There is nothing worse than paying for items that you do not need, that you spend money on because you shop when you are hungry or you forget what you came for and are in a rush.
Making a grocery list prior to leaving the house is essential. Take your time and plan out what you will need.
Start with looking at your routine.
- Do you make a list and bring it with you?
- Making a list is a must. Nothing worse than not buying what you really need.
- Bringing it with you is another must. Something I often forget! I now take a picture of my list with my cell phone, which I have with me all the time.
- What day and time of the week do you normally shop?
- If you are shopping late at night, you are missing out on many perishable items. Most stores tend to store those in the coolers overnight.
- If you are shopping when it is crazy busy, it could lead to unwanted stress and items that may be sold out or staff that are too busy with customers to go to the back and restock or grab you an item.
- I try to shop before 10am if possible. Stores are usually fully stocked with those sale items and they are not so busy that you are not constantly maneuvering your cart around crowded aisles.
- Do you look for coupons before or do you just pay top dollar for products?
- Please, Save your money!
- Take the few extra minutes to look through the mail or newspapers each week and set aside coupons for items that you would normally buy or items that you only buy when on sale. Even if it's a .25 cents off coupon, those .25 cents add up over time.
- Stuff them all in a large envelope and when its time to prepare your grocery list look through them and set aside what you think you will end up buying.
- Stores do have 'in store coupons' usually at the entrance, have a look at those as well.
- Coupons and couponing will be featured on another page.
- Do you shop when you are pressed for time?
- Some say shopping when in a rush is a good thing. You're in and you're out licketly split. You get only what you came for and did not spend any more money on anything else.
- Some say shopping when rushed is not such a good thing. You got your eggs, got your milk, but forget to get the toilet paper! You realized this on the way home or at home, and have to make another trip back to the store. ugh.
- Do you shop when you hungry?
- Shopping when hungry will increase the number of items that you put in your cart and increase your grocery bill at the checkout.
- If you don't have time to prepare yourself a small snack prior to going, take with you a granola bar and eat it on the way, or bring along your bottled water. Water tends to fill us up and satisfies our hunger temporarily.
- Are you a flyer shopper?
- Do you take those extra minutes to browse through a weekly flyer sent out in the newspaper?
- Even if you have your favourite stores don't disregard the rest. Often times you may find your must haves on sale at another store and your favourite store will price match.
- Shopping by flyers is similar to coupon shopping. We will feature this on another page.
- How often do you shop?
- If you find yourself shopping twice a week, find out why. Are you forgetting items, does your family drink more milk than you fridge can hold.
Now that you have had a look at your routine, figured out if you can make the most of your shopping experience we can move on to making that list:
No comments:
Post a Comment