The grocery budget causes a lot of financial stress, but it doesn't have to be a category you just cut! In this episode, I'm sharing my seven most actionable tips to help you stop overspending on groceries.

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

My favorite crock pot recipe book: https://amzn.to/4bSW9NQ

Printable Meal Planners: https://www.theexuberantelephant.com/printable-meal-planners

---

❇️ Join The Empowered Money Circle on Skool: https://www.theexuberantelephant.com/emc

🟪 FREE RESOURCES: https://www.theexuberantelephant.com/downloads

🟪 EVERYTHING PAGE: https://www.theexuberantelephant.com/everything

🟪 BLOG: https://www.theexuberantelephant.com/blog-home

➡️ Try YNAB for FREE for 34 days: https://theexuberantelephant.com/ynab (affiliate link)

---

DISCLOSURES

By using the affiliate links above, I may earn a small commission if you decide to purchase anything. Thank you for your support :-)

YNAB Disclosure: I am a YNAB Certified Budgeting Coach, which means that I have been trained to coach people on using YNAB software and the YNAB budgeting method. I have met select requirements of You Need a Budget LLC in order to receive this certification, which means that I have the ability to competently coach YNAB to others. I am not an employee of YNAB, and all non-YNAB related opinions and recommendations are my own. My views do not reflect the views of YNAB and its employees or affiliates.

today, we are diving into one spending area that causes a lot

of financial stress for the majority of my my clients.

and that is the grocery budget. we all have to eat.

right? it's not like this is a category you can just cut out of

your budget today, i'm giving you my seven most actionable grocery

budget tips. this includes some smart shopping tips,

but also i'll share what to do before you even leave the house.

hello and welcome back to another episode.

i'm so happy that you've shown up today because that means you are

taking another step towards creating a more positive

relationship with your money and using it as a tool to live your

greatest life. today, we are diving into one spending area

that causes a lot of financial stress for the majority of my my

clients. and that is the grocery budget.

we all have to eat. right? it's not like this is a category you

can just cut out of your budget. cold turkey.

pun intended. anyone? anyone? anyway.

also, it really doesn't help that grocery prices have been

skyrocketing recently. but there still are a few ways that you can

help keep your costs down at the grocery store.

today, i'm giving you my seven most actionable grocery budget

tips. this includes some smart shopping tips,

but also i'll share what to do before you even leave the house.

because the truth is one of the biggest ways to save money on

groceries doesn't happen in the store.

it happens in your kitchen before you ever even head out the door.

the number one reason we overspend usually isn't because

of the price of organic kale, but rather a lack of planning and

awareness of what you already have on your shelves at home.

so let's go ahead and dive into these seven tips.

tip number one, plan out your meals.

i started doing this a few years ago,

and it has been such a game changer.

every sunday, i take about twenty minutes and plan out our meals

for the week. this has become so incredibly helpful because

it takes the decision making out of the equation for later in the

week when you are already tired and hungry after a day of work.

you make the decision on sunday, then you just have to execute the

plan. let me go ahead and walk you through what i do.

so the first thing i do is take a look at our week ahead.

what do we have going on this week that will interfere with or

just limit our meal prep time. for example,

a lot of the times i go to a yoga class on monday nights at 05:30.

so that's not a lot of time that i'm available.

so i usually make sure that dinner is something that is easy

for my husband to get started while i'm away.

or maybe you're busy on a tuesday night with your kids' soccer

games. so then tuesday's meal should be something like

leftovers or something quick that you can throw together in fifteen

minutes. there's no reason to be cooking a complex meal that night

when you have no time. again, just by making the decision ahead

of time, it removes the fatigue where you'd normally probably

just order takeout or grab something on the way home.

the second thing i do is open up my fridge and take a look at what

needs to be used up soon. maybe maybe there are some leftovers

from the weekend. i will put those on the menu for monday or

tuesday night. maybe there's some salad items that won't last the

full week, so i'll put those on the lunch menu for early in the

week. i've also heard this called reverse meal planning where

instead of finding a recipe that you want to cook first and then

needing to buy 10 random ingredients,

you find your ingredients and say,

what can i make from these things?

chat g p t, i've heard, is great for this,

putting in the things you have in your pantry and saying,

what could i make with this? use the resources you already have on

hand. another thing is to embrace leftovers and

then focus on using up ingredients that you've already

spent money on before you buy something new to make.

then the third step is to see what do i already have in the

pantry that can go into meals for the rest of the week,

which leads me nicely into my second tip.

tip number two, shop your pantry first.

now that you've added the leftovers to the menu,

what do you have hiding in your pantry that can make your next

meal? do you have a forgotten piece of meat in the freezer?

that is perfect for a crock pot meal that you can let simmer all

day long. i've turned some slightly freezer burnt meat into

some pretty amazing things in the past.

maybe you have a bunch of canned veggies and beans.

those are great for an easy chili or a thing called a dump it in

soup. this idea actually comes from one of my favorite crock pot

recipe books. i'll link to it in the show notes,

but remember to check and see if your local library has a copy

before you run out and buy it. this is actually what i did for

this exact same crockpot book. checked it out from my library,

tried a few recipes to see if it was worth buying,

if there were enough recipes in it that i liked.

turned out there was, but check it out at your library first.

another thing, don't be afraid to experiment.

maybe pretend you are on the tv show chopped and you have five

random ingredients from your pantry and fridge.

how can you combine them into a meal?

honestly, i do this all the time and call it a lindsay concoction.

i look at it this way. either it creates something delicious and

you can enjoy the heck out of your frugal meal,

or maybe it's not the best thing you've ever had,

but you'll never recreate it because you'll likely never have

that same combination of ingredients again.

so get creative. see what works. see what doesn't.

you'll learn each time you do. tip number three.

make your list and and check it twice.

before heading out to the store, make a list of the items you

need. i like a physical list on a piece of paper.

but you can also use the note app on your phone if you prefer.

most weeks, i don't need more than a few fresh staples like

milk, bananas, or salad fixings. because because i've already made

the most of what i have in my house,

i don't tend to need all that much.

tip number four. check your grocery store ad and app.

one final tip before leaving home is to check and see what is on

sale at your store that week. if there's something you can stock

up on and it's on sale, maybe add it to your list.

but remember, it's only a good deal if it's something you will

actually use. maybe pasta or canned veggies are on sale.

those are always good things to have on hand.

or you can grab a frozen pizza if it's on sale.

i always have one of those in my freezer because,

honestly, every single friday in my house is pizza friday.

no. that doesn't mean we spend a lot of money grabbing pizza at a

pizzeria. most of the time, it's a frozen pizza that costs 3 to

$4. also, take a few minutes to scroll through your grocery

store's app if they have one. there are usually digital coupons

that you can clip. so take a look and see if there are any coupons

for anything that is already on your list or,

again, anything that you could add to your pantry for next week

or next month. just make sure that the coupons that you clip

are for products that you would normally buy.

it really is not a great deal if you end up saving a dollar,

but then not end up eating the thing that you bought.

also, make sure to combine this with checking the store brands

and the unit price, which i will talk about in a second.

i actually had a couple of coupons clipped in my app this

weekend that i ended up not using because the store brand was still

a better deal. so don't just assume that because there's a

coupon, it's the better deal. okay.

so you have your meal plan, you have your shopping list,

and you've checked the ad and the coupons on your app.

now let's talk about a few in store tips.

tip number five. unit price is your new best friend.

so forget about the big yellow sale tag.

it is designed to distract you. the real secret to saving money

is in the tiny little number in the corner of the price tag,

which is known as the unit price. this breaks down the

cost of the item by ounce or pound or number of

items in the package so that you can actually compare apples to

apples, or one jar of pasta sauce to another.

one item might be on sale, but it's still actually a higher

price per unit when you compare it to the other one.

yes, this takes a little bit of extra work to look at the

numbers, but the savings can add up.

just make sure that you are in fact comparing the same unit.

for whatever reason, sometimes one tag will show the price per

ounce and the other one will show it per liter.

so just make sure you are double checking your numbers.

also, the larger size of something is generally the better

deal, but not always. again, it pays to take a few seconds to

look. occasionally you will have to pull out your calculator and

figure out the per unit price. to do that,

you take the price of the item and divide it by how big the

product is to get the unit price. so for example,

if something is $5 and 40 ounces, you take $5

and divide it by 40 to get your unit price.

tip number six. embrace store brands.

store brands or private labels as they're sometimes known are often

made in the exact same factories as the big name brands.

sometimes they even have the same ingredients,

just with a different label and a lower price tag.

try challenging yourself to buy one store brand item per trip

that you would normally buy in the name brand.

start with something simple like canned beans or spices.

most of the time, the difference is barely noticeable,

especially with something like beans that are generally going to

be mixed in with other ingredients.

while i buy the store brand for the majority of my grocery items,

i will admit that there is one thing that i have yet to find an

acceptable generic of. that one thing is cheerios.

and just the original ones. there are actually some decent honey

nut generics, but the original cheerios are one thing i do stick

to the name brand on. but i've tried the other ones,

and now i know. i'm willing to pay a little bit more for the

brand name on that particular item.

and finally, tip number seven. stick to your list.

this sounds like the easiest one, but honestly is probably the most

challenging. right? you came to the store with a plan.

now it's the hard part. the discipline to ignore all of the

colorful displays, the end caps, all of the sale price tags that

are trying to grab your attention.

this is where your willpower muscle will be tested.

because those end caps and those tempting displays and the impulse

buys near the register are all designed to separate you from

your money. and they can derail your plan and your budget

if you let them. if you find yourself reaching for something

extra, take a moment to pause, take a deep breath,

and remember your bigger goals. then ask yourself,

is this something you truly need, or can it wait until next time?

or perhaps not even at all. okay, friends.

we've covered a lot today. shopping your pantry,

making and sticking to a list, comparing the unit price,

checking the ads and app for coupons,

and embracing store brands. but let's circle back to where

the magic truly begins. making your meal plan ahead of time.

and if you're sitting there thinking,

meal planning sounds great, but it also sounds like another chore

that i will just fail at, i hear you.

i see you. but that's exactly why i created my printable meal

planners. this process does not have to be complicated or

complex. these meal planners are designed to take the stress out

of the process and give you a clear simple way to map out your

week intentionally so you can stop asking what's for dinner at

00. it will help you do a quick check of your pantry in

order to make sure you are using up the items that you've actually

paid for first. and it will help you create an intentional

shopping list so that you can follow it because it aligns with

the plan you just set. also, this is the exact

same planner i use every single week.

plus, i also share even more recipes,

super easy recipes, crock pot recipes,

and some bonus tips inside. you can grab the printable meal

planners on my everything page at the

exuberantelephant.com/everything. and,

of course, that link will be in the show notes for you.

alright. that is all for today. remember,

every single penny you save today on a loaf of bread or a container

of milk is a penny that you can send towards a bigger,

more important goal. don't discount it just because it seems

like it's only a penny. those pennies will add up over time.

you have the power to negotiate for a better financial life,

and it all starts with small confident steps just like the

ones i've shared with you here today.

so you've got this. i am here cheering you on every step of the

way. and remember, your biggest wildest dreams are

within reach. let's go make some money moves so that you too can

start to experience financial freedom.