Monthly food shop is this expensive?

[Foxysoxy01]

Today I spent the day helping a friend out with her monthly budgeting (they are saving for a new extension so need to have a realistic monthly budget to stick to)

One of the costs was £400 a month on the food shop. My first thought was that seemed huge and it could be cut down maybe even nearly halved. There are 3 of them my friend, her husband and their teenage boy that is a bottomless pit!

She explained it included washing powder/comfort, cleaning products and packed lunch stuff for DS and didn't think she could do it for less.

She shops at Tesco/Sainsbury's and normally has it delivered.

Having thought about it I actually think maybe she was right and food is just more expensive than it used to be and prices have just sort of crept up without me really registering.

So my AIBU is...do you think I was wrong and £400 a month is fair or is she way off?
What are your weekly/monthly costs in comparison?
And what do you do to make it cheaper?

I think it's pretty fair - I can't get ours any lower - 2 adults and primary school aged child. I don't want to eat pasta and jacket potatoes every day so will spend a bit more for food we enjoy. I think there are worse things to spend money on tbf.

I have £100 a week for all shopping and try to keep to £70 or less. There are five of us. Four adults and Ds3 (10). However I go to the supermarkets in the evenings when they are doing their final reductions and the wine rest from Lidl so some weeks I can be £25 and others much more depending on what I get. £100 is not bad for a weekly online order.

There is 5 of us and I spend about £120 each week, and that is using Aldi, and then some top ups at Tesco. Would love to try and get it down a little but my 3 DS are always so hungry!

She could go to Aldi but tends to like the convenience of home delivery.
I'm not sure she has actually been to Aldi before so I might suggest me and her going to do a shop and see how much she saves. It's only 15 mins away from where she lives so not even far to go.

It depends. If I fancy a bottle of wine, a steak for dinner one day and salmon another day this obviously costs more.
Then if things like the oils, herbs and spices need replacing these cost.

There's 5 of us, and a cat, and we spend about £500-550 a month. We eat very well, do packed lunches for all of us daily, drink shitloads plenty of wine, go through loads of toiletries (I have 3 girls...) have tons of fresh fruit including berries etc.

I get weekly deliveries from Morrisons (much cheaper than Sainsburys, I switched) and also go to Lidl every 10-14 days for odd things that I can only get there. I bulk buy washing powder and dishwasher tablets from Costco.

I think groceries are far more expensive than they were a year ago.

Most months I spend 70-93 a week in Aldi for a family of four.
We need to top that with milk etc in local shop.
Cat food I buy in bulk from amazon £30 every 3/4 months but 3 cats
Then I sometimes buy toiletries or washing stuff in savers as well

If I go to Asda it's often 90-120 but I get tempted in the clothes section.
So I'd say your friends prob right plus teen boys can eat!!!!

I do a £150 monthly online shop then allow £250 for the rest of the month, sometimes we spend it all sometimes we don't, sometimes we get a takeaway using that money during the month too x

I bet half of it gets thrown away. There are three of us and I spend up to £80

I spend about that on three of us, but I I don't need to be too frugal. I could definitely reduce it if I wanted to save for something else

She can cut that, we're 4 and my shop this week was 30odd quid.

It takes retraining the brain and using places like aldi. Joining pages on facebook for ideas for recipes and where the deals are in what shops. It takes commitment at first until you get used to it.

I don't shop online though.

Two adults and two teenage boys and a dog - we spend about £200-£250 - only top ups are milk and bread during the week. I would spend far more if I had it. This all includes washing powder etc but always buy the on offer ones - I pay £6 to Tesco for delivery saver and don't shop anywhere else online - Sainsburys is expensive

Gamer that's amazing, how can you possibly do it on £30? I spend £10-15 just on dc pack up! Does that include cleaning and toiletries?

We don't drink alcohol btw

ours is about £350 a month including all of those things, 2 adults and 2 dcs that are going through a growth spurt as they seem to want to eat constantly that's done with morrisons I find them to be better value than Tesco and sainsburys.

200-250 a week?

I don't think £100 a week for a couple and their teenage son is much at all. Certainly not a LOT.

I spend £200 plus a week - £100 is nothing😱

Well its everything. Plus when i started i did out a space to store stuff so i can bulk buy. Now it's all established i really don't need to spend much. Once a month ill spend around 130 quid on a 'big shop' so the rest of the month is just perishables really.

Really focusing on waste at the end,of the week is a good starting point and go from there. I rarely get waste.

I think it sounds about right.

I spend about that. It is for me, DH and two teenagers who still live at home. So four of us usually, but it rises to five in uni holidays when DD1 comes home.

I could cut it somewhat by going to Aldi more, but I find their fresh fruit and vegetables rather too hit or miss, going off same day sometimes.

Sometimes I do Tesco home delivery if I can get a cheaper midweek slot. I don't use the expensive weekend ones as it is cheaper to drive to the store.

We spend around £550-£600 a month for two adults, a teen, bottomless tween and two primary aged children.

That includes £15 a week for the teens lunches, £10 a week school dinners split between the other three kids and packed lunches for the other days a few packed lunches for DH and a cooked lunch for me.

All cleaning stuff and toiletries included though I spend very little on cleaning products. We spend around £12 on a giant washing powder from Costco every three months or so, same with toilet roll, kitchen roll, bin bags, tea bags, pasta and rice. I think the foil and cling film from there will last for about 5 years, we are over 12 months already and there's loads left.
I bulk buy meat from the butchers, he has really good offers so I stock up the freezer once a month spending about £50.

The rest of the shopping is from Morries, M&S, Wilko and Iceland. I buy almost everything branded.
I've tried Aldi/Lidl to reduce costs but the fruit and veg was crap and most of the other products have nut/peanut traces so no good for DC3 with allergy.

I spend about £4-500 per month for 4 adults , that's just food and toiletries , no cleaning stuff and no alcohol ( all t total) . I shop mainly at Tesco and M&S . Cleaning stuff and Coke / Pepsi we do a bulk shop at Costco every 4-6 weeks which is normally another 120-200 . Dog food is also extra .

I have got one coeliac so that increases the bill a bit ( approx £2.50 for a small loaf )

We spend a fair bit more than that (family of 4 including two bottomless pits) - but that includes a lot of quality convenience meals for DH and I (Charlie Bigham etc), plus wine etc. We could definitely cut down on our monthly food bill but value our time too much (and I'm not a great cook)...

Mine for 2 children (4&6) and 3 teens (14,15 &18) plus DH is £160 a week not including the kids weekly £1 week allowance each week. For 7 people I think that's very good but could probably lower it too £150 a week at a push.