Frugal Living: Price List

Hey ya'll!

After a great weekend at a youth retreat at Fort Caswell on Oak Island (I'll share about it soon!) I am [trying] to get back into the swing of things. I want to squeeze just a few more moments out of summer!

Today I'm sharing a little project I have been working on .. creating a grocery price comparison list! I'm not going to lie .. I felt a little funny walking up and down aisles writing prices down! I promise this isn't what I do for fun .. it's what I do to save money!

When we moved a little over a month ago it quickly became apparent that grocery prices were just flat out higher here then they were in Georgia. As in milk is an entire dollar more! In addition, we have fewer grocery store options. I sure am missing Kroger mega sales and gas perks! After a few trips to the store I decided it would be beneficial to start comparing the prices of the items I buy most. I have kind of been doing this in head for a long time, but now I have different stores that I am not as familiar with.

There are a couple of different ways you can go about creating a price comparison list. Many bloggers refer to it as a Price Book. One way is to grab a notebook and write down the price you pay for items over time to create a list. I choose to make a list of the most common items that I buy and then headed to 3 local stores to write down the non-sale price. Aldi, Wal-Mart, and Food Lion are the closest stores. There is a Harris Teeter too, but it is farther away. (But so far I am noticing they have great sales and good coupon policy!) Now, this is not a list of every single item that you can ever buy at the store, but what I buy the most often. It also doesn't really include meat and fresh produce. Those prices change and fluctuate with the season. I did however write down my "buy" prices for meat and produce that come from past experiences with sales. As I have said before, if meat isn't on sale, I do not buy it. I also usually choose my fresh produce based on what is on sale as well.

So how will a price comparison list help me save money?

• It will help me know if an item is really on sale or not and if I need to stock up!
• It will help me track sale cycles.

I was actually kind of surprised by what I discovered. For most items, Wal-Mart was just a few cents cheaper than Food Lion. Aldi was consistently cheaper on most items, sometimes up to 50 cents, and they for sure have the best produce deals. However, there are some items I never buy at Aldi because I prefer the name brand or do not care for the quality. There are still a few blanks to fill in, but hopefully this list will help us to be able to stay within our previous budget even with higher overall prices! I will definitely be adding this list to the Menu Planning portion of my Home Management Binder.

I have also heard that you can do this same thing with an app on your phone .. might be worth checking out!

What do you do to save money on groceries?

For more Frugal Living tips click here!

I'm linking up today at A Bowl Full Of Lemons and for Thrifty Thursday!