Being busy working a lot lately, it's been hard to find time to do frugal shopping like buying reduced rack produce from the open air market, or going to the scratch and dent store. But earlier this week I was able to arrange a play date for my kids after school and used that time to do my bargain shopping.
My first stop was at the store that sells collapsible shopping carts. The last one I bought, from an expensive place that I thought would be good quality actually was such terrible quality that it broke the first time using it. Sometimes just because something is expensive doesn't mean it'll be good quality. This store, on the other hand, is the store where I've bought all my other wagons and they have replacement parts so I don't need to replace the entire thing in one shot if something breaks. I've come to terms with the fact that I need to fix or buy a new one a couple of times a year, because I'm very heavy on my carts, and I don't plan on changing how I use them, and take them as a price of how I shop and the price for not having a car. I just make sure to include the price of carts into my budget with a sinking fund (under the category of 'things for the house').
I visited one scratch and dent store and bought 9 packages of gluten free chocolate covered wafers being sold at 3 for $2.85 for a total of $8.57. As they usually are sold one for $2.85 or more that was a terrific price.
The next store was another scratch and dent store, where I bought even more goodies!
They had a few boxes of my kids' favorite gluten free cereal for $1.42 each, so I bought a few boxes. They had some more gluten free cereal just in bags since their boxes got destroyed, for 95 cents a bag, so I bought 9. Rice was being sold also for 95 cents a kilo package or 43 cents a pound (cheaper than usual even if not dirt cheap) so I bought 3. Gluten free pasta was being sold at $1.42 a package so I bought 4 (pretty good price but not quite stock up price). Dijon mustard was 95 cents each, an amazing price, so bought 3. Good fruity teas were being sold at 1/3 of their usual prices at $1.42 so I bought 2, and giant jars of pickles sold at $2.85 a package, so I bought two.
By the time this was in my shopping cart, it was mostly full, but I still needed produce, so I went to the nearby open air market and perused the reduced price produce that some of the stalls had.
One stall had apples and star fruit for 65 cents a pound, bell peppers for 39 cents a pound, and bananas for 45 cents a pound, and eggplant for 26 cents a pound, so I grabbed one box of each and spent $10.
Another stall had both apples and bananas for 39 cents a pound, and I bought all they had, spending $3.31.
By this point, my stall was mostly full. I got some fruit, some vegetables, and the clock was ticking. Though I could have stayed longer at the open air market and bought even more things, I decided to go home to my kids.
Not quite sure the next time I'll be back at the open air market, but I'm going to try to fit it into my busy schedule, because I'd still rather find a way to pay less money for things my family will be eating anyhow, even if it means needing to arrange playdates for my kids while I do that.
Got any great deals lately? If you're a busy person, how do you fit frugal shopping into your busy life?
These posts make me wish we had a scratch and dent store near me!
ReplyDeleteI wish. I had lost the receipt by then, and it no longer had tags. I bought it at one of the cheap grocery stores I go to, and since then, every single time I've gone shopping, I've seen people with those carts, all broken. (In addition to my wheel falling off, the back completely came out, and nearly everyone's is now attached with cable ties.)
ReplyDeleteI like your super frugal shops Penny. All basic ingredients full of fresh fruit and vegetables and from the photo no precessed foods.
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