Tips To Save Money At Grocery Stores In The New Year

A new year means a lot of people are looking over budgets and setting plans for ways to save money.

Mindy Dennison with "See Mindy Mom" was here with some ways to save money at the grocery store without coupons.

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"My most popular videos on my channel are what I call pantry cooking, or "use it up" challenges. And that's where I take a look at what's in my pantry, fridge, and freezer. And I try to make meals for my family using the items that I have and just use some stuff up, especially things that are going to spoil. It's money we've already spent, right. So we want to make use of the things that we have. And you would be surprised how this adds up over the course of the year. Because typically speaking you can delay going to the grocery store by a day or two if you practice this discipline every once in a while. And that really makes a difference across the year," Mindy said.

How do you use a meal planner?

"So I put out a free e-book for my viewers at the end of 2023. It's over on my website, SeeMindyMom.com. And in the back of it, I put in this "use it up" meal planner and it has a place where you can take inventory of your pantry, fridge, and freezer. And then maybe go to Pinterest, go to Google and find some things that you can make with those items that you want to use up and make a meal plan for your family."

Do you need coupons to save when you shop?

"No, you can actually get some really fantastic savings on groceries if you shop the weekly sales at stores that offer them. So I actually just filmed a video last week, and it's coming out tomorrow. And I went in to Reasor's and I picked up their sales flyer. This is the one from last week, a new one came out today. And I put together a meal plan for my family utilizing what was on sale. So I picked up mostly items that were on sale. And I actually plugged in the items that I purchased at that grocery store into my Walmart app to see how much I would have paid if I had purchased them at Walmart. And I would have paid $40 more if I had purchased those same items. A lot of people think it's cheaper to go to Costco, to go to Sam's, to go to Walmart. And I'm not saying don't shop there. There are deals to be had. But I'm just saying that your traditional grocery stores that run fantastic sales are going to have some really good deals. And if you can build your meal plan around what's on sale, you are going to see savings."