***This is my guest post from The Humbled Homemaker. To go ahead and read the full story, head here or start reading below!

I have a lot of little tricks up my sleeve when it comes to finding ways to save money especially at the grocery store. Like using Ibotta to earn any rebates on the purchases that we make at Kroger, to using Kroger’s app to download coupons to my Plus card, to keeping a price list so I know if Aldi or Kroger has the best price, and even keeping a family favorites binder that allows me to know what recipes my family enjoys most so I can just jot down any ingredients from those recipes we might need. 

And since groceries are usually one of the biggest expenses that most households have and if you’re like me, you’ve tried everything from extreme couponing to just “winging it”. However, once we switched to a clean-eating diet, using coupons regularly became a thing of the past since there aren’t many coupons for fresh fruits and vegetables.

And since we switched to a clean-eating diet, Aldi has become our favorite grocery store since we can literally get all our staple items for a fraction of the cost. However, I still wanted to save more and so there are few other things that we do that help us keep our grocery budget in check.

Notice, that I said that we’re keeping our grocery budget “in check” not “low” because I’m a firm believer that your grocery budget goal shouldn’t be the lowest number possible but the most realistic number possible for your family and your current lifestyle.

And these quick tips will help you do just that – keep your grocery budget in check no matter how low or high it may be.

Speed Shop

Shopping with three kids under 4 years old will teach you to shop fast or risk having a major meltdown followed by something getting broken. So I shop no longer in each store (Aldi and Kroger) than 20 minutes. Even when I don’t have my kids with me, I set the timer on my phone for twenty minutes. This keeps me focused on my shopping list and not on everything shiny I past.

Next time you’re in the grocery store, set the timer on your phone for 20 minutes. It’ll be challenge especially if you’re used to browsing the aisles while shopping but over time, you’ll start see how shopping fast really does save you money.

Head here to The Humbled Homemaker to read the full post. 

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