Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Cost of living

Stretching your budget? Share tips and advice to discuss budgeting and energy saving here. For the latest deals and discounts, sign up for Mumsnet Moneysaver emails.

what budget does alcohol come out of

39 replies

catphone · 15/12/2024 15:26

If alcohol adds significantly to your weekly shopping cost, would you still account for it it out of your food shop budget or personal spends for hobbies/books/treats?

OP posts:
AllProperTeaIsTheft · 15/12/2024 15:28

I don't have separate budgets for different things tbh. Sometimes we buy booze as part of the supermarket shop and sometimes dh orders wine online.

suki1964 · 15/12/2024 15:32

If its for indoors its supermarket shop, if we were heading out, its personal spends

Fireworknight · 15/12/2024 15:33

Food shop budget.

user1492757084 · 15/12/2024 15:34

I would allow for a bottle of wine or a six pack of beer per week and any alcohol used in cooking to be included in the normal budget.

Excess to that would be treats.
If hosting a major event like Christmas, a dinner party etc I would budget that alcohol in treats.

kelsaycobbles · 15/12/2024 15:36

It has its own line

Bjorkdidit · 15/12/2024 17:10

You need to think about how much spare money you have and are you consuming similar amounts or is one partner drinking a lot more.

If you share a bottle of wine at the weekend and you can easily afford this, it can come out of the weekly shop.

But if one partner doesn't drink, the other drinks quite a bit and money is tighter, it should come out of personal money.

ClassicalQueen · 15/12/2024 20:15

I'd say the food shop budget. I don't budget too carefully though, more as a rough idea of where money is going.

JamMakingWannaBe · 15/12/2024 20:27

I don't drink alcohol. DH does.
I eat red meat. DH doesn't.
Out of our regular weekly shop, one balances out the other.
Anything he buys to drink during the week, his Virgin Wine subscription or my Amazon nozecco order comes out of personal spends.

allmybooksarefromthelibrary · 29/12/2024 15:24

Personal spends unless it is bought for cooking.

CoastalCalm · 29/12/2024 15:26

We buy it from joint and husband transfers extra to cover it unless I’ve bought a lot of things that are just for me grocery wise and then we waive it as joint spend

TartanMammy · 29/12/2024 15:34

A £7 bottle of wine or a few bottles of beer would be absorbed in the weekly food shop (although I don't buy alcohol every week, or even every month).

A more expensive bottle of spirit would be bought from our own spending 'fun' money.

TheSpottedZebra · 29/12/2024 15:37

Well it depends. If you need to cut down so much that you're querying all non essential spends, obviously booze is an easy one to cut.

I take it your partner doesn't want to cut back?

Goldmember · 29/12/2024 19:27

I have a separate alcohol budget line. When summarised it's added to groceries and eating out to total all food and drink spends. I find it useful to review how much we average pm on alcohol.

TeenLifeMum · 29/12/2024 19:30

We don’t drink that much but when I do buy alcohol I buy pricier wine. Just adds into the usual food shop. Thankfully we don’t have a strict budget but at times money was that tight, we just didn’t drink. When dc were tiny, I chose a cleaner every fortnight over alcohol.

DreamCatchingSpiders · 29/12/2024 19:32

If it's more than a £10 a week or a high proportion of the amount you are spending on groceries then it should come from personal spends. I don't think it's fair for it to be counted as groceries if there's children/one of you doesn't drink and you are on a strict budget.

supersonicginandtonic · 29/12/2024 19:45

Food shop, although to be fair we are rubbish at budgeting.

WoahThreeAces · 29/12/2024 19:47

Alcohol comes out of my personal fun budget. DH doesn't drink so I wouldn't buy it from groceries budget. I don't buy a lot, but if I fancy a glass of wine, I'll buy it from my own money.

Notaflippinclue · 29/12/2024 19:48

The boomer budget!

Overthebow · 29/12/2024 19:52

We don’t have set budgets for anything so it just comes out of our joint account like anything else. If we had to budget that carefully that we had proper budgets for everything then we wouldn’t buy alcohol.

HorrorFan81 · 29/12/2024 19:55

Overthebow · 29/12/2024 19:52

We don’t have set budgets for anything so it just comes out of our joint account like anything else. If we had to budget that carefully that we had proper budgets for everything then we wouldn’t buy alcohol.

Same as this

Bobbybobbins · 29/12/2024 20:47

We don't have separate accounts or a set budget but we don't spend loads on alcohol and have similar spending habits on everything so I works for us.

Kitkat1523 · 29/12/2024 20:48

Never drink at home

Radio4head · 29/12/2024 20:58

DP drinks at home so he buys his own alcohol.
We get a few bottles in at Christmas or holidays in the big shop, because those are the only times I drink at home.

ilovethecoldsideofapillow · 29/12/2024 21:03

Joint account for our weekly food shop but alcohol is separate unless it's Christmas

TartanMammy · 29/12/2024 21:32

Overthebow · 29/12/2024 19:52

We don’t have set budgets for anything so it just comes out of our joint account like anything else. If we had to budget that carefully that we had proper budgets for everything then we wouldn’t buy alcohol.

So unless people have unlimited money they shouldn't buy alcohol 🤨? I'm sure plenty of people with healthy incomes have budgets for various things.