Stretch Your Food Dollar: Regroup and Recommit
As the New Year approaches, many of us are reevaluating our budgets, looking at our goals from the past year, and setting resolutions for the year to come. Maybe you stuck to all of your goals, and maybe you fell off the wagon near the end of the year. Either way, January is a great time to recommit to fiscal responsibility.
Setting a food budget is an important part of your overall budget. Unlike your rent, insurance, or cell phone bill, your food budget is unlikely to be a fixed amount each month. You have more flexibility with this spending category, but that can be both a pro, and a con. How do you decide what a realistic number is for your household’s food budget?
Each year the USDA compiles statistics about the average cost of food in the US, and it offers guidelines for families to help them set a realistic food budget. In 2009, the average household of two probably spent $350 – $450 a month if they were on a thrifty or low-cost eating plan.
My partner and I set a goal of spending $350 a month on food, and we did pretty good until October. Then life got pretty hectic. I got a job working outside of the house, and my partner had classes two nights a week. Eating a home-cooked meal every night was a big challenge. Even with the best of intentions, we went over budget several times due to eating out once a week. I’m looking forward to regrouping and recommitting in January. When I actually take time to plan the week’s meals, taking the week’s schedule into account, it makes it much easier to plan for late nights.
If you’re in the same boat as me, how about recommitting to track your expenses? Using an Excel spreadsheet is a simple and free way to track all of your expenses – you just need to remember to get a receipt for everything you buy. If a receipt isn’t available – because you bought something from the vending machine, or from the taco vendor off of the street – then keep a little notebook in your purse so that you can make a receipt for yourself. Enter all your receipts into the spreadsheet on a regular basis – like on Sundays over coffee and the Sunday paper – and it’s easy to see if you’re staying on track with your spending goals.
Here are a few simple tips from previous Queercents articles to help you stretch your food dollar and stay on target with your family’s food budget.
1. Never grocery shop when you’re hungry – you end up buying more.
2. Always shop with a list, and stick to the list.
3. Scout the weekly food ads to find out which store has the best deals.
4. Pay attention to coupons and see if your grocery store offers double coupon days or will honor competitors’ coupons.
5. Avoid buying products on the end caps, as well as pre-prepared convenience foods. The best deals are going to be found in the produce, meat, and dairy sections. Cooking whole foods isn’t just cheaper – it’s healthier, too.
Here’s to your financial health in 2010!
Photo credit: stock.xchng
I don’t know if it was already highlighted on Queercents, but I find the easiest way to track my expenses is using Mint (mint.com). Even if it has been, they’ve made a lot of upgrades to their display.
They now do budgets and a bunch of charts too so I can see very easily where I’m spending more than I normally would. Easy to tell that I ate out a lot more than usual in December!
You do have to give them access to your accounts, however. If you’re squeamish about that excel sheets work but you’ve got to have the dedication to actually use them and haul around receipts (something I don’t have).
Thanks for the link to the food cost web page! That is going to be very helpful for slimming down my budget this year.
Hi Liz, I think Mint.com sounds like an awesome resource. I’m hesitant to allow someone to have access to my accounts. I recently had my Paypal account hacked, and while Paypal was very prompt about initiating an investigation and resolving the issue, it has intensified my distrust of the internet. I can understand the challenge of keeping receipts, though.
I’m glad you found the worksheet useful. It’s definitely a great way to check your budgeting instincts.
I tried Mint but found it didn’t suit my budgeting style- for example, every cent spent at the grocery store, including the money I take out for my week’s allowance- tracked as food whereas in my system, OTC meds would go into medical, supplies for making gifts would go to gifts, and then of course groceries themselves. So it constantly warned me about going well over my budget!
I budget about $110 a month for food for just me and my girlfriend on weekends but have gone over that so often that I’m upping it to $120. I definitely go over without a list and when I spend the weekend at my girlfriend’s (less time for the marathon cooking and freezing sessions) so one of my New Year’s resolutions is to learn to build those sessions into my evenings and to get back to list making.
Atlantis, that’s an excellent point about breaking out your receipts and actually itemizing expenses. For example, toilet paper and shampoo often end up on the grocery list, but they shouldn’t be allocated in my food budget. I guess if you wanted to make it really simple, though, you could. But if you were allocating expenses for your business, wouldn’t you want to be specific about how your money was being spent? Really great discussion point!