Un-shopping Technique

grocery shopping

Un-Shopping Technique

Remember the last time you grocery shopped? It was probably last weekend. No matter how hard you tried to shop with your head, your heart got in the way, allowing you to buy the pricier items you told yourself you wouldn’t buy before you left the house. When you got home you tallied it all up and wondered how you were going to pay next month’s bills. You can survive the storm of bills you receive next month using the Un-Shopping Technique.

Last January I lost my job. I was already using coupons for almost everything we had to buy. No coupon? No purchase! But still me and my husband were having a hard time trying to pay bills and buy food on his salary and my unemployment checks. (He also has to pay child support for 2 sons from a previous marriage, so 30% of his monthly income is already gone as soon as he gets paid!) Now you are feeling our pain, right?!

I read online that some people were shopping out of their own kitchen freezers and cupboards instead of making scheduled weekly trips to the grocery store. Most of the people who did this were able to avoid grocery shopping for at least 1 week each month. They only bought the essentials at the grocery store…milk, bread, butter, eggs…You know the basics. So instead of spending $125.00 on groceries that week they only spent between $10.00 - $20.00. I decided to give it a try.

The first thing I did was take inventory of what was in my freezer, fridge and cupboards. I found that I could make the following meals for the next 7 days:

Breakfast: 5 days, Cereal, 4 oz juice

2 days, fruit smoothies and bagels.

Husband’s Lunch for 5 days: peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with potato chips and home made choc. chip cookies.

My lunch for 5 days: banana, grapes, yogurt and a granola bar

Weekend Lunches: Frozen pizza’s, chicken wraps

Supper: spaghetti w/meat sauce and a veggie, tuna casserole (2 nights), meatloaf with rice and a veggie, Caesar chicken salads, canned vegetable soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, home made macaroni and cheese.

I only had to buy milk, chips, bananas and grapes. I already had everything else on hand. My grocery bill came to about $10.00! (I used $1.00 off coupons to buy the milk and the chips)

The next week I did it again. I made meals like BLT’s with home made russet fries. Egg salad sandwiches with a side of broccoli. There is nothing wrong with making sandwiches for supper! Grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato and a side of clam chowder soup from a can. You can get fancy and make wraps instead of sandwiches if it makes you feel better. The second week I spent about $20.00 at the store. I normally spent $125.00 each week. Over the course of 2 weeks I had saved $220.00. Excellent.

The un-shopping technique will make you look at your grocery shopping habits differently. Every time I pick an item from the shelf or in the meat or produce departments I find myself immediately calculating how many meals I can get out of it. For instance, I can stretch 1 pound of ground beef into 2 meals by making 20 meatballs for a spaghetti dinner, then using the leftover meatballs and sauce to make subs the following night. Roast a chicken one night, and then make chicken noodle soup or chicken pot pie the next night. Make enough beef stew for 2 nights instead of 1 by adding lots of extra potatoes, carrots, mushrooms and celery. Make a side of cornbread to go with the stew and you will definitely stretch it to 2 nights! Always be thinking about how you can get 2 meals out of whatever you buy even if it means adding a side of bread or extra veggie.

Now I shop out of my kitchen at least 1 week each month. You will be quite surprised at how much you can do without when you put your mind to it. My husband loves it when he asks me if we have to shop this week and I tell him no. We did not have to shop last weekend and we don’t have to shop this weekend either! (Only the essentials this weekend cost us $26.00) I have been doing this since July and what I have noticed is that my checking account balance has gone up quite a bit since then. Before I started doing this I was carrying close to 0 account balances every month from January to June. Now we have $600.00 more than we did before. (HMMM...6 months = $600.00!) We were even able to buy Christmas gifts, which we did not think would have been possible with me out of work.

This un-shopping technique has made me realize that in the past I was shopping more out of habit, and less out of real need. I shopped every week because that is what I was conditioned to do. It’s what my mother did. It’s what my brothers do. It’s what I taught my own kids to do. We have all been conditioned to shop every week for no other reason except that we have always done it. It is a part of our behavior. It’s what we have been programmed to do on Saturdays and Sundays. But you can change your behavior using the un-shopping technique…and save money. Money is always a great motivator!

Even after I find a job I will continue to use manufacturer’s coupons and continue to un-shop at least 1 week each month. I plan on opening a “wish” account for me and my husband in which all of our un-shopping savings will go into. Some day we will go on that cruise we have always wanted to go on!

Now I challenge you to shop out of your kitchen for 1 week in January. Pick any week you want. I would love to hear about all of the creative breakfast, lunch, and dinner dishes you make. I would also love to hear about how much $$$ you saved during your un-shopping weeks!

Tip: Do not look at the grocery circulars during your un-shopping week. Out of habit you will go racing off to the store just because something is on sale. If it has been on sale before, it will go on sale again. Only buy the “essentials” during your un-shopping week.

Hope you enjoyed my article and found it useful! Susan Crafts

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Comment by Susan Crafts on September 23, 2011 at 8:49pm: Thanks Janet! Happy to hear you are havng posotive results! Keep us posted!

Comment by Janet Turcotte on August 9, 2011 at 5:03pm: Love this article, my husband and I started doing this this past month and it rearlly dose work. It is amzing how much money you save.

Comment by Lenora Morales on February 3, 2011 at 12:25am: This is a great article! Thanks so much for sharing =)

Comment by Devonie Kemp on November 15, 2010 at 7:01pm: Love the article! As I've been recently separated from a regular paycheck, this is a great way to save. I am a huge fan of dry beans; they can go a long way and are dirt cheap. Adding rice to broth-based soups really makes them go a long way also. Thanks for the great info!

Comment by Linda Rogacki on October 12, 2010 at 6:14pm: Great article, I like the way you did your page. Very nice.

Comment by Laurel Nicolosi on August 1, 2010 at 2:33am: This is a great article Susan!! I think we often forget how much food we have stashed away in cupboards or the fridge that has gone bad, or we buy without looking at how many meals it can make. I am learning to cut sugar out of my diet as much as possible so that makes me re-evaluate EVERYTHING I buy.

I am also excited because I found a way to get my groceries for free - look at my page if you want to see how and help others! :)

Comment by Susan Crafts on June 8, 2010 at 8:39am: Great Brittany! Let us know how you make out!!!

Comment by Brittany Willet on June 7, 2010 at 12:10am: Fantastic info chickie I'm going to try it myself

Thanks

Comment by Dede on March 31, 2010 at 12:31am: Are any of you using this fabulous technique??

Comment by Susan Crafts on February 4, 2010 at 9:29pm: Kathleen, I have already started a Food and Drink Recipe section. Go to Practical and Pennywise and click on the Food and Drink Recipe link. I will send Dede my pizza, pie crust and chocolate chip cookie recipe. The artichoke pasta I purchased at a health food store only because I was curious. There is also a link called Healthy Treats for Kids. I suppose the treats were intended for children...but me and my husband love them! I will ask Dede fo put those recipes under the Food and Drink tab because I think they are being missed standing alone. If you would like a really good head start on finding healthier versions of the foods you love, go to www.eatbetteramerica.com. I have directed other Divas there and they said they loved this website. Go take a peek and see what you think.

Comment by Kathleen Silvia on February 4, 2010 at 6:32pm: Did you start a page yet for these innovative organic treat recipes???? I live the way you described the pizza dough you make, now celery seed pie crust, and the chocolate chip cookies, and artichoke flour....I think you should start a page on this because that in itself is pretty interesting for people who want to eat healthy and want to get away from the mundane every day stuff....I don't know a lot about how to cook like that but I would like to learn more. Maybe we can take every day recipes and make it your way with those cool ingredients you just mentioned? Just an idea!

Comment by Susan Crafts on February 4, 2010 at 5:56pm: OOPS! It looks like somehow my comment to you above got cut off!

I started to say I go through the sales inserts every week and then decide what to make for dinner that week based on what is on sale. Then I see how many coupon match ups I can make. I use a lot of coupons every week. If I don't find the coupons I need in the Sunday paper inserts, then I go directly to the manufacturer's website to see if they are offering any that I can print out. Sometimes your grocery store's website will have coupons for you to print. I know our Food Lion and Supertarget offer online coupons.

On Monday I cooked a 12 lb turkey. I had a lot of turkey meat to use up! For tonight's supper I made turkey pot pie with peas and carrots. I make my own celery seed pie crust and I use fresh carrots that I cook until fork tender. Then I made a pot of turkey noodle soup for tomorrow night's supper. Perfect! Because tomorrow it is going to be a rainy day here in Palm Coast! There is just something comforting about eating soup on a rainy day! I only paid .79 lb for the turkey back in November. Monday and Tuesday we had the turkey dinner with mashed potatoes and broccoli. The turkey pot pie will get us through 2 more dinners. The turkey noodle soup will get us through 2 more meals. This $9.48 turkey made 6 meals for us! We will alternate eating the soup and pie from now until Sunday. I was going to freeze the pot pie to have maybe next week, but my husband said he won't get sick of eating turkey because it is made different each night. That works for me!

Comment by Kathleen Silvia on February 4, 2010 at 5:27pm: Oooh thanks for the clarification....That makes more sense to me now! And your husband is outdoors, and probably burns that right up. I was a bit scared in the beginning of your article, and from what I saw on one of the morning shows once, it is easy and cheaper to make some type of pasta all week. I think that is a great idea too that you can get the sales with your family on the meats that is perfect. I love it. xoxoxo

Comment by Susan Crafts on February 4, 2010 at 12:03am: Hi Kathleen!

Thank you for commenting on my article. I am glad you found it helpful.

Eating healthy is very important to me and my husband. I see you didn't like my husband's lunch! LOL! PB&J sandwich, potato chips, cookies. But that is what he likes to eat for lunch every day in the summer. Let me explain to you why he eats this for lunch. It gets very hot and humid here in Florida. My husband works outside as a heavy equipment operator. There is no refrigeration for his food. He has a cooler, but he says the ice melts too fast in the heat. He will only make sandwiches from lunchmeat during the cooler months. I buy the Smuckers Low Sugar grape jelly for him. The peanut butter is Smuckers all natural. Just peanuts, salt and oil (oil is from the peanuts). He puts the PB&J onto 1 slice whole grain bread and folds it in half. The chocolate chip cookies I make from scratch using whole wheat flour, raw sugar, brown sugar, corn oil, vanilla extract, chocolate chips and almonds. This is a healthier version than most recipes you will find. He packs 2 or 3 small cookies for his lunch. Although there is sugar in the cookies, working outside, my husband sweats most of his electrolytes out of his body and he needs to replace his sugar and salt throughout the day. No excuse for the chips except that he likes them! But he only puts a handful in a baggie. He doesn't go crazy with them. Everything in moderation. I also make him a homemade version of Gatorade that he loves! The pasta that I cook is made from whole grain or whole wheat flour. We don't eat pasta very often. Maybe 2-3 times a month. I think the best pasta I ever bought was made from artichoke flour. It was very good. Expensive, but good!

You are so right about the cheapest foods being the unhealthiest. A cart of processed foods for $65.00 is not my idea of a deal. It is kind of like having a sale on heart attacks, high blood pressure, and obesity. Very bad stuff in those carts! We don't eat processed foods, so the frugal shopping tips we saw on tv did not fit into our lifestyle either.

It is challenging to buy healthy foods on a small budget. But I have managed to do just that. I take advantage of the stock up sales if it is something I am going to buy every week anyway. For instance, last week our Winn-Dixie had prime rib on sale for $3.99/lb when you buy 20 lbs. or more. I phoned my brother and asked him if he would like to go halves on a 20 lb. prime rib. He immediately said yes! We had a 24 lb prime rib cut into 1 ½ inch thick ribeye steaks and it ended up costing us about $47.00 each. I wanted to have them cut into 1 ¼ inch steaks to stretch it further. But my husband likes his steaks cut thick. I honestly couldn’t deny him this because he eats ½ a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch every day! It is going to take 2 days for me to eat a steak that big.

Then my sister in law called and said she was getting skinless, boneless chicken breasts for $1.38 lb but she had to buy 40 pounds. Then she said she can get 80% ground beef for $1.80lb if we get 40 lbs. So we went halves on that too. I normally buy the 90% ground sirloin. But I have been unemployed for over a year so I decided to lower my standards just this once! (I will be sure to drain it well.) I take advantage of sales like this whenever I can. I am not going to have to buy meats for about 4 months! All 3 of these deals never happen to me in the same week! It is just the way it turned out this month.

We don’t eat meat every night of the week. I make a variety of home made veggie dishe. I make a honey whole wheat pizza crust and top it with sauce, skim mozzarella, peppers, mushrooms, onions, garlic, spices and black olives. Very cheap to make. I make home made vegetable soup, gourmet stuffed mushrooms, eggplant parmesan, veggie stuffed peppers, black bean soup, pea soup and several other veggie dishes. Again, all very inexpensive to make.

Every week I go throug

Comment by Kathleen Silvia on February 3, 2010 at 10:09pm: I think your article is extremely informative and I agree while we do need to shop out of your own kitchens, some of the meal ideas are not the healthiest like cookies, p&j, pasta...
Unfortunately this is what I find the hardest about saving money tips like this with meals. Good Morning America and the Today Show has done this....but what is overlooked is that some of the meals you are creating might be saving money but are putting unwanted pounds on the scale instead. The cheaper foods are the unhealthiest and it is such a shame. It really does cost more to eat healthy and I find that fact discouraging.
For example, I buy fresh fruits and vegetables for salad and snacks, anything we do snack on is either granola bars, oat meal, lean meats, light breads, and the only drink in the house is juice or water. I don't "stock up" when I go to the store or buy things on sale and I still find myself at a bill of 120-160 either every week or two weeks. A people would talk to me about how much money they saved at a particular store, and how they got two full carriages of groceries for say $65....But I know that if I was purchasing what they were I might be 20lbs overweight....
"The un-shopping technique will make you look at your grocery shopping habits differently. Every time I pick an item from the shelf or in the meat or produce departments I find myself immediately calculating how many meals I can get out of it. For instance, I can stretch 1 pound of ground beef into 2 meals by making 20 meatballs for a spaghetti dinner, then using the leftover meatballs and sauce to make subs the following night. Roast a chicken one night, and then make chicken noodle soup or chicken pot pie the next night. Make enough beef stew for 2 nights instead of 1 by adding lots of extra potatoes, carrots, mushrooms and celery. Make a side of cornbread to go with the stew and you will definitely stretch it to 2 nights! Always be thinking about how you can get 2 meals out of whatever you buy even if it means adding a side of bread or extra veggie."
That is the best advice and the smartest. Since I have been so frustrated with the market, I have been trying to extend the left overs, or make other things out of the left overs and I have been saving an enormous amount of money.
I do think your article is great, and advice that has been much needed for so many people. I would love the feedback about how I can fine tune the shopping with finding affordable healthier items. When I lived in RI I used to say all that time how I feel like I sold my soul to the grocery store (not mentioning the name) and now with moving to another state it really has not changed.
Great article and so desperately needed!

Comment by chris on January 3, 2010 at 8:41pm: Nice article. I'll give it a try. My husband works at Target and I shop there a lot for grocery's and then still stop on my way home from work every few days to get bread and milk. There are only three of us and we all seem to eat different things. I have food restrictions, son isn't much of a meat eater and my husband loves meat (more like stew, stewed chicken)

Comment by Dede on January 2, 2010 at 11:01pm: I am so happy that you find time to relax and put the time into DivaCafe that you do:)

Comment by Susan Crafts on January 2, 2010 at 8:22pm: Using the un-shopping technique helped me pay for the $400.00 roof repair bill I got the other day! At least I did not have to charge it. This technique has a way of offsetting those little surprises in life!

Comment by Dede on January 1, 2010 at 11:46pm: Susan! You are going to be a hit here. I am so proud of you and your hard work. I don' t know how you are able to give us so much time and do all your volunteer work as well:)

Comment by Lisa Merriman on December 31, 2009 at 7:28pm: Susie - thanks for this - I enjoyed reading about all your wonderful ideas. Keep 'em coming!