Meal-Plan Your Way to Savings at the Grocery Store

We’ve all heard the advice: “Don’t ever shop for groceries on an empty stomach.”

It’s doubly true if you’re trying to save some cash.

Grocery shopping without a plan can lead to mindless, frantic, and emotional purchases that drive up costs and don’t align with your health and fitness goals.

I’m sure you’ve been there: Your fridge is empty and you’re pressed for time, so you rush to the closest store and just start tossing items in the cart. You don’t look for items on sale, you don’t check prices at other stores, and you don’t pay close attention to quantities. You definitely grab a box of cookies.

The results:

• You spend more than you want to.

• You leave with high-calorie “convenient” items you don’t actually need.

• You buy too much food. You’ll end up paying more and likely not eating all of it before it spoils.

Here is some better advice: “Don’t grocery shop without a plan.”

With a solid plan, you can make choices that support your healthy habits and save yourself from spending more money than you want or need. No mindless shopping, no food waste and no overspending.

The absolute best way is to plan your meals for the month. This might seem like a lot of work at first, but it’s actually pretty simple. You can reuse one week four times or you can swap some recipes in and out of a weekly rotation if you prefer variety. Every planned meal is going to help you with your budget and fitness goals.

With meals on the calendar, you can break down your grocery shopping into two manageable pieces: monthly buying and weekly buying.

Monthly Purchases 

Frequently used ingredients should be purchased in bulk at discount stores. These are the items that show up in many meals and won’t go bad if they’re stored properly.

A few examples: oatmeal, pancake mix, condiments, egg whites (keep an eye on these, they don’t last forever), canned food, frozen vegetables and fruit, and so on.

You can also look at buying meat in bulk if you have freezer space. Divide the meat into smaller portions and thaw out what you need when you need it.

Weekly Purchases

Some items—especially fresh, healthy choices—might not last anywhere near a month, and we don’t want food to go to waste.

This is where weekly purchases come in. If you know what you’ll eat every week, you can make planned trips to get the exact amount of fresh fruit, vegetables, milk, eggs, fresh-baked items and so on. If anything goes bad before you get to it, adjust the list so that next week has less waste.

With weekly shopping on a meal plan, you avoid waste because you’re buying the right amount at the right time. You’ll also avoid ordering $40 pizza because you didn’t plan ahead.

Plan, Budget and Save

Everything starts with your meal plan. After you create it, you can make your monthly and weekly lists, and the longer you stick to the plan, the easier and more precise you will be.

You’ll become a “routine machine,” and you’ll be able to save some cash!

Intimidated by a monthly meal plan? Start small: Plan out the next three days and then get only the food you need to execute the plan.  

If you need help matching up healthy eating habits with your fitness goals, you know we’re just a click away. Contact us!

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Fitness is a journey, Coach Alex.