AIBU to ask how it's possible for anyone to spend so little on food and supplies?

[Nicebucket]

Right, so colleagues and I were discussing how much we spend on things each month.

One bloke said he spends £80 on both food and toiletries in the entire month.

In London.

Is this really possible?!

Course it's possible.

When I was skint and on my own £30 would get me enough meat for the month from farm foods - usually 3 kilo bags of chicken fillets (I'd say about 6 portions per bag) 2 bags of mince (about 8-10 portions) 2 bags of beef cubes (again about 8-10 portions) plus a couple of pizzas or similar bunf in the oven food. A fuck of a lot of tinned tomatoes, big sack of spuds and some stock cubes maybe another tenner, 30 eggs for £2 and a decent store cupboard of herbs and spices meant that I could get a decent range of meals and snacks and then it's just bread, butter and oil.

We probably don't eat much better now tbh but spend more for convenience and ethical reasons (such as free range eggs etc).

Wouldn't work for me but for a single guy I'm sure it could? Say £10 a month for toiletries. Deodorant, shampoo, toothpaste, soap (own brand or £ shop this could be done for a fiver!!) and then £70/£75 for food. Provided he has a store cupboard he could survive quite easily on £17/£18 a week?

green18

We spend £80w for a family of 4 so that's £20 each pw and £80 pm each.

No, you aren't first of all feeding 12x4 = 48 weeks, you lost 4 weeks in your calculation.
52x20=1040, and comes up to £87/pw
You are also feeding children not 4 grown ups!

Antimatter No, I am feeding 2 teens that eat as much as adults if not more with packed lunches etc so please don't tell me what i do!

Wow, turned into a very interesting thread!
I definitely spend too much on food.

I can't do £80 a month, but I aim to bring it down to about £120-150 or even less/

I'd save so much money if I could do that!

green I pointed out a mstake in your statement.
Do you disagree with my maths calculation?

Honestly I don't care how much money anyone spends on their shopping but I care about underlying asdumptions.

Yeah, I think a key fact is I do have a family decent spice/herb rack. And I do love to pounce on those supermarket bargains- helps having a big freezer just between the two of us. At one point we had venison, a turkey crown, duck and pigeon breast steaks in there as they had been knocked down to silly prices on their use-by date.

If we cut down what we spent on the wine rack and in the pub to £80 a month for the pair of us we'd be laughing

It comes down to being organised. Yes we have a garage freezer and a pantry for tins and spices. Tinned and frozen veg is just as good for you as fresh stuff. You may spend a bit at the start getting everything in. Then you just monitor stock levels and make sure you never run out. Toilet roll is a big cost too. I think we've got about 48 rolls stuffed in the garage because they were on offer. DH thinks I'm mad but I hate cheap rolls and if it's on a deal I buy it in and hoard it. I have enough emergency meals in the freezer and pantry to make sure I can be flexible on a budget.

We very rarely have a drink either. Alcohol is expensive. But we do have a monthly takeaway/eating allowance which we keep in an envelope. We tend to save up a few months in a row and treat us all to a Sunday lunch out somewhere.

Meals may get a bit samey, and I've switched chicken breasts for thigh fillets for cost. And we eat a lot of mince when we used to have steak. Bacon sarnies are now boiled eggs and soldiers for a weekend treat. But at the end of the day we are eating less processed food, we are reducing red meat intake, eating more pulses, cutting out booze, sugar and salt. All these things mean we are probably healthier as well as better off.

Oh and snacks, we rarely have them in. I think it's a bad habit for kids to get into and they are often unhealthy and mean they don't eat their meals. So if you stop snacks then that helps costs too.

I would say it's quite easy. Either aldis/lidls or tesco/sainsburys basic brands. No need to fill up on 'cheap carbs' either, though there's absolutely nothing wrong with bread,pasta, rice, etc in moderate amounts.As for toiletries/cleaning stuff, a couple of pounds (out of the £20) should cover this easily.
No offence, but I think many people on here have not experienced real poverty. Once you do, you get resourceful and learn to make the most of your money. Unless you prefer to live off frozen pizzas and pot noodles, which is a choice but not neccesary.

When I lived alone I spent no more than £8 per week on food and £2 per week on toilet ries. Take out once a month. - £50 total. I ate jacket potatoes, reduced and frozen veg, boiled rice, tuna pasta, beans on toast and the really cheap meat in morrisons like 56p belly pork and 84p Turkey thins.

You stop wearing make-up and only use sparing amounts of shampoo, conditioner and shower gels

why do you need to stop wearing make up?

I wear make up I have eye shadows that are years old, mascara is a fiver twice - three times a year? concealer is about 4quid and I have a cheap lip stick...and cheap foundation, I mean my yearly make up budget must be 15 quid?

then shower gels and shampoo, hardly massive expenditures - how much do people use? I have a huge tresome shampoo and conditioner for the dc and its lasting months, maybe 9 months? it was on offer about 8 for two?

the most high volume stuff like that for us - is handwash and washing liquid.

oh and loo roll.

A big freezer is a huge help. we do not have one, but my goodness if we did we would massively save food bills and also eat like kings.

I don't think it's easy. I think £18 per week is quite tough. I reckon it's one thing if it's entirely by choice, because you're saving for something but if needs be you can get a take away, it's another when you have no choice. I've been genuinely skint in my life, every penny accounted for and every mouthful planned. It was shit. Pasta with a nice tomato sauce with basil from the window box is nice but over and over again it becomes tiresome. It wears you down. I think on that sort of budget there would be a lot of pasta/potatoes/bread/bulking.

I think it also depends on your starting point and facilities. If you have a pretty well stocked larder with spices etc you can make basics better. A friend of mine has had long term money problems and said it was after 6 months when all of these things dwindled that it became tough. If you can afford to take advantage of offers and have the space to store bulk buys that helps-also if you can afford to replenish your spices/seasonings/oils. Having a good size freezer (or indeed a freezer at all) makes it easier. Having a garden helps.

I probably spend way too much on food, about £500 a month for two adults, a 2 year old and a 6 month old.

Yup it's possible, family of 3 here and we spend no more than £60 on food a month. And never buy value things

That's got to be a typo hasn't it? £60 a month for three people???

If it werent for the fact I have kids a husband and two cats I could do the same.
I start work early so no breakfast. Unlimited tea on site, we get lunch included (wrap/sandwich/soup), to which I supplement a bottle of tap water and a packet of crisps (30 odd pence from a multipack). Four days a week.

It costs me about £4.50 to make spag bol for four adults (dh and I have over two days) so thatd do me four work days. The rest of the week - egg sandwich for bfast. Soup for lunch. Similar home made meal for dinner. Probably totalli g £12 per week.

Add in £15per month for toiletries (am happy with any old shower gel!), £8 per fortnight for a takeaway.

I dont buy coffees out.

Yes it's doable if you cook from scratch. We buy from the local butchers, have at least 3 a day healthy veg/fruit snacks and milk twice a day. stews/curries/lentil soups can add both nutrition and taste to the food. For example, if I am cooking veg curry, On the side I can take some bulk made lentil from freezer and add greens to it to add bulk and flavour plus lots of proteins. I also make my own bread.
We are pretty skint though. So have to. It is hard to be fair. But saves a fortune I think. Plus I show DCs how to cook in the hope that in few years time they will be able to help me too. DH works very long hours.

And I hardly ever buy coffee outside. Make my own before leaving home in a travel mug and at the work place.

Nicky said it for me too. A big larder space is certainly helpful. Also I have extra freezing space because it's hard to cook all from scratch everyday. It does take some determination and long term investment though. So your initial couple of months through this route might cost you more than you hope for. But in the long term it's good investment.

Ds1 reckons he spends £20 a week, max. He is a student, so perhaps living a bit more frugally than others, but set against that his enormous appetite!

When he isn't at home, I usually spend between £100 and £110 - but sometimes less - a week on 3 adults and 2 teenagers.

So yes, I think it is perfectly possible.

Buying bar soap is much cheaper than shower gel and hand wash, 20p per bar, its environmentally better too, as no plastic bottles. Shampoo and conditioner, I buy Alberto balsam when it is 4 for £3 and I buy supermarket own brand toothpaste which costs 50p rather than £2+ for Colgate total. My dentist assures me it works just as well, just tastes slightly different.

My loo rolls and kitchen rolls come from home bargains, for cleaning I use star drops and Zoflora, washing up liquid and I buy a big box of lidl washing powder every six months.

So my toiletries and cleaning stuff comes to a couple of pounds a month.

antimatter I think if you need to get out more. It was an estimate. My point is that it is possible to spend that amount.

antimatter I posted the meal plan. The potato was only supposed to be for the roast on Sunday, I wasnt including it anywhere else. The breakfast tortilla is more of a scrambled egg burrito (because of buying tortilla wraps instead of a loaf of bread). One medium baking potato is usually about 40p I think. It was just from memory anyway.

No I haven't included spices, mayo, butter, oil etc, but we're talking about someone in employment who presumably has somewhere to live with cooking facilities and cupboard space who won't need to buy those things every week. He may well need to buy another couple of vegetables and/or potato for meal plan but it's not going to be much more than another pound or two.

It wouldn't be possible (or desirable) for everyone, obviously. Just wanted to show it was theoretically possible.

I stopped wearing make-up because I have sensitive skin and the stuff I wore that didn't make me want to claw my own face off was expensive. I do have some leftover but I use it for occasions now. Though I have noticed the older stuff is getting congealed and you aren't supposed to keep things for too long once opened. There is usually a little symbol on the back denoting this. I have no idea whether its bad to leave things longer than this, but all the SPF stuff is chucked out once past it's use by date because the SPF is practically useless.

And if you are my DH or DSS they liked to use a rich lather of showergels and shampoos. It's so wasteful. Bar soap dries my skin out, so I use only small amount of showergel and I don't shower/bath everyday because my skin can't take it. DH has two showers a week, he doesn't reek because he has a stand up wash everyday. In summer he will have more than this a week.

Oh, and I have grown my hair long so I can keep it neat and tidy without a myriad of hair products like I used to use. Being frugal is not for the stylish!