Ok, here goes...
Don't shop when you're hungry, and then skip the aisles with sweets/biscuits/crisps etc
Asda is one of the cheapest places to shop. Sainsbury's and even Tesco are more expensive. (they sneak higher prices here and there so you think you are saving, getting points, then wham, you see your bill is £10 more than if you had gone to Asda).
Buy own brand goods.
Things like biscuits, pies and yogurt can be made more cheaply at home. Get a yoghurt maker cheaply from Ebay, some fruit, a box of UHT milk for 40 p and a 30p container of store brand plain live bio. and a few tablespoons of sugar will make you a weeks worth of yougurt..actually, once you do the first batch, you just top up with the milk and fruit. as you make one container plain and that is your new start.
We have a second hand kenwood chef, and bought the juice extractor attachment. In less than 5 minutes, we have fruit or vel juice as all you do is cut the fruit into pieces. The pulp goes in the yoghurt or a crumble
The Chef also has a dough hook and all you do is throw in your ingredients for pie crust, it does the rest so all you have to do is roll it out, perfect everytime. You can also make bread dough in it, and home-made bread is a lot more filling than cheap storebread, you can make it as you need it, etc. so less waste as well
Things like Burgers or sausages (meat or veg) can be made cheaply from home. We make all our own sausages, again using the chef, it has a mincer and sausage making attachment, best investment we ever made. Got the attachments as they came up on Ebay, the machines can also be bought second hand there. Though you can just roll your sausage mixture in breadcrumbs instead of casings, we do that now making your own pizza is cheaper than buying cheap frozen. It is also cheaper and less wasteful to buy mushrooms and onions frozen lol
Another way we save money is we bought a teapot and strainer. I can hear you saying, how does that save money. Simple. A box of loose tea makes three times as much tea as the same amount spent on tea bags. A cafetiere also saved us money as it is cheaper to buy ground coffee than instant, every time. Takes a whole 3 minutes longer to steep in the cafetiere is all, and that is mostly gone by the time you get out the cups, add your milk, sugar, etc.
now, we buy our milk from the milkman. We tried it both ways, and discovered it was cheaper to buy it that way because milk and eggs are two things that when you run out, you end up dashing to the store to get, and you end up spending in petrol at least the amount of pence you think you are saving getting there, a few more pence than that waiting with the motor running to get past someone into a space, , etc. That was a real eye opener. you also get milk when you need it that way, if you discover you unexpectedly used more milk, just leave a note out. he can also deliver potatoes, eggs, and orange juice meaning less trips to the shops for those items as well. We get cream from ours as well and make ice cream and butter. 2 large containers of double cream will make 1 litre of ice cream and a load of butter.
Other ways to save if you can...look at the cereal you are buying. In winter, i keep porridge oats to hand. cheap, and very economical. Get the kind you cook and for 35 p for the store brand you get a kilo that will last you at least 2 months. You can also mix it with honey and add fruit to it, shape into bars and bake for lovely snacks. Again, i use my fruit puree for that lol if buying cold cereals, I suggest looking to see if you have an Aldi nearby. Boxes of cereal there are cheap and nutritious, with kid's type cereals being about 69 p a box. We buy baked beans from there as well, and tuna and such, lookout, you can save some money. Hubby is finicky about his baked beans but loves those as they taste like heinz ones, only 9 p a tin instead of 40. if at Asda (or tesco), we buy store brand on our adult cereals when we can, if Aldi doesn't have the sort we want (or if its not an Aldi week LOL).
Ok, other ways to lower your bills in general...if your heat runs on a thermostat instead of a timer, it is cheaper to turn the thermostat down 1-2 degrees and leave it on constantly than to turn it on only at night or for a few hours to warm the house up. Same with hot water, turn down the hot water tank and leave it on, it is cheaper. If you like to eat stews and casseroles, look at investing in a slow cooker. You can leave them on all day cooking unattended (designed for this, perfectly safe) and only use the amount of energy a light bulb would use. Do a large casserole/stew and you can freeze half, meaning you can just microwave or pop it back into the slow cooker for a few hours, again saving energy either way?
another savings is doing eco friendly type cleaning. clean with things such as washing soda and vinegar and tea tree oil. take a bucket of hot water and add 2 drops of tea tree oil and a squirt of any washing up liquid. You can clean your kitchen, bathroom, and mop floors with that, it is antibacterial. pour into the toilet slowly when done and let sit for an hour, then scrub and flush. Wiping your taps with vinegar will get them shiny and the acid kills the germs. Washing up liquid and a bucket of warm water and a squeegee will get you perfectly spotless windows and glass everytime, its what window washers use. Any drips, wipe with a yellow dust cloth, it will not leave smears. for dusting, try using an electrostatic duster instead o polish and use damp duster to do the tops of the telly, etc. loads cheaper. if you like the scent of the polish, just ad a few drops of lavender onto the cloth.
lastly, i recommend changing your washing powder to gloop and using ecover bleach occasionally to brighten the wash and remove stains. I remove stains with an astonish bar first, goes a long way, then do an economy wash with gloop. If my whites need a boost, or stubborn stains, etc., 2 tsp. of ecover bleach (£1.52 a box but you only use 2 tsp. a full load) does the trick. If you dot know how to use or make gloop, email me gain and i will happily give you the link lol. Always line dry if possible, that will save you tons of money in electric and or gas. Also, the sun is naturally deodorising and a natural brightener and has a natural antibacterial action.
We also save by using cloth nappies and washing a load of them every two days. Its not everyone's cup of tea, but my two have eczema and my DD was prone to thrush, and so we had to make the switch as it was the only thing that keeps their skin happy as the disp. are full of chemical preservatives and such. not to mention it is a lot cheaper than the 5-8 quid a week nappies cost.
I also save on buying shampoo and such by signing up to www.freeukstuff.co.uk and getting freebie shampoo samples (bottles not dinky envelopes) and getting vouchers from www.wishvalue.co.uk - asda will take all the vouchers, even if you don't buy the item.
Right. most of that is just a cut and paste job, but there are some good ideas in there (I thought, anyway) If the lady in question is reading this I hope she doesn't mind me copying this here....
HTH
