To think that DH is being totally unrealistic about the weekly food bill!

[goingeversoslowlymad]

Am getting a bit stressed out about my DH and the grocery shop. Our weekly bill is usually between £80 to £100, we would do a top-up shop of about £20 midweek, so max £120 all in for a family of 4. We do not use nappies, this includes everything including toiletries and cleaning products.

Money is pretty tight at the moment and I can appreciate he wants to try to cut down a bit but I seriously can't seem to get it much lower than this, there are no luxuries in this either i.e wine, magazines etc. Everyone I talk to in our situation seems to spend a similar amount but DH seems to think it excessive.

I'm going to give a veg box and meat pack delivery a try. Also going to order online to avoid being seduced by the offers instore. I don't see it being much cheaper but hopefully he'll stop moaning if I prove he's being unrealistic! What does everyone else spend?

Poopoo I agree - that includes everything including petfood and painkillers !
If Im passing Aldi I tend to stock up on tissues,tampons for DD ,toothbrushes - very cheap and I keep a stock for when they get manky.

PooPooInMyToes We spend approx £2/£3 per week. Our dogs are old, have a small appetite and only eat the dry food. We get it from the pet shop on the local market and they weigh it out for me (in colder weather the dogs eat more so I spend more then, but not a huge amount more). I suppose in the long run it would be cheaper for me to buy the dog food in bulk, maybe by getting one of those giant bags of it. Unfortunately we never have enough money all at the same time to do that

I cant imagine what a family of 4 must eat for 50 pound a week.I wouldnt say we eat luxury by any stretch of the imagination but 40-50 pounds just wouldnt cut it.

As well as the wholewheat stuff we also buy free range eggs and decent meat eg, naice ham and lean mince beef.I just cant bring myself to ue the alternative and I was a single aMum of 4 fr 5 years so not exactly minted.

The children eat alot of fruit especially the baby who lives on it,that is pricey too.

Poundland batteries dont last long either I have found.

I would defo send dh shopping,mine does it sometimes and ive noticed he buys stuff like value museli when its his money hes using but it then stays in the cupboard as its vile
He also buys massive bananas as he thinks its a bargain

Teapig. Oh yes the painkillers! I get through a lot of them. I also get my cleanser etc from the supermarket. Peoples birthday cards, wrapping paper, some children's presents for parties etc.

I wouldn't think of subtracting all that stuff plus all my treats before presenting my tiny little shopping bill and expressing shock at everyone who spends more!

Ledkr. I eat loads of fruit and veg as well as i don't eat meat. Tried buying it from the green grocer but would always find it was over ripe or sneakily mouldy when i got home so it was a waste of money.

We are a family of 5 (3 under 10s) and until I started work at the end of last year I would spend £50 a week on shopping (including kids packed lunches). Everything I bought was Sainsburys basics, their basic mince is fine - fry it up (without any added fat) and then just pour out the excess fat that comes out the meat. It is no fattier than their normal (non-lean) mince.
We would have a mince based meal 2* a week so e.g. for spag bog the basic mince 99p (gone up now to £1.25), tin of basic kidney beans (19p), few handfuls of frozen onions and peppers (70p for a whole bag so maybe 35p). Tin value tomatoes 30p. Packet basic spagetti 30p. Grated cheese. Total cost for 5: less than £2.
Then a value fromage frais or yogurt for pudding (30p for 4).

I think given the way prices have gone up since I started work that my bill would probably be nearer £60 a week.
Guessing slightly, as now I work we sometimes buy crisps or biscuits as well. I think we live quite extravagently and my last monthly shop came to £160, but I will still need to buy fresh fruit/veg, and bread etc through the month, at about £20 a week.

We spend £60 ish every 10 days. Eat 90% organic/ fresh juices/ etc...

But.. We don't drink alcohol and we don't buy any snack food like crisps/ biscuits etc..

We also only eat porridge for breakfast which is cheap/ filling/ nutritious. Add half banana/ raisens. When we ate cereal it was 4 boxes a week which was almost £10 just on cereal
We don't have a budget and can afford more but with the produce we buy this is what it's at. We shop at ocado. After my supermarket repeatedly put Our shop cheapest at ocado. Most expensive at tesco

Ledkr. I find that with poundland as well. Often what i buy will not last long, or will seem like a bargain but will turn out to be a half sized pack of something so not actually cheaper at all.

poopoo We have one of those cheap "buy by the bowl" fuit shops in town.It lovely quality but doent last long and i only go to town about once a week. I think it also depend on the time you have too,I work part time and days off are busy with baby and household crap.I dont always have the car either so often have to rely on local shops untill i can get to the supermarket.

Those who are saying they shop chaeply for a week can i ask about bread and milk,because our baby drinks full fat milk and im buying it constantly as do I bread and fruit.
I buy 2 pkts of value biscuits for dd2 and a few crisps for her packed lunch but thats the only so called luxury apart from wine.

PooPoo £8 on batteries

Poundland is your friend

Ah x post while my snail-like internet connection rebooted

Our 'big' online shop (so all the cleaning products etc) has gone up by about £30 in the last couple of years. Everything is so expensive. We've just moved out of the city centre too which makes a real difference, there's only one supermarket in walking distance, no ethnic shops for spices, pulses etc so I find I am spending more. Once I've factored in time and petrol for hunting out cheaper shops it doesn't really make it worth our while.

Mustcontrol. That was for 16 batteries. Im guessing poundland sell them in packs of 4? So it would cost 4 pound plus about an hour and a half of my time resulting in about 30 quids loss of wages plus the cost of parking which is 1.20 and petrol. At around 6miles each way . . . no idea what that would cost! Then at ledkr says they don't last five minutes anyway.

Poundland isn't always the cheapest way!

Actually just looked at the link and see they do bigger packs although i would still make a loss due to petrol, parking and time involved. I sometimes stock up at ikea if i am there.

21 meals a week for £45 is about 2 quid a meal!! Less when you add toiletries like loo roll, washing powder.
What meals are you eating? The only family meals I could do for 2 quid total is soup, jacket potatoes, cheese on toast, omlette, beans on toast, risotto, chicken wings, lentil curry (I can't think of anymore!)

Family of 4, 3 adults and one nearly adult, I spend £80 per week max, and that includes dog and cat food, cleaning stuff etc. £120 - I think I would faint if I spent that much. I shop around for the best deals, cook from scratch and we have packed lunches every day.

www.mysupermarket.co.uk/ is an excellent website, tells you which supermarket has the special offers on and shows you the unit cost of food to make sure you are buying the best value. Once you have added everything to your basket, it shows you which is the cheapest supermarket to order from.

I eat well and spend about £40/week for me and DH. We don't buy basics stuff but 75% of what I buy is on offer such as two meats for £6 etc.

I would have thought solution is obvious, get him to do all the shopping for next 5 weeks & if he doesn't get anything on your list then do NOT go buy whatever it is yourself, instead point that out to him the oversight when he says "Why are we out of toothpaste-milk-ham-bog roll-beer?" etc. He'll probably be overjoyed to let you take the job over again. (You'll have to get creative if you run out of bog roll, but it is possible!)

I have opposite situation, DH somehow manages to spend like £30-£50 more than me almost every time. We don't waste whatever we buy, at least.

These threads make my mind boggle at the people I see strolling around waitrose with a full trolly and what they must spend/earn .

We spend on average £70 a week for two adults. That's about £30 in Aldi and £40 in Morrisons.

Forgot to say, we also have to do tops up shops through the week. So maybe an extra £10 a week?

The last time I did my shopping online (Sainsbury, about 3 weeks ago) it was significantly more expensive than going to the shop itself, which really surprised me. Then I realised that although I do meal plan, I often change the meals I'm going to cook based on offers that are available in the store - especially on meat.

The other thing that really keeps my bills down is switching to cheaper cuts of meat. I buy things like fillet steak/pork fillet only very occasionally now - instead favouring things like belly pork, shin of beef, etc.

I also buy good coffee and there are some things that I will not compromise on in terms of buying own brand - Heinz ketchup or Nouvelle toilet roll or Colgate toothpaste. But still, including (usually) 6 bottles of wine a week my bill at Sainsbury's is around £120. That's for three adults and includes food for two cats. I also buy things like batteries, light bulbs, birthday cards and wrapping as I need it - and anything household all in the one shop. Some weeks are more expensive than others, as all the cleaning stuff always seems to run out at the same time!

My online shop was over £150 which really surprised me - and I didn't buy anything especially extravagant on it!

I actually think the Poundland batteries are fine, what on earth are you using them for, in cameras and remote controls they are ok.

Bottom line is if you can't get it down then dh needs a dose of reality, I agree that you should get him to do it and see what he thinks.

Bold. You can see the offers online as well so it makes no difference.