Good luck we in declutter mode again as trying to make our house and garden work harder for us during these times.
Trying to downsize clothes, books and toys to have more minimalist home and space dedicated to the things that matter and save money.
For us that's running 4 freezers some may say cost of energy but the savings buying reduced and freezing ofsets the cost of electric to run them they all fairly new freezers they don't cost a lot to run as long as defrost fairly regularly and keep full they more efficient.
My small half chest is just for bread as find although overalls reductions harder to find bread still can be easy plus always loads free bread on olio.
I'm not prepping for weather disasters or nuclear war.
I'm prepping save Me time and money as I work 4/,7 days.
I don't always have time go at times items reduced in evenings as have little one put to bed and family tea to cook.
We also run 1 car so it's coordinating time to go together and usually drive to big supermarket further away or even 2 or 3 shops in 2 go as aldi is next to hoke bargains . B&m next to asda and poundland we do variety different retail parks as we live in large city we loyal to no one its learning who's cheapest for what.
I have a sad old people's trolly to go ti local High Street I don't care how it looks itss been so practical to carry heavier stuff and during 2020 spring panic buying it was invaluable as would do 2 or 3 runs in 1 day to nearby High Street to ensure we had enough.
I do like buy fresh weekly as find fruit and veg sadly just hardly lasts mostly packed lunch and snacks weekly light items to carry.
I buy soft drinks and cereals once a month as they so bulky to store would take up too much space.
We cut back on juice fizzy drinks and booze and buy squash.
Tesco Value squash is less than 50p bottle so that saves money as buy 10 of each flavour.
Ketchup the kids used like lidls batts it's been out of stock for over 6months only expensive heinz.
Aldi bramwell gone up and often out of stock and they only have heinz.
When it is in stock its 77p.bottle last week.
My 4 kids I estimate get through least 2 bottles a month so 26 bottles a year.
If I was to buy 2 bottles of heinz a month would be over ,£6 v £1.54, aldi.
But experimenting with other brands morrisions savers Ketchup is 2 p less than own brand hardly much of saving.
Sainsbury value Hubbard brand was 46p recently gone up to 49p but cheaper than aldi or morrisions.
So 98p v £1.54 aldi or nearly 7 quid 2 bottles heinz that's a huge saving.
I brought 6bottles olive oil. 6bottles sunflower at start of war.
No idea how much that's saved me as oil really shot up and doesn't take much space.
Really is deciding what do you most use.
What do you think will shoot up.
Recent sugar increased and rice caught me by surprise.
We get through roughly 1 tin baked beans a week so brought 52 cans before they went up.
Paid £1.09, lilds for 4 used be 99p so bulk brought and the next week they £1.29, and now they possibly £1.39, so made a saving there.
Tinned tomatoes value lilds and everywhere else used be 29p
Then they went upto 32p
Now they 39p lilds
Value penne used be 29p and spagetti 20p now 41/45p and 28/ 30p.
Lilds rice last week gone up 30p for 8 bags boil in bag.
Need to start planting seeds and trying grow more at allotment and in many pots around our garden..
Might add raised beds to front garden.
With buying extra buy few extra items per week so set aside £5,/ 10 buy cheap extras then at end of month you be surprised how much you have and feel slightly worse when see price gone up again.
Can't beat price rises on fresh or dairy it is what it is we not going up milk or cheese.
But will long life grocery items and cleaning/ bathroom items sometimes can beat them as 12 tubes toothpaste doesn't take up much space or 12 bars of soap.
Biggest issue I'm finding is either the value or own brand is out of stock and at little tesco they don't stock the cheapet items only branded .
But also the value or own brand supermarket items are going up in price lilds and aldi although still cheaper most time than big 4 the range and availability been poor and price difference shrinking not to mention factoring in time and petrol go elsewhere as lilds been useless in 2022 really bad availability whole empty ailses and freezers.