31 Days to a Better Grocery Budget: Stop Making Excuses and Commit to Change (Overig)

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by Crystal on March 01, 2010

“You can’t change anything when your ‘want-to’ is broken.” -Kevin Catalyst

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve received emails which say something like, “I really wish we could lower our grocery budget, but…”

You know what? If you start with that attitude, you’ll likely never succeed at having a better grocery budget. Sure, you might not be able to get your grocery budget down as low as someone else–maybe your family eats gluten-free, or maybe you eat all organic, or maybe you live in a rural area with only one over-priced store–but the truth is: you can lower your grocery budget.

But it will never happen until you stop making excuses and commit to change.

So I’m starting out this series by challenging you to set aside the negativity and commit to wholehearted willingness to change your mindset, your shopping habits, and quite possibly even your life.

Your grocery budget is likely never going to change until you are also willing to.

Has changing the way you think or shop changed your grocery bill? Tell us about it!

31 Days to a Better Grocery Budget: Yes, You Need a Budget
by Crystal on March 02, 2010

“A budget??”

I can hear the groans right now. You were all pumped about these great new money-saving ideas you were going to learn and implement from this series; the last thing you wanted to hear about was a boring topic like budgets.

Remember how you promised me yesterday that you were going to stop making excuses and commit to change? Well, setting up a budget is your first opportunity!

Why You Need a Budget

Without a budget in place, all the money you save is pretty superficial. I’d go so far as to say that without a budget in place, bargain-shopping, coupon-clipping and deal-hunting are likely not going to save you any money. In fact, you might be spending more money in an effort to save money–which totally negates the savings, right?

A budget gives you the ability to track your spending and saving–and hopefully to see an increase in savings and a decrease in spending. Without a budget in place, your money will just be running through your fingers with no set objectives. A budget gives you parameters and purpose, it gives you boundaries and it gives you freedom to live creatively within those boundaries.

How to Set Up a Workable Grocery Budget
1) Average Your Grocery Spending From the Last 4-8 Weeks
How much have you spent at the grocery store over the last 4-8 weeks? Average that amount out and use it as a basis for your initial grocery budget. Ultimately, you’re likely going to want to whittle it down quite a bit–since saving money is one of the big purposes of having a grocery budget!–but now is not the time to worry about that. It’s a huge step just to start with a concrete budget in place.

2) Be Realistic
Don’t put undo pressure on yourself to come up with some crazily-low and impossible-to-stick-with figure for your grocery budget. This is not a contest or a competition and if you want to persevere and see long-lasting benefits, you’ll want to give yourself some breathing room.

3) Challenge Yourself to Slowly Lower Your Budget
Over time and with practice, you’ll likely be able to reduce your original grocery budget figure fairly significantly. But just remember: it takes time. You’re not going to cut your grocery bill in half this month. However, if you slowly shave off 5% here and 5% there, within 6-10 months, it’s very possible you can have it lowered by 30-50% or even more.

Always give yourself grace, though. If you’re ever feeling frustrated or stressed about it, step back and remind yourself that it’s just a grocery budget. The world’s not going to come to an end if it’s $5 or $10–or even $30 or $50!–more than you’d like it to be.

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