Buying In Bulk Pays Off

I’ve shopped at Sam’s Club pretty much all of my life. After all, paying 12 cents a piece for my packs of ramen has always appealed. In mid-October, I started a special Sam’s Club experiment. In one morning, I dropped $400 at the local Sam’s, and another $100 at the Wal-Mart next door. Sounds like a lot, right? But since that trip, my grocery store runs have been limited to milk, eggs and fresh fruit (under $10 a week).

There’s only been one major exception to my inexpensive shopping trips, and that was picking up the Thanksgiving ham. I could have gotten it during my initial bulk buying run, but I just couldn’t figure out how to get it into my freezer with my other purchases.

I still have plenty of food left, too: my husband and I are comfortably stocked for another at least another two weeks. Assuming that we only make it that far (though I am planning to see just how far I can stretch it), I will have spent approximately $580 for food for two adults for two months. That breaks down to about $35 per week per person — or less than $2 per meal. That’s actually on par with the baseline amount some states use for food stamps.

I do have a few tips to share that make the bulk buying experience easier:
Prepared foods drive up your food bill. The more you can make from scratch, the cheaper you can eat. The biggest obstacle for most people seems to be bread — but there are many recipes that require just 5 minutes of your time to make a loaf.
You don’t have to make everything from scratch, though — crackers are an example of your time being far more valuable than the effort it would take to make a certain food.
Ingredients store better than prepared food, despite the preservatives. You can store flour almost indefinitely, but a loaf of bread may not make it through the week.
Soups and stews are your friends: they’re easy ways to use frozen or canned vegetables, as well as any leftovers.
Break down anything in your freezer into meal-sized portions. For instance, if you buy a 40-pack of hot dogs, you don’t want to have to defrost the whole thing for just one meal.
Indulge in a few of your favorite foods. For me, I have a weakness for cheese. I bought a big block of Gouda and ate it on practically everything (and often by itself).
Plan your shopping trip in advance. Pick items you can use in multiple meals and draw up at least a general meal plan.

These tips come out of my experiences — and my mistakes. I think my experiment has shown that buying in bulk can be an effective way to save money on food — and I don’t have to spend nearly as much time grocery shopping as I’ve needed to in the past. Since I was already used to cooking from scratch, I think I may have wound up saving time as well as food.