A few days ago I went shopping at two of my favorite stores, scratch and dent stores, where you can get so many delicious goodies for extremely cheap, because their packaging got messed up or they're past their sell by date.
I was really excited to show you the pics from my shop, because what I got was certainly phenomenal deals for great products, and then I did another shop at a 'regular' cheap grocery store and wasn't going to share about that shop.... And then I thought, why only share the 'extra special' shops with you and not my 'real life' shopping habits as well, so, here it is. My extra frugal shopping trips' results as well as those from my 'regular' frugal (ish) shopping trip.
The first store I went to often has great deals on gluten free products and this time was no exception. The thing I was specifically looking to find was cereal and gluten free cereal in particular, since cereal is ridiculously overpriced where I live and gluten free cereal even more outrageously expensive when not bought at special discount stores.
After that, I visited another local scratch and dent store, but one that leans more heavily towards selling junk food (the place where I bought my Reese's Pieces in bulk) and this time was really excited by my find. One time recently when I was there, I saw these Brussel Sprout Puffs whose names sounded so weird that I just had to buy one to try it, at $2.85 a bag, and despite being something like 20% brussels sprouts, they tasted nothing like that, and were just a delicious snack. (I had brussels sprout hating friends try them and they also proclaimed them delicious.) This last time that I was there, they were selling them at 1/5 the original price, at 57 cents a bag, so I bought 20 bags of them. Soooo worth it!
They also were selling Raisinettes for 71 cents a package, so I bought 8. (Nostalgia, seriously!)
Lastly, lime juice is really overpriced locally, so I generally just replace all recipes calling for lime juice with lemon juice. But I saw these cute little lime juice bottles being sold for 95 cents each, so I bought 9.
Total for that shop?
$24.28.
Lastly, the cheap regular grocery store. I don't have exact numbers for this store, but wanted to tell you what I bought and why.
I went to this store to buy cheap gluten free bread, generally sold at $1.42 a package, but they were completely out of stock for that, so I bought the last two of their sliced gluten free bread for that price, and then a few packages of pitas, for twice that price, instead of the usual 4 times the amount for gluten free bread in other places. Rice cakes bought cheaply to use in place of bread when we run out and for quick meals. Also regular sliced bread that is price controlled for my gluten eater, Lee.
For the kids lunch sandwiches, I bought a large kilogram package of sliced cheese, at the cheapest price I can find it anywhere.
They had fresh matbucha, a sauce like salsa, being sold for about 60 cents for the package, so I bought some.
I really wanted some bok choy and mushroom stir fry, and planned on making some for us and some for a friend who just had a baby, but the bok choy they had was really gross looking and figured I could get a similar feel and taste by replacing it with wide stemmed swiss chard. (Success!) Bought mushrooms also for that.
This store is the cheapest place I can buy frozen green beans, and I love them as a quick healthy addition to meals, so I bought a few packages.
My kids really miss when I would make desserts on the weekends, but I'm honestly too wiped and busy to do that, so decided to buy a giant package of jello powder so I can make desserts. The jello powder is much cheaper that way than it is to buy individual jello packages.
Lastly, while I don't generally use cleaners in my home other than dish soap and baking soda and vinegar, there are two cleaners that I do use: one is an all purpose cleaner that I use also as floor soap and also to clean various odds and ends, and one is toilet bowl cleaner. I found the cheapest stuff that this shop had.
Lastly, not shown, I have really been craving orange juice lately, and I saw on the shelf with the orange juice was one labeled with a much lower price, so took that, and when I took it to the register to pay, they charged me the lower price written, as per the law. Score!
Total cost? Approximately $60. Not bad, if I may say so myself.
I'm really glad we have so much delicious food in our house now, and I love that scratch and dent shopping allows me to get things for a fraction of the price that they'd be otherwise.
Have you gotten any great deals lately? What were they?
I was really excited to show you the pics from my shop, because what I got was certainly phenomenal deals for great products, and then I did another shop at a 'regular' cheap grocery store and wasn't going to share about that shop.... And then I thought, why only share the 'extra special' shops with you and not my 'real life' shopping habits as well, so, here it is. My extra frugal shopping trips' results as well as those from my 'regular' frugal (ish) shopping trip.
They had two different types of gluten free cereal being sold cheaply, at two different price points. The cheapest ones were 57 cents a package and the other ones at $1.42 a package. Yes, they are sold in bags without their boxes since the boxes got ruined, but at this price, quite frankly I don't care. I transfer all opened cereal packages to resealable containers anyhow.
I bought ten packages of the cheaper cereal and 5 packages of the more expensive but still cheap gluten free cereal.
Gluten cereal was being sold for 71 cents a package so I bought 4 of those for my gluten eater, Lee, to eat.
I also saw these cookies that were like raspberry fig Newtons and gluten free, vegan, and without any unhealthy ingredients, for only 95 cents a package. I bought 9 of them but regret getting that little because they are amazing.
Total for that store? $27.14
After that, I visited another local scratch and dent store, but one that leans more heavily towards selling junk food (the place where I bought my Reese's Pieces in bulk) and this time was really excited by my find. One time recently when I was there, I saw these Brussel Sprout Puffs whose names sounded so weird that I just had to buy one to try it, at $2.85 a bag, and despite being something like 20% brussels sprouts, they tasted nothing like that, and were just a delicious snack. (I had brussels sprout hating friends try them and they also proclaimed them delicious.) This last time that I was there, they were selling them at 1/5 the original price, at 57 cents a bag, so I bought 20 bags of them. Soooo worth it!
They also were selling Raisinettes for 71 cents a package, so I bought 8. (Nostalgia, seriously!)
Lastly, lime juice is really overpriced locally, so I generally just replace all recipes calling for lime juice with lemon juice. But I saw these cute little lime juice bottles being sold for 95 cents each, so I bought 9.
Total for that shop?
$24.28.
Lastly, the cheap regular grocery store. I don't have exact numbers for this store, but wanted to tell you what I bought and why.
I went to this store to buy cheap gluten free bread, generally sold at $1.42 a package, but they were completely out of stock for that, so I bought the last two of their sliced gluten free bread for that price, and then a few packages of pitas, for twice that price, instead of the usual 4 times the amount for gluten free bread in other places. Rice cakes bought cheaply to use in place of bread when we run out and for quick meals. Also regular sliced bread that is price controlled for my gluten eater, Lee.
For the kids lunch sandwiches, I bought a large kilogram package of sliced cheese, at the cheapest price I can find it anywhere.
They had fresh matbucha, a sauce like salsa, being sold for about 60 cents for the package, so I bought some.
I really wanted some bok choy and mushroom stir fry, and planned on making some for us and some for a friend who just had a baby, but the bok choy they had was really gross looking and figured I could get a similar feel and taste by replacing it with wide stemmed swiss chard. (Success!) Bought mushrooms also for that.
This store is the cheapest place I can buy frozen green beans, and I love them as a quick healthy addition to meals, so I bought a few packages.
My kids really miss when I would make desserts on the weekends, but I'm honestly too wiped and busy to do that, so decided to buy a giant package of jello powder so I can make desserts. The jello powder is much cheaper that way than it is to buy individual jello packages.
Lastly, while I don't generally use cleaners in my home other than dish soap and baking soda and vinegar, there are two cleaners that I do use: one is an all purpose cleaner that I use also as floor soap and also to clean various odds and ends, and one is toilet bowl cleaner. I found the cheapest stuff that this shop had.
Lastly, not shown, I have really been craving orange juice lately, and I saw on the shelf with the orange juice was one labeled with a much lower price, so took that, and when I took it to the register to pay, they charged me the lower price written, as per the law. Score!
Total cost? Approximately $60. Not bad, if I may say so myself.
I'm really glad we have so much delicious food in our house now, and I love that scratch and dent shopping allows me to get things for a fraction of the price that they'd be otherwise.
Have you gotten any great deals lately? What were they?
Tags
extreme frugality
frugal food
frugal shopping
frugal strategies
gluten free
grocery shopping
sales
scratch and dent
shopping list
shopping sales
stockpile
stockpiling
Kudos on your frugal shopping. I'm at the point where I have to purge again. But I did save $20 at Publix today, so that made me feel good. Keep up the great work. Love your blog.
ReplyDeleteI seriously thought that Ajax is only available in Holland... lol
ReplyDeleteWe have no scratch and dent or super low priced stores. Aldi is about the best I can do.
ReplyDelete