Setting goals for your grocery list

Going to the grocery store is often a hassle: the crowds, the carts, the lines at the cashier... a trip to the market is often unpleasant enough without even mentioning the increasing costs of food which can lead to increasingly higher grocery bills. The crowds and the carts will often be part and parcel of the weekly shopping but with a little care and management, you can keep the total at the bottom of your receipt from fluctuating too wildly from week to week. One way of checking spending at the supermarket is to set a goal for the average amount spent per item when dividing the total bill by the number of items in the order. For example, if the goal for the average amount spent is set at $2.00 per item, and the total bill comes to $50.00, then there should be about 25 items in the order.

So...
Goal average amount per item =$2.00

$2.00(number of items)= Total bill amount

If I'm remembering correctly, algebra doesn't get more simple than that.


This is just an example of course. This system of setting an average amount per item spent is merely guideline. However, by being more conscious of how the cost of each item is going to affect the total bill, it may be easier to make thriftier shopping choices. More often than not, there are enough sales and coupons in any given week that customers needn't alter their basic grocery lists too much. By simply buying the store-brand or the brand of a product that's on sale, and using coupons or the supermarket's discount-club card (all the ones I'm familiar with can be obtained at no cost) consumers can fairly easily stay on target for their goal. Other ideas to help achieve your average cost per item amount include:

-Buying produce in season. Produce tends to taste better and cost less when bought during the seasons it would "naturally" be harvested.

-Stocking up on a favorite item or pricier basic (such as butter) when it goes on sale.

-Instead of buying already prepared or heavily processed snack-food and frozen dishes, consider buying the whole ingredients and cooking or preparing the item at home. Be careful however, as making something from scratch is not always cost effective, depending on the ingredients and length of time needed for preparation.