Article by Make The Days Count Contributor Marie Monroe

 

“Gathering groceries is a life sustaining activity.  It can also be a ritual of affirming life rather than a chore of struggling with life.”

 

I have been a fan of what I call “Spiritual Economics” for a long time.  It has seemed to me that the better my frame of mind, the better able I am to make financial ends meet.  And even without the bottom line changing at all … when I am more optimistic I seem to see and feel my wealth instead of my lack.

 

A few changes in thinking and in habits have gone a long way to keeping me focused on gratitude for what I have instead of feeling bad about what I don’t have. 

 

These changes have helped me see that I have enough, indeed more than enough.  I literally went from not having enough to a sense of abundance without any change in income.

 

Creatures of Habit

I am a creature of habit and making changes is not always easy for me.  But when I discovered that I could actually create greater abundance in my life with a few changes, I became more motivated.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking about high finance here … although I am convinced that this approach works in that arena too.  

 

I’m talking about the basic necessities of everyday life such as paying the monthly bills and budgeting for food. 

 

Grocery prices have been steadily rising. When grocery prices go up, increases in income typically lag far behind.  Juggling here to pay there had become a mindset and a way of life for me.  Many times it seemed I was stretching the budget to the breaking point just to keep up. Even trips to the supermarket to shop for staples had begun to tug at my spirits as I watched the usual grocery allowance bring home less and less.  One day I decided, when bringing in 3 bags instead of my usual 5 that the $120 I had just spent should and could go farther.

 

Determined to do better with what I have, I took on the project of investigating how I shop for groceries and how I could change habits to benefit my family.  I looked at the where, when and how of my grocery shopping and came up with some very interesting information.

 

Where I Shop

I realized that I prefer a certain store - not particularly surprising, but in the long run the reasons I preferred it weren’t good enough.  This is how I rationalized using my store: I can shop after work and will enjoy my weekends off more if I get the grocery shopping done during the week.   I’ll use this store because it’s on the way home and I don’t have to go “out of my way.”

 

Plus, after using this store for a long time, I found another reason to keep using it: I’m familiar with the layout.  I know where everything is and can go right to it.  I thought, “Well, that saves me time and it’s less stressful than having to hunt for what I want in some other store.  I just want to get this chore done quickly and get home.” 

 

What I didn’t see until I looked closely was that all of these “benefits” of convenience were costing me money and that I could have convenience and save money if I did a little homework.

 

When I Shop

I was shopping after work when I was tired.  My concentration was off so I shopped automatically and my real goal was to get it done and get home.  I’d hit the store during rush hour when everyone else was rushing in and rushing through to get home too.  On this schedule I was squeezing my shopping into my daily routine and I was irritated with the long lines.  Shopping “on the squeeze” set me up to skip comparison shopping and to buy out of habit without much thought.

 

Hurrying along also seemed to make me prone to impulse buying without giving much thought to my need for the item, how I would use it or when. 

 

Also, shopping after work put me in the store right on the verge of starving since I had not yet had dinner.  True to popular wisdom, shopping when hungry seems to add some expensive urgency to my shopping.  My impulse shopping goes up when I’m hungry.  I also tend to buy more convenience foods that can be fixed quickly when I finally do get home.  Impulse shopping and convenience foods can very quickly chomp away at any budget!

 

How I Shop

I found that I shopped as a store loyal, brand loyal, and time regular customer.  I also discovered that I would enter the preferred store, travel up and down the same aisles in the same direction to pick up the same items every time.  I would scan for the usual brand in the usual size then chunk it into my cart without knowing what I was spending or what else might be a better buy.  In fact, one day I realized that I actually had no idea what some of my usual items cost!  I had gotten to the point that brand loyalty was more important than any other way of choosing items! 

 

So … already store loyal, I’d travel around my store picking up the brands that had somehow earned my loyalty in a routine that was very important to me even though it was stressful, costing me money and piling up unhealthy convenience foods in my fridge and pantry. 

 

5 Essential Changes I Made to Save Money at the Grocery

All of these habits were steadily carving away at my buying power not only as grocery prices went up, but as other costs of daily living went up as well.  I decided to change that and found many ways to change my shopping habits in order to save.

 

First, I took on grocery shopping as a project.  I set aside leisurely time on my days off to get acquainted with several stores on my usual routes about town and close to home.  I picked one at a time that I never used and visited it with a sense of exploration.  I browsed.  I discovered its layout.  Consequently, I felt comfortable returning to that store even when in a hurry or tired.

 

Second, in every store I visited I picked up sale flyers and I asked the cashier about any specials that were routine.  I was shocked to find, for example, that stores had many of my household’s staples at significantly reduced prices either routinely or on certain days of the week.  For example, I found banana Wednesday at one store and avocados at 1/3 my usual price at another.  At my house this is important!

 

At all stores I found certain ‘hook you and keep you coming back’ routinely inexpensive staple items like milk, cheese and eggs!  The list of finds in routine specials and ‘hook you’ items is lengthy, but you get the idea.  Reading and asking will fill in the rest of the savings story.

 

Third, in just a few trips to explore, I had begun to plan multiple shopping trips throughout the week to buy less per trip, save more overall and make grocery shopping a less stressful chore.  I stopped squeezing my shopping trips into the exhausted part of my day.  I began to view grocery shopping as a hunt for treasure.  I began to enjoy finding the great deal and very importantly for my savings and my peace of mind.  I transformed myself from a harried hurrier into a leisurely browser.

 

Fourth, once I slowed down and began to enjoy shopping more, I took time to read labels and store-posted information about items.  I discovered that my brand loyalty for the sake of quality didn’t hold up!  I discovered this by reading labels and comparing ingredients on similar products.  For example, I’ve now given up a life-long loyalty to a peanut butter we all grew up with.  I’ve replaced it with a store-brand at ½ the cost, matching ingredients and no taste difference.  Even more surprising, this item and several others, come from a health food shop that I had always believed was too expensive!  I wouldn’t have known this shop’s values until I took time to explore it.

 

Comparison shopping between items in the same store also brought some other surprises and significant savings.  By reading the posted price per ounce tabs that stores have on their shelves I learned that what I thought was saving me money wasn’t.  Economy sizes aren’t always economical!  The eye and the mind can be easily fooled by packaging.  Marketing experts know a lot of tricks. One that is hard to grasp at first glance is that one package, jar, bottle or can might appear bigger than the next while the actual contents are less than what seems to be a smaller item!  To know what you are getting in a package is on the label listed as the weight of the actual contents.  Just picking up the bigger size of an item may mean that you are buying a package rather than its contents!

 

Fifth, I changed my attitude about buying groceries.  I did this consciously by letting go of my struggle and scarcity beliefs.  I began to remind myself that what I need is available to me.  This is the part of resource management that I call my spiritual economics.  It is a matter of faith for me that I will be able to have the provisions I need and that I have all the resources I need to get them.  

 

When I think otherwise, the reverse is true.  If I focus on lack, fear, deprivation and scarcity, I see those things everywhere I turn.  If I believe instead that my needs will be met and that I have everything I need to have a good life, I see those blessings everywhere I turn!  

 

Food sustains us.  Gathering groceries is a life sustaining activity.  It can also be a ritual of affirming life rather than a chore of struggling with life.  Approach it with the notion of bringing greater abundance into your life and I believe you will begin to transform not only your shopping habits but also your thoughts and beliefs.  I believe that we can see our blessings and “create” more wealth with the same amount of dollars we had when we felt poor! 

 

Of course, we have to do our homework and footwork in order to use our resources better, but those activities are valuable in themselves.  Every step I take to better provide for the needs of my family is a way of churning out more love.  Every step I take to better provide for my needs is a way of increasing my own self-love.  Who can argue with the value of that?!

 

I wish you happy hunting, happy shopping and far more blessings to count! 

 

“The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers.  The original meal has never been found.”

-Calvin Trillin

 

“Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.”

-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, The Physiology of Taste, 1825

 

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