a week on your mortgage and save thousands of dollars in interest.
Sarah Blair: If you normally run your car on standard unleaded petrol (91), keep track of how many kilometres you get to a tank and then see how many kilometres you can get on a tank of 95 or 98. You may find out that if you get extra kilometres, the price for the higher octane petrol works out lower per km. Plus, you get an added bonus of not having to fill up so often. This works for my Mazda, but didn’t work for my fiance’s Toyota, so it wont work for everybody … sorry.
Jhunette Lopez: Loving sites like Cash Rewards and Shopback where you get money back into your bank account by accessing the retailers from their site!
Graeme Otway: When going on holidays there are websites where you can swap houses for accommodation.
When cooking you can substitute items that are in your pantry or in your garden instead of buying more expensive items that are in the recipe, e.g. silverbeet instead of spinach. Get creative with flavours you already have.
Have a no meat night.
When you have to go drive anywhere make sure you have other things that are in that area to do and do it at the same time so you don’t have to go out again and waste time and petrol.
Only buy what you need.
Keep away from the pokies!
Don’t smoke!
Shop at Op shops or look in the free section on sites like Facebook.
Turn off the lights when not needed and appliances.
Join the library for free fun.