How To Stop Spending Money On Food?

After your mortgage, car payments, and other big expenditures, what’s the one thing you spend the most money on each month? Undoubtedly, it is food. Whether you are ordering your favorite burger from a food truck, preparing food at home to stay healthy, or picking it up from McDonald’s or KFC – as a basic necessity, food demands money. If you observe deeply, the expenses on food take a bigger portion from your overall budget.

Overspending on food happens for several reasons. Poor planning can be one of the causes. If you want to save money on food, you might need to modify how you approach grocery shopping and food buying.

We have some tips stored for you to help you spend less on food and maintain your Personal Finance without resorting to cheap noodles or processed cheeses.

Let’s hop in!

Ways To Stop Spending Money On Food

1. Research About Prices

One of the best ways to stop spending money on food is to learn when things are on sale and only purchase them then. Studying prices isn’t as boring as it sounds – it can be kind of a fun thing to do.

Set aside about 30 minutes a week from your schedule to slip through the sales flyers each week. Make yourself a cup of coffee or as you browse. Play your favorite music in the background and list items you need to purchase on sale while humming.

You will start to see patterns in terms of sales. For instance, you might notice that coffee is $6 one week, then $4 the next, before jumping back to $7.

Once you learn the sales sequence for the foods you normally buy, only start purchasing them only when they are on sale so that you end up saving money on food.

2. Stick To Your Grocery List

Making a grocery checklist can help you spend less on food but only if you pledge to stick to the list. Since you can’t put blinders on when you step into the market, you need to train yourself to ignore or avoid certain store areas such as snacks, cookies, and chocolate aisle.

If you want, you can take help from money management software to help you control overspending on unnecessary things.

3. Eat Before Shopping

It might sound funny and odd to many people why they need to eat first before going shopping. However, we have the most logical explanation for this money-saving strategy.

Never shop when you are hungry! When you go to a grocery store empty stomach, something strange happens the minute you set foot inside the store. Suddenly, everything looks like something you need to buy and eat right now. Everything starts looking tasty and unintentionally leads you to the snack or frozen food aisle. As a result, you buy things you didn’t mention in your list. Infact sometimes you end up buying a snack that you don’t eat for at least a month. Why? Just because you picked it up when you were hungry.

So stop spending money on extra groceries and eat before you go shopping.

4. Consider Buying In Bulk

Some grocery stores sell bulk bins for essential items such as cooking oil, flour, rice, and nuts. You can save a lot of your money using the bulk bins rather than purchasing food separately.

When you buy wholesale, you only purchase what you need, which means you are less likely to toss food. The price is often lower since you are not paying for extra packaging.

5. Think Out Of The Grocery Store

Depending on where you live, the superstore might not be your only choice for food purchases. Many areas offer farmer’s markets that let you purchase in-season, locally grown yield in the spring, summer, and fall.

While farmer’s markets have the dishonor of being costly, that’s not true. Most food from farmer’s markets is less expensive than the food on sale at the grocery store.

6. Plan Out Your Meals

Wasted food is a big truth in this world. The average individual ends up wasting over 200 pounds of food each year. Food waste isn’t just apprehension for the eco-conscious. It should also be a huge concern for your wallet. When you purchase food only to throw it out of the mouth, uneaten, you might as well throw your money in the garbage.

Preparing each meal for the week before you go shopping will help you avoid excess waste.

7. Coupon Carefully

You can save money with coupons. Some people really love their tokens and believe that the coupons help them save on food items. But you can also waste your money if you get caught up in the game and start buying food you won’t eat.

Don’t let this “Save 50 cents” tempt you into purchasing items you will never use or don’t need. Instead, save coupons for the food you do eat regularly.

8. Limit Meals Out

You knew this suggestion was coming. Try to limit meals to special occasions only!

You end up paying more for food at restaurants in two ways. First, the food charges more when someone else makes it. Second, you risk wasting food you previously bought when you choose to eat at a restaurant instead.

While choosing to dine out, pay attention to any deals offered by the bistro. Many restaurants will offer special discounts on weeknights to appeal to many diners.

If you want help breaking the restaurant routine, set aside the money you would have spent on a meal out of the next time you get the desire. Prepare your meal at home in its place.

Look at the money you have collected aside at the end of the month. You will be happy to know that you have saved a pretty good amount.

In A Nutshell

By saving your money on food, you can use it to achieve some of your short-term financial goals, such as paying your debt or school fee. Otherwise, with these savings, you can go on a vacation or enjoy a concert of your favorite pop star concert.

If you want to save your money on food in the most enthusiastic way, you may contact My EasyFi to organize your finances.