We are fortunate that we don't have to save out of necessity. We do it as a way of life. That's what we have always done. We grow a fairly big garden, can and freeze what we harvest. I do most of the maintenance on house and equipment. We rarely (almost never) eat out. We buy store brands instead of name brands in most cases. I used to hunt so we had venison to eat but don't do that any more. We still catch fish for some tasty meals.
Hello Sheldon, You and your wife sound like my deceased husband and me. We both worked, and worked our five acers. We spent our time in a 3 acer garden patch along with our five children. We also raised rabbits, chickens, and a few pigs and cows. It was a great way to teach our family long lasting standards. I use to sew, can, pickle, and recycle everything for our family. I found it a great challenge, and even a lot of fun.
Interesting, I've never heard of the Scan-rite guarantee, but will definitely check that out, because I did have something ring up incorrectly before. I do tend to not check, unless the total is way higher than I expected. Also, Kroger has the Free Friday item, where you can log in online, and add it to your card, then redeem it within 2 weeks. I also use their electronic coupons, where I load them onto the courtesy card, and they're taken off as the items are scanned at the register.
How do I save money, by not having any. No, seriously I am someone who will shop at yard sales and thrft stores. Hey this stuff was new at one time. I also shop a store frequently called 99 cents only. This is a great place to go to cut down on my food budget. I have saved a whole lot of money on grocery's since finding this store in my area.
I have cats, so we go through a lot of paper towels. Two of them are old, and one of them throws up at least a few times a week, and there are other messes around the feeding station, etc. Three times a day I was using paper towels to dry the cat bowls after washing them. Then there are all of the other messes that required paper towels. Not long ago, someone at the Tractor Supply Company recommended Sellars Blue Shop Towels, which were on sale. I forget what the price was but, although they are available from Amazon.com, they were far cheaper at TSC. They are made from recycled paper but they work almost like cloth towels, except that they can be more easily rinsed out and even dried in a dryer, although when I simply drape them over the sink, they dry within an hour or so. They absorb well and can be reused multiple times. In fact, I have been using them for about a month and I haven't worn one out yet. It doesn't sound like much but we were going through a lot of paper towels. While I could have simply used regular towels, they would have to be washed in a washing machine and stored somewhere between washings, and some of the stuff I clean up with them is not something I want mixed in with our dirty clothes. These can simply be rinsed after use, and dried within a very short time, ready for the next use. In other words, they are more convenient than rags or regular towels.
Living alone has given me the opportunity to rework my shopping strategies and save money, but this advice equally works for anyone feeling identified with this dilemma; big savings VS big waste. When buying canned goods or processed food you may find significant discounts in big cans and packages, what is theoretically a good deal, unless it results in waste of food. If you buy a big can of soup and nobody is going to eat it all today, you can still have saved money by refrigerating leftovers, and even without refrigerator, processed food may last for 1 or 2 more days at room temperature as long as it contains preservatives, which is everyday more uncommon. So if you find yourself throwing away part of the food that you bought for cheap, you are wasting money rather than saving it. My workaround here is buying dehydrated food alternatives whenever exist these for a given food. Dehydrated food last longer and you can always take as much or little as needed every time. Actually my shopping list include a variety of dehydrated beans, potatoes, tomatoes, whole egg, egg yolk, egg whites, meat, chili mix for fresh salsa, and some other foods that may not be available at the store all the time. As an additional money saving tip; I break my shopping list down into 3-4 sub-lists, one for different chain stores and one for the farmers market, grouping items based on the lowest price, that may change every-week. So if this week "product X2" is cheaper at Walmart, this item goes in the Walmart list rather than the corner supermarket it was the past one, and this way go through them.
Well, I am in my 50s but I still don't qualify for any senior discounts that I know of. Sigh... On the other hand, I'm not so sure I do want to qualify because then I guess there would be no way around it. I would be a senior!
Back in the dark days of my largely misspent life, I wanted to see if I could feed myself on a dollar a day. At the time, this was partly an experiment and partly by necessity. In those days there was a day old bread store in my town that sold all sorts of bakery items cheap. A dollar would buy 3-4 loaves of bread. I already had coffee, so for one day I lived on bread and coffee, and still had bread left over. Canned tomato soup was cheap, so the next day I had bread, soup and coffee. On the west side of my town is a large cemetery. On two sides of the graveyard are wooded ravines. Around the edges blackberries grow wild, and there are rabbits galore in the spring and summer. So, some days I had fruit and meat, thanks to my skill with an air pistol. And living beside the Mississippi river meant fish were plentiful as well. After a few weeks I was confident I could feed myself on even less than a dollar a day. That's no longer the case, however. I miss those days.
It was a lot cheaper to buy many kinds of food back in those early days. I remember when my kids were growing up, many times we had to make every penny of the food budget stretch as far as possible. They used to sell chicken backs for about 19 cents per lb., and we often had chicken noodles or chicken soup made form those chicken backs and necks. A special treat was to build a campfire out back, and put a grill (shelf from an old fridge or oven) on top of the rocks and then we roasted the chicken backs over the fire. The dogs happily waited around for the leftover bones, so they were happy, too. We didn't roast the necks; and those made another whole meal with rice or noodles.
Saving money in shopping? Of course, I hunt for sales and discount coupons. But what I really enjoy is the gimmick of credit cards here that grant gift certificates for a certain amount of purchase using the credit card. From the 30,000 gas bills for one month, I got 2,000 worth of gift certificate from a reputable boutique. I was able to get 3 shirts and a pair of denims for that amount. Not bad considering that the gift certificates were freebies.
I get senior discounts when they are on. I look through the sale papers each week. I use my plastic garbage bags that I have to pya 5 cents for......for garbage as it is cheaper than buying a box of garbage bags for my kitchen garbage. I belong to ensure club, so I get coupons every month. I sign up for other coupons when I see them. I go to walmart because they honor other store's sale items and coupons. I go to consignment shops and thrift stores (when I am not in Winners, haha) I buy in quantity......if an item I use regularly is on sale this week, I stock up, and skimp on other things, next week I do the same with the next product that is on sale. I always have shelves of stock.
I buy some things used to save money. I use Ebates when shopping online, so I can get a little money back. I also use my PayPal debit card and also get money back. It's about equal to Discover's 1% cash back bonus. It doesn't sound like much, but it does add up, and I'm not doing anything I wouldn't be doing otherwise, except clicking a button to activate the savings first, before checking out, in the case of Ebates. I hold garage sales with my neighbors a couple of times a year, and we sometimes swap or barter items among us, in addition to bringing in a little cash.
My wife and I each get more than a thousand back from PayPal each year just by using it as credit rather than debit.
In what way, Ken? Do you mean selecting credit at check out, rather than debit, or are you referring to PayPal Credit?
With a PayPal Business Debit MasterCard, you can get 1% back on most purchases by using it as a credit card rather than a debit card. In other words, when I make a purchase with my debit card, I have to choose “credit” rather than “debit” when asked at the check-out counter, or after swiping my card.