Grocery game: worth the time?

[Runrooster]

I make exception for the weekly grocery circular, which I always look through to familiarize myself with weekly sales.

Same. Reading the weekly supermarket ads can be a real money saver, combined with a price book (mental or otherwise). When foods you like are offered at a price well below the usual amount, put them on your shopping list and center your meal planning around them. Anything where they limit the amount you can buy at that price is likely a loss leader and therefore a prime candidate for your list. For example I see the supermarket I frequently shop at is offering asparagus for 97¢/lb this week. We don't usually eat a lot of asparagus, but we'll gladly work it into a few meals at that price. They're offering butter for $1.97/lb (limit 2 lbs), a price definitely worth taking advantage of. A particular variety of bread is offered at $1.49 per loaf, also a good price these days. There's a brand of pimento-stuffed olives I like that normally costs something like $5/jar but it's $1.49 this week. I'll stock up on a few at that price.

I’ve been struggling with my long term habit of cutting grocery costs, to the bone. I stock up on loss leaders, frequent the ethnic/produce store, shop the clearance rack near my work at lunch. The savings are substantial but so is the time.

Curious whether anyone has tried to quantify the savings per hour spent. Even if my numbers are different they’re probably in a similar ballpark. Basically this clearly made sense when I was working fewer hours and made a lot less money. My income has tripled but my hours have also gone up.

As a start, I shop for 3 people, 2 seniors. I spend $50-$100/week, $300/month. I don’t limit myself if there’s a good sale. But I also often stop at a store (30 minutes total) for only 2 items. Today I did that and saved $30. The clearance rack has mostly good produce for $1 / 2 pounds. Some days it’s all apples and oranges and some days I get artichokes and leeks. I usually walk out with $5 cost, or about $20 value. Mostly it’s an excuse to walk at lunch.

I realize the main savings is in what we eat, little processed food and rare fish or beef. Nothing organic. Shop in season. And my parents don’t eat much, less fruit than I do.

Every now and then I say I’ll ramp up the spending but then I balk at $4/ pound plums or $3 each artichoke. My Mom says “just buy less”.

[Cranky]

Nobody else is paying me for my time, and I find competitive grocery shopping both entertaining and profitable. YMMV

[Dicey]

I hate waste. I don't like to over pay for anything. I love a deal. I find shopping the way we do satisfyingly subversive.

I also abhor food waste. The stores you describe specialize in overruns, packaging changes, close to expiration date, even very recently expired items. Buying and using this food reduces waste, which has value.

Also, these stores, especially the ethnic food shops, tend to be mom and pop operations. Yeah, I'm happy to support people who are working their asses off to succeed in life.

I also like Costco for the value and quality they provide and the fact that they pay their employees handsomely. I like their priorities. Win-win.

FWIW, I'm in the "and Beyond" cohort. Just because I can afford to buy groceries at any price doesn't mean I'm willing or required to.

Finally, I'm a fan of Amy Daczczyn's Pantry Principle. Keeping a well stocked larder means I have to shop less often.

[cool7hand]

Do whatever works for you. Who cares what others think.

[MayDay]

When I didn't work FT I knew all the grocery prices and went to multiple stores like you describe.

Now I work FT and just buy whatever we want/need at whatever store is convenient.

Obviously we spend more on groceries now. But at the same time my income has more than doubled in 5 years. I use a lot of mental bandwidth on my job and it's paid off. That pays much better than grocery shopping for deals. At some point when I stop working FT I will have the mental bandwidth and time and go back to it.

[lhamo]

One way to simplify things is to combine the Amy D Pantry Principal mentioned by @Dicey above + just tracking the loss leaders at one or two main stores.  In the greater Seattle area, Fred Meyer (Kroger chain) tends to have the most reasonable regular prices + great loss leaders (most requiring coupons but those are easy to add to your shopper card with the app) every week.  That is also the store that is closest to me, so that is my main grocery store.  But we also get the weekly flyer for Safeway/Albertson's, so every week I look at that quickly to see what the loss leaders are and then if there is something we need that is at a good price I'll swing by on my way to do other errands to get those items.

There are also certain things we get once or twice a month at Costco.  Stuff we get at the Asian market once or twice a month that are much cheaper/better variety there.  And occasionally I'll swing into Grocery Outlet (our local liquidator chain) or Trader Joe's (rarely).

If you are a carnivore the biggest area you can save is probably by only buying meat when it is a loss leader or otherwise heavily discounted and then having a large freezer to store it in.  For me the current target prices are under $1/lb for chicken (lowest I have seen recently is $.79/lb) or under $3.50ish for whole cuts of beef.  For fruit/veg, I just try to buy whatever the heavily discounted produce is for that week at Fred Meyer.

[mistymoney]

Nobody else is paying me for my time, and I find competitive grocery shopping both entertaining and profitable. YMMV

I despise it with a vengeance!

I'll participate from time to time but I have a red hot rage against the entity for wasting my time on such nonsense. Provide a savings or no - but don't make me keep track of pieces of paper or click on imaginary stickers online, etc.

And I'll eliminate both the brands and the vendors who play these games whenever I can. Because - I hate them!

[seattlecyclone]

I make exception for the weekly grocery circular, which I always look through to familiarize myself with weekly sales.

Same. Reading the weekly supermarket ads can be a real money saver, combined with a price book (mental or otherwise). When foods you like are offered at a price well below the usual amount, put them on your shopping list and center your meal planning around them. Anything where they limit the amount you can buy at that price is likely a loss leader and therefore a prime candidate for your list. For example I see the supermarket I frequently shop at is offering asparagus for 97¢/lb this week. We don't usually eat a lot of asparagus, but we'll gladly work it into a few meals at that price. They're offering butter for $1.97/lb (limit 2 lbs), a price definitely worth taking advantage of. A particular variety of bread is offered at $1.49 per loaf, also a good price these days. There's a brand of pimento-stuffed olives I like that normally costs something like $5/jar but it's $1.49 this week. I'll stock up on a few at that price.

I’ve been struggling with my long term habit of cutting grocery costs, to the bone. I stock up on loss leaders, frequent the ethnic/produce store, shop the clearance rack near my work at lunch. The savings are substantial but so is the time.

Curious whether anyone has tried to quantify the savings per hour spent.

I guess it would help to know how many hours you're spending on this. You'd need to do shopping in some fashion anyway, so it's really any "extra" time you spend looking at deals and/or making special trips that counts.

You mention spending half an hour going to a store to buy two things. That's probably not worthwhile. I don't do that. Instead if I'm making a trip to the supermarket anyway I'll spend ~10 minutes scrolling through the weekly ad and any other deals in the store's app, adding some low-priced items to my shopping list. It's not unusual for this to save $20. $20 (post-tax) for 10 minutes of work is pretty good!

If I do make a second shopping trip in a given week I might go to a different chain to take advantage of a second set of loss leaders, but I won't make a special trip just for those.

[sonofsven]

To me it's not worth it. Years ago I shopped the discount scratch and dent food outlet for staples and snacks, but these days I shop at three stores: Costco, my local co-op for veggies and probiotic stuff, and the "country market" (real name) if I need an onion or some sandpaper or something.
Instead of looking for bargains I simplified what I eat.
I don't eat processed food with very few exceptions (yogurt, sauerkraut, sour cream, bread, tortillas--I can't think of any others.)
At the discount grocer I often bought high end snacks that were cheap, but they were really just processed junk.
Another thing I bought was cans of beans, but I quit eating beans (because of inflammation concerns), and besides, dry beans are cheaper, and canned beans at Costco are just as good a value in my experience.
I found I bought more junk because it was cheap.
In my case running around to different stores bargain shopping is a waste of gas and time.

[Cranky]

I find going to Costco both tedious and generally overpriced on grocery items, so I really only go when we need coffee beans, and I buy a lot at one time.

[Runrooster]

I think I spend about 3-4 hrs a week shopping, and another hour scanning sales, loading coupons. Like mistymoney I was complaining about the tedium of that but I understand they do it to limit sales. Otherwise they’d run out of stock even faster than they do, which is often by Sunday.

The nature of our main ethnic store plus one other store would take at least 2.5 hours anyway. So I guess I earn a good return. And I’m busy but not that busy.

I wish I liked Aldi or LIDL more. They have good general merchandise but the produce is iffy and sale items run out. Plus it’s in the other direction as the ethnic store. Granted I’ve only been there a few times, usually when they have a loss leader on blueberries.

The reason it’s hard to see how much you saved is often you’re substituting items. You wouldn’t buy asparagus if it wasn’t on sale, so is the normal price what you compare against or the price of broccoli?  Today I got waffles on sale, which my mom eats daily, but I usually buy her the other ones. Or pistachios were a loss leader which all three of us eat with breakfast, but I don’t know what the next cheapest sale price is. Plus I bought the limit allowed which often freaks out my Mom and has her giving them away.  so I hide them from her until the next sale.

Actually another shopper was complaining about our ethnic store. It has a big weekend sale section, but regular prices are the same as other stores.

The other random issue is that my dad has been having health scares. Last week I thought he’d end up in the hospital and wished I hadn’t bought so many packets of his daily tortillas. Which seems funny today, they weren’t expensive and if something happens we can give it to a food pantry. Still after a few years of food hoarding due to the pandemic, I want to get to where I stock 2, maybe 6 months worth of food.

[Cranky]

My Aldi has nicer produce than the bigger chain grocery! It doesn’t have a lot of specialty produce though - they have cilantro but not other fresh herbs, so I just don’t use fresh out of season.

[roomtempmayo]

I think I spend about 3-4 hrs a week shopping, and another hour scanning sales, loading coupons.

That seems like a whole lot to me.

Our grocery spend got a little out of control during the pandemic (hello Whole Foods delivery), and I've been watching it for the past year or so.

The local cheaper supermarket does free online ordering and curbside pickup.  I start with their sale add and the weather forecast each week and build a menu in Paprika (menu planning app).  The app then creates a grocery list that I plug into an online grocery order.  It might take me 30 to 45 minutes, but most of that is menu planning that I'd have to do no matter what, and I do it from the comfort of my living room.  Cost savings are probably 1/3-1/2 less than Whole Foods without any fees, plus you don't get hit up for tips.  Weekly spend for three people is $60-90.

Building menus around what's on sale and in season seems worthwhile, as I'm likely saving something like $40-50/week for minimal effort.  But spending hours running around town to the scratch and dent store or other discounters seems well past the point of diminishing returns.

[Runrooster]

I’d love to be able to do that. Coworker swears by “instacart from ALDIs”. I don’t drive all around town and have no idea where the scratch and dent or discounter are. I walk to my chain grocery store which has good clearance produce and bakery.

So the 3 hours includes 45-60 minutes to drive to the ethnic store which has staples from my parents homeland. I could go there once a month but it also has good prices on produce in general.

Which is another factor. We buy a lot of fruits and veg. Neither parent eats much meat, and a decent variety of fresh food can add up. I don’t know any chain grocery store where I could get out in $60-$90 even if I shopped very carefully, but we live in a HCOL area.

[Laura33]

What parts of the grocery game do you enjoy, and what drives you nuts?  What would you do with your extra time if you don't do the grocery game?  Can you focus on the part you like and figure out an easier way to do the stuff you don't?  E.g., if you want an excuse to go for a walk at lunch, then why not keep doing what you're doing to get a great deal?  But then limit your weekly shopping trips to a single store vs. chasing the most deals at multiple stores, and enjoy a little extra time with your family, or doing something else productive (researching cheaper cell phones/insurance/etc., cutting off old recurring subscriptions you don't use, etc.).

I would also suggest cutting back on the pressure you put on yourself to plan around the best deals everywhere.  Yes, that is a great habit to be in.  But it sounds like you have a lot of other pressures in your life, and that those have gotten worse lately (more time at work, more medical demands from the seniors).  That sucks away your mental bandwidth, so that stuff that has been easy (or at least manageable) in the past suddenly seems impossible.  And when that happens, you need to listen to what your body is telling you.  Each of us can handle only so much shit at one time, and so when one turdball grows beyond control, you need to find a way to cut back on another turdball so they both still fit in the available space.  Really, it's awesome when you can find asparagus for $0.97/lb, but the world will not end if you miss the sale and go without asparagus entirely -- no matter how cheap it is -- because you've decided you're going to eat out of your freezer this week instead of dealing with all the shopping.

Finally, are you doing ok?  One of things I've noticed is that when big scary things are happening, it becomes super-easy to over-focus on the trivial and meaningless, because it allows you to feel in control of something (even when that something doesn't actually matter).  So it may be that your fretting about the grocery game isn't really about the groceries or the money after all (a/k/a "it's not about the tortillas").  Worth thinking about at least. 

IOW, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.  Figure out for yourself what you consider to be "good enough," and let go of the rest until the rest of your life lightens up a bit.  And in the meantime, be kind to yourself.  You've worked hard and saved hard, and that has you at a point where you do not need to make the most financially optimal decision at all times and at all costs.  As long as you're staying within what you can afford overall, it's ok to lighten up a bit on the grocery effort while you adjust to all the other crap happening in your life. 

[Laura33]

So the 3 hours includes 45-60 minutes to drive to the ethnic store which has staples from my parents homeland. I could go there once a month but it also has good prices on produce in general.

How much gas and wear and tear does it cost you to make that drive?  How much would you save on produce if you went every week?  And how much would you save on gas if you went only every month and went to the closer store for produce instead?  And most important:  what is that extra hour of your life worth?

[Runrooster]

I mean the closest real grocery store is still 15 minutes one way. Adding 15 minutes a week so my parents get variety when they want etc. is no big deal.

[Laura33]

I mean the closest real grocery store is still 15 minutes one way. Adding 15 minutes a week so my parents get variety when they want etc. is no big deal.

Well you can of course decide that it's worth the trip for emotional reasons.  But you've been focusing on the $$$.  And if you want to look at the $$$ objectively, you also need to consider the cost of the gas and wear and tear on your car from the extra driving around.  What is the current estimate, about 55 cents/mile per the IRS?  That's a decent basic number to work from.

[Runrooster]

Yup, 55cents a mile, 8 extra miles round trip. Im talking about saving $100/week, $4 wear and tear a drop in the bucket. I do make an effort to bunch trips, so if I drive to work on Friday I will shop on the way home.

It sounds like your time is worth a lot more than mine, or that driving and grocery shopping are especially tedious. An extra hour of my time, vs the stress of that drive, maybe $20 (post tax, not as a wage to drive/shop)?  My response to seattlecyclone assumed I’d continue going to the ethnic store, it’s all the extra stops I question some days.

[Runrooster]

I was glancing through this thread at work and missed the super long (famously) message from Laura33. Right, im going through hell right now, 2 weeks out from my first professional exam in 13 years. They’ve gotten easier but im older. We had ONE bad week at work and my coworker moved to remote, plus they’ve brought in new software just as I’d gotten used to the old one.

But this particular musing is something I’ve been mulling for awhile. Is it fun, is it exhausting, is it a distraction from daily hassles?  I literally can’t convince myself to pay full price for… almost anything. Just wait, it will show up eventually. It feels weird, like im a mutant.  Our (minimum wage) caregiver goes to one big ethnic store, pays whatever, doesn’t stock up and her life is okay. The worst part is that whenever I try to break this habit, the expensive food is tasteless, out of season or I’ll find the perfect sale the next day. I learned the hard way not to brag to coworkers about my latest score. One or two enjoyed it, the rest thought I was nuts, even when all of us were making minimum wage.

I don’t know if I wanted confirmation that it’s fun and worthwhile or permission to pay full price. It does help to hear I’m not the only person who shops competitively.

Sorry for the endless edits but also: going shopping this weekend was a forced break from studying which has even preempted walks and sleep.

[englishteacheralex]

I do not have time for the grocery game. I do one grocery shop a week, usually on Saturday afternoon. I either go to Target or Costco. Remember, I'm in Hawaii, so my grocery options are limited. I alternate Target/Costco every other week. Before I go, I check the sales in the circulars and add sale items that I know we'll use to our list.

I have a list of about thirty dinners that I rotate through, and we all eat the same things for breakfast every day so I just keep a running stock of those items. Lunch is either leftovers from dinner or a set frozen lunch option that I always stock (for when there are no dinner leftovers). I meal plan for the week on Saturday mornings and most of the meals have ingredients that can be mixed/matched. This way we have maximum efficiency with minimum waste. I do mostly frozen produce in order to avoid waste.

I'm ok with not getting the best possible deal on every grocery item in order to keep to this rigid system that allows me to spend as little money and time as possible. Since I keep such a simple meal planning routine, I can stock up on items that are on sale and, for many items, I rarely have to buy them at full price.

[RWD]

I think I spend about 3-4 hrs a week shopping, and another hour scanning sales, loading coupons.

We spend about 1 hour a week shopping. Wife skims the coupons on her phone for a few minutes right before we leave or on the way to the store. If she misses a coupon she can just scan the barcode in the store and load it up immediately (Kroger app).

We do spend significantly more on groceries than you, though some of that is certainly what we're buying rather than lack of deal-hunting. Considering only time versus grocery bill I'd estimate you're saving $9/hour compared to how we spend. Not terrible, but I bet there's some compromise where you only spend 2 hours (instead of 4-5) and only increase spending marginally.

Though I think Laura33 has the best advice (as usual).

[Runrooster]

Yeah, I’ve heard good things about Kroger. Come to think of it about 10 years ago we had a good all purpose store (Magruders) which had great produce, good weekly sales, and reasonable general merch. It was still over a 2 hour shop because it further away and shopping just takes time. I miss that.

This thread could be a rant about the sucky grocery options in the DMV. The 3 big chains have 2-3 loss leaders every week but overall the prices are not much below Whole Foods.

[simonsez]

Every now and then I say I’ll ramp up the spending but then I balk at $4/ pound plums or $3 each artichoke. My Mom says “just buy less”.

Buying less and/or something else as a substitute can be great solutions.  You ever think about opportunity cost instead of just your hourly wage while looking for deals?

I.e. does it cost less (land, equipment, labor, packaging, logistics, etc.) to grow and process them yourself?

If so, do it and pat yourself on the back for saving money and putting work into something that grows (and is good for bees).

If not, appreciate the amazing economies of scale that go into growing food the store is offering for prices lower than you could replicate and pony up.

Life is too short for angst over groceries whenever you're already getting a decent deal as provided by capitalism/innovation/permanent-agriculture that have NOT been available to all humans in climate-controlled stores for 99.96%+ of our species' duration on this blue marble.  It's up to you if it's important to trim additional dollars off this already subsidized food budget or not.  I mean seriously, the first grocery store didn't exist until 1916 (a Piggly Wiggly in Memphis, TN), the first fridges for home use in 1913, and indoor plumbing/running water didn't exist until the 1840s if you were wealthy.  Anatomically modern humans have been around for ~315,000 years.  Gathering food and water and the storing of supplies has never been easier or less time-consuming!

[Laura33]

I was glancing through this thread at work and missed the super long (famously) message from Laura33. Right, im going through hell right now, 2 weeks out from my first professional exam in 13 years. They’ve gotten easier but im older. We had ONE bad week at work and my coworker moved to remote, plus they’ve brought in new software just as I’d gotten used to the old one.

But this particular musing is something I’ve been mulling for awhile. Is it fun, is it exhausting, is it a distraction from daily hassles?  I literally can’t convince myself to pay full price for… almost anything. Just wait, it will show up eventually. It feels weird, like im a mutant.  Our (minimum wage) caregiver goes to one big ethnic store, pays whatever, doesn’t stock up and her life is okay. The worst part is that whenever I try to break this habit, the expensive food is tasteless, out of season or I’ll find the perfect sale the next day. I learned the hard way not to brag to coworkers about my latest score. One or two enjoyed it, the rest thought I was nuts, even when all of us were making minimum wage.

I don’t know if I wanted confirmation that it’s fun and worthwhile or permission to pay full price. It does help to hear I’m not the only person who shops competitively.

Sorry for the endless edits but also: going shopping this weekend was a forced break from studying which has even preempted walks and sleep.

If it's working for you, then go for it, by all means.  My mom is the lady who'd leave $10M to the local library and everyone would be floored that she had all that money.  But she flat-out enjoys saving money.  She plans all the travel for her consulting jobs, and she adores finding deals and working the points game.  Whenever she goes to the outlets for clothes (most often for her grandkids, of course), we have to play the "price game" and guess how much she saved (hint: you must always, always guess high, so she can be proud in announcing the great deal she got).  It gives her pleasure to not spend -- or, more accurately, to spend a hell of a lot less through her own efforts than she'd spend otherwise.  She enjoys that feeling of saving money than she'd ever get from a splurge.

So, yeah, if it's serving a purpose for you -- an excuse for a walk, a break from studying, etc. -- then by all means keep on keeping on!  Hell, that's how I started batch cooking:  I was in law school and wanted an excuse to watch football every Sunday, and I figured if I cooked for the week, I'd save time M-F.  It doesn't even need to be the most financially optimal use of your time; you can consider it a hobby and do it just because it makes you happy.  My point is only that it is also ok to back off when life hits and following your normal routine is causing more stress than it is relieving.

Also, my time is not worth more than yours.  This is a value assessment, not a financial one.  We each have exactly the same 24 hours every day, and we each have both the privilege and the burden of deciding how to spend them.  So the only question is whether that 3-4 hrs you're spending on shopping is worth it, or whether the extra hour or two you'd free up by cutting back is worth more than the $ you save that week.

[TheGadfly]

This thread is really timely for me. In my younger years (before kids), I loved the grocery game and sometimes felt like I was "beating the system" by sourcing relatively high quality food at minimum cost. Recently, with a toddler and a baby on the way, grocery shopping (not to mention meal planning, cooking, clean-up etc) has become an enormous hassle. I also find ordering groceries on an app to be tedious and frustrating since they routinely do not fill the entire order or they include substitutes that I don't like.

A few weeks ago, I signed up for one of those Blue Apron -type services to have three dinners per week delivered to my door (I may increase it to five). I've long been opposed to these services thinking I could re-create the same meals myself at a lower cost, carbon footprint, etc. but I had to give in. The meals end up costing twice as much as I would spend on the same ingredients but the time savings is priceless (no meal planning, no coupon clipping, no circular reading, no 2+ hour shopping trips, no $ on gas, no wear on my car, very little food prep and very little clean-up). With the extra time, I can spend it with family or even turn to my side-hustle, which is something I actually enjoy doing.

TL/DR If you love the grocery games, go for it. If you don't, it's worth outsourcing.

[StarBright]

A few weeks ago, I signed up for one of those Blue Apron -type services to have three dinners per week delivered to my door (I may increase it to five). I've long been opposed to these services thinking I could re-create the same meals myself at a lower cost, carbon footprint, etc. but I had to give in. The meals end up costing twice as much as I would spend on the same ingredients but the time savings is priceless (no meal planning, no coupon clipping, no circular reading, no 2+ hour shopping trips, no $ on gas, no wear on my car, very little food prep and very little clean-up). With the extra time, I can spend it with family or even turn to my side-hustle, which is something I actually enjoy doing.

If you want to play the meal delivery service game you can get a couple of accounts going and then put them on hold when the  promo pricing runs out. Then switch to another one. I get 2-3 meals a week for a family of 4 for about $38 bucks this way. 

I used to switch them up but now I just do HomeChef. I get promo pricing about once a quarter, use it for 3-4 weeks and I'm usually tired of their food by the time the regular pricing kicks in again. It can be a nice break from the grind of planning/cooking/shopping for 7 dinners a week.

[Runrooster]

Thanks for getting it TheGadfly. I got a headache trying to explain myself to Laura33, even though I’ve met plenty of people with her “you get what you pay for” and “you deserve better” attitude. I’ve watched a number of them come around some when they see the quality of what I eat. It’s not analogous to buying the weird, outdated, out of season clothing that’s been through 3 retailers and no one bought. A salad kit that was in the refrigerator 20 minutes ago got replaced with new stock, they slapped a .50 sticker on it and it was sold within half an hour. It still has a week long frig life. I can stop, you get it. And yeah if I had a toddler and newborn, the calculation would change. We pay for lawn care, a caregiver who does household chores, I drive a Tesla, I still have the bandwidth to save $60/hour.

[economista]

A few weeks ago, I signed up for one of those Blue Apron -type services to have three dinners per week delivered to my door (I may increase it to five). I've long been opposed to these services thinking I could re-create the same meals myself at a lower cost, carbon footprint, etc. but I had to give in. The meals end up costing twice as much as I would spend on the same ingredients but the time savings is priceless (no meal planning, no coupon clipping, no circular reading, no 2+ hour shopping trips, no $ on gas, no wear on my car, very little food prep and very little clean-up). With the extra time, I can spend it with family or even turn to my side-hustle, which is something I actually enjoy doing.

If you want to play the meal delivery service game you can get a couple of accounts going and then put them on hold when the  promo pricing runs out. Then switch to another one. I get 2-3 meals a week for a family of 4 for about $38 bucks this way. 

I used to switch them up but now I just do HomeChef. I get promo pricing about once a quarter, use it for 3-4 weeks and I'm usually tired of their food by the time the regular pricing kicks in again. It can be a nice break from the grind of planning/cooking/shopping for 7 dinners a week.

I've used them in the past too, but I found that they didn't actually save me any time. My family eats more than 2-3 meals per week! So yes, the dinners covered by those meal services are covered, but I still have to meal plan for breakfast, lunch, snacks, and the other nights of the week. I still have to do grocery shopping so having those meals covered only saved me approximately 5 minutes or less on my grocery shopping? Plus, I had to take the time to choose which meals I wanted them to send me.

Granted, we buy the same staples for breakfast and snacks  but we really ended up in a quandary over lunches. We eat leftovers for lunches but those meals never made leftovers and we would end up scrambling to figure out what to have for lunch the following day.

[Laura33]

Thanks for getting it TheGadfly. I got a headache trying to explain myself to Laura33, even though I’ve met plenty of people with her “you get what you pay for” and “you deserve better” attitude. I’ve watched a number of them come around some when they see the quality of what I eat.

Ok, well, we're totally talking past each other then.  I take it as a given that you eat very high-quality, healthy food at a very cheap price.  That is far and away the best result, if you have the time and energy to put into it.  It's a real gift to your health and your family.

The only problem is that it does take time and energy to achieve those results, and you said you were "struggling" with it.  All I was trying to say is that it's ok to back off of that effort for some period of time if it was becoming too much, and that if you wanted to do that, keep the parts that you get value from (like using shopping as an excuse for a walk), and ease up on the stuff you don't enjoy as much. 

If I misread your post, and you still feel like the end result is worth the time and effort you're putting into it, then by all means keep on doing what you're doing. 

And FWIW, I have never, ever been a "you get what you pay for" person -- I am the queen of store brands and Lidl.  And when I say "you're worth it," I don't mean that other food would be better/tastier/healthier.  I mean your sanity and overall happiness matters, and that when life becomes overwhelming, it's worth slacking off on some of your optimization efforts for some period of time, even if it costs a little more.

[StarBright]

A few weeks ago, I signed up for one of those Blue Apron -type services to have three dinners per week delivered to my door (I may increase it to five). I've long been opposed to these services thinking I could re-create the same meals myself at a lower cost, carbon footprint, etc. but I had to give in. The meals end up costing twice as much as I would spend on the same ingredients but the time savings is priceless (no meal planning, no coupon clipping, no circular reading, no 2+ hour shopping trips, no $ on gas, no wear on my car, very little food prep and very little clean-up). With the extra time, I can spend it with family or even turn to my side-hustle, which is something I actually enjoy doing.

If you want to play the meal delivery service game you can get a couple of accounts going and then put them on hold when the  promo pricing runs out. Then switch to another one. I get 2-3 meals a week for a family of 4 for about $38 bucks this way. 

I used to switch them up but now I just do HomeChef. I get promo pricing about once a quarter, use it for 3-4 weeks and I'm usually tired of their food by the time the regular pricing kicks in again. It can be a nice break from the grind of planning/cooking/shopping for 7 dinners a week.

I've used them in the past too, but I found that they didn't actually save me any time. My family eats more than 2-3 meals per week! So yes, the dinners covered by those meal services are covered, but I still have to meal plan for breakfast, lunch, snacks, and the other nights of the week. I still have to do grocery shopping so having those meals covered only saved me approximately 5 minutes or less on my grocery shopping? Plus, I had to take the time to choose which meals I wanted them to send me.

Granted, we buy the same staples for breakfast and snacks  but we really ended up in a quandary over lunches. We eat leftovers for lunches but those meals never made leftovers and we would end up scrambling to figure out what to have for lunch the following day.

I find them to be a brain break AND a time saver honestly.

Three nights of "here are your pre-portioned ingredients for food that you chose from a limited list of meals" does me a world of good when meal planning and grocery shopping feel like a slog. They lighten the load just enough that I can keep going and sometimes are cheaper than what I would have ended up planning because of decision fatigue.

Also the clean up is nice - I just dump most of the trash back into the bag it came in and toss the bag.

On those weeks husband take leftovers I've frozen and I eat yogurt and fruit for lunch and the extra simplicity is nice.

But I absolutely get that they aren't for everyone :)

[TheGadfly]

I find them to be a brain break AND a time saver honestly.

[/quote]

The brain break is what tips the scale for me. Our family basically eats the same thing for breakfast, lunch and snacks; there's almost no planning there an we rarely find ourselves with "nothing to eat" when it comes to those meals. Dinner is a different beast for some reason. We can't just eat a bowl of cereal or beans/rice at 7pm and call it a night. Dinner for us requires careful planning, higher-cost proteins, time to cook, time to clean, etc. Alleviating that burden for a few nights per week is worth the premium.

Also, for us, if we don't have meals planned for the week, we are highly likely to buy take-out, which costs, like $30 per serving. A premium meal kit costs $12 per serving.

[dcheesi]

I think this might be an area where "picking your battles", or "optimizing your optimization" might be useful concepts?

In software, it's way too easy to spend way too much time & energy hyper-optimizing every code block, when in practice 90% of the time the efficiency is just not that crucial. It's better to identify the 10% of cases where efficiency is really important, and just focus your optimization efforts there.

In this case, knowing who has the best price on staple items is often good enough, and doesn't really take that much effort to keep up with. OTOH, trying to keep track of dozens of items that you only buy occasionally is likely to involve a lot more effort, for a lot lower ROI.

As for the driving time/distance concerns, my approach to that is often "purchase of opportunity" based. If I'm going into the office, I'll stop by the Costco that's on the way (and maybe have a cheap lunch while I'm there). The other day I went to the bank, and there's a supermarket nearby that has a better selection of items than our neighborhood boutique grocer, etc. When I'm there, I'll grab the good deals and any exclusive items I can think of. But if I'm not there and I need those same items, I'll just buy what  I need where I am (possibly in smaller amounts), rather than going far out of my way for them.