Victor
One way to blow your budget is to buy everything you don’t need but want because you are hungry while walking through the grocery store’s aisles. The best way to fix this problem and save money on your shopping trip is to eat before going grocery shopping. This one trick can save you hundreds of dollars each month on items you don’t need.
We’ve all done it. We’ve gone to the store hungry. This is one of the worst things you can do. It will sabotage your grocery shopping effort. Most of our grocery shopping is spent buying the things we want or the things we like. It’s not built around shopping strategically for the meals we were planning to make. Most grocery store layout is designed to get us to go in a certain direction and by certain things, and it works.
However, you do have one tool at your disposal, and that is to go shopping on a not-quite-full stomach. The solution is to eat before you go grocery shopping. Let me caution you here. One of the mistakes you can make to really protect yourself is to eat a lot and think “I’m going to be so full I won’t be tempted to buy anything.” The problem with that theory is you’ll be so full you won’t even want to shop for what you need, let alone what you want. You will start saying to yourself, “I don’t need that”. You are simply uninterested in food at the moment. You will wind up not purchasing what you need.
Why eating before you grocery shop could save you big money
So the process is simple. After you put together your list based on a strategic set of menu items that you want to make, you eat something light, a small meal or protein-based snack, something of that nature, especially if it involves a treat fix that you might want, but please don’t pig out.
I usually stop at my local favorite, Bojangles, and have a chicken biscuit. It doesn’t overfill me, and it stops all cravings. You don’t have to eat out, you can eat something at home, but this is part of my shopping routine.
This is probably the best solution for effective grocery shopping. Whether you eat something at home or grab something out, develop it as part of your routine.
Have a Routine
Another bonus tip to making sure that you’re not hungry when you go grocery shopping is to shop as a routine, as I just mentioned. Shopping sporadically and on an impulse will definitely cause you to spend more money than you plan to, and usually also results in a waste of groceries. It’s the unplanned and impulse purchases that generally cause most of our waste and loss of money.
I typically start early in the morning, so the first thing out is to get something to eat on the way, and then, I hit the grocery store settled, and I’m not overly full, and I’m not hungry. My first trip is usually to Sam’s Club because it opens early, and I have a membership that allows me to enter early when it opens for the business members. You pay a little more for this, but depending on your personality and your grocery volume, you might like it better, and it might be worth it.
Grocery Shopping Objectives
- Shop as a routine
- Eat before you shop
- Purchase according to your plan
If I go to the store hungry, I will buy every snack and treat I put my eyes on. I rationalize the entire time that I haven’t had this in a while or this looks great. I’m just going to do it this weekend, and the family will love it too. But the truth is, if I shop this way, I wind up buying so much of this stuff that all we do is gain weight from it, half of it might go in the garbage, or it just sits on the shelf for weeks or months until I throw it out.
I hope you try this technique the next time you go shopping. I truly think you’ll find it a big game-changer in how you shop and how much you spend. Create a routine that includes eating before you go shopping and stick with it. You will spend less on impulse purchases.
