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Some Things I've Learned About Grocery Shopping

Okay, so some things I've learned while Grocery Shopping...

Firstly, Either you have more time than money, or more money than time when it comes to stocking your fridge & pantry. And that will determine what you can buy and where and how much effort you put into grocery shopping. (Many thanks to my Facebook friends last summer for helping me figure a lot of this stuff out, in the comments they gave on a post inquiry I had about frugal shopping):

    1. If you have more time than money, then you ought to check the following out:
      1. Ibotta app and/or Checkout 51 app. With these apps, you simply look for "offers" of rebates you can receive by purchasing various items at differing retailers. Then, you scan your receipts after your purchase. The companies that run these apps then reimburse you after a certain collective rebate amount is met (usually 20$) and you pocket the funds via venmo or a mail-in check, etc. I wondered what the catch was, really the only thing you have to do is answer a survey question every so often like "how often do you buy bananas during the month of June," etc.
      2. The Krazy Coupon Lady website. These people fit their name, THEY BE CRAZY, but super helpful if you want to save money (or, in certain odd cases, earn money for purchasing things!). You might have to go to five different stores and bring three different types of coupons with you and spend triple the amount of time at the register and need the assistance of quadruple the amount of cashiers, but hey, if it keeps your wallet from dieting, it might just be worth it.
      3. Different stores have different prices for various items, which means you'll have quite a few stops to make. Farmer's markets, Rancho Markets and Sprouts and Smith's have fabulously fresh produce at the best prices. Smith's and Macey's have caselot sales every six months or so, and their food storage items are a frugality dreamland. Walmart and Costco's baby items are simultaneously cheap and quality.
    2. If you have more money than time, then you ought to look into these:
      1. WALMART GROCERY PICKUP! This has SAVED me as a working mom. I go grocery shopping on my lunch break. I look at my recipes/dinner ideas for the next two weeks on Pinterest, type in the groceries I need on grocery.walmart.com, and then I choose a pickup time. The chill Walmart peeps come right out to my car at the time I chose, load up my trunk themselves, and BAM. Done. Grocery shopping complete.
      2. There are some excellent restaurants around here, many of which have INCREDIBLE healthy eating options. For more info look forward to a future post with some reviews, but for now, here's the link to their websites:
        1. PULP 
        2. ZUPAS 
        3. GOOD THYME
        4. THE MIGHTY BAKER (this one doesn't provide meals, but their desserts are beyond divine)
        5. CHIPOTLE
      3. FREEZER MEALS FOR THE WIN. Make them or purchase them ahead of time and then make friends with your slow cooker. This gal has some great ones on her blog.

Secondly...EVEN if you're in a hurry...sometimes it really pays to take the time to go through the regular checkout line and talk to the cashier. Ask them how their day is going. Compliment them on their dragon earrings or ask for their advice on what to name your cat. Call them by their name (that's what name badges are for, people!). You might just make their day. They might just make yours. 

Thirdly...You never ever know which long lost friend you are going to run into in the ice cream isle. Or two, or three, or four. Or maybe eight people you met while you lived in Argentina as a missionary. (This is a true story. It was awesome. Smith's at 11:30pm on a Saturday night apparently is the time and place for Argentina Rosario missionaries to find each other, half of them wearing MESSI jerseys.)


Fourthly... Some of your favorite things resulted from impulse buys when you saw something awesome while grocery shopping and you really just really wanted a taste of it. ...
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...
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And some of your greatest buyers remorse stems from that too...


Buy the food, eat the food, love the food.
Happy grocery shopping.

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