Saturday, January 23, 2010

Shopping Sales

I quit shopping sales for a while. I took it for granted that Aldi had the best prices and pretty much shopped there exclusively for a while. I started adding on another local store when I realized I couldn't get everything I wanted at Aldi. I still went with my meal plan and shopped around it. The problem is that it is hard to take advantage of sales if I have a strict shopping list. I don't get the paper, which means I don't get ads and never knew what was on sale.

My solution: Sunday Saver Most of the ads I will ever need are available online. I can now plan around what is on sale before I leave my house. I already know what Aldi's regular prices are so if I find a better deal I can get things elsewhere. I also keep an eye on price changes. For example, I used to buy 8oz blocks of cheese at Aldi for $1.49. Last time I went, the price had risen to $1.79. With that info, it is no longer cost efficient to buy cheese at Aldi since I can regularly find it on sale for $1.50. Would I drive out of my way for $0.29? No. However, since I usually have to make 2 stops anyway, might as well maximize where I can.

3 comments:

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  2. I stopped shopping at Aldi's a while ago because all the canned stuff was in tiny cans and not really a bargain and in keeping with reducing my trash and recycling, this was a disaster.

    Their vegetable selection was awful and not that cheap and I couldn't afford their frozen meats. Milk and bread were marginally cheaper and some other items that I wouldn't have bought anyway, but mostly I could shop sales and find cheaper groceries someplace else.

    Plus gas went up over $4 a gallon at the time and I needed to find a place for one-stop shopping.

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  3. Whenever I need a break from using coupons and shopping the loss leaders at stores, I will shop only Aldi, but it is never too long when I figure out that I need to go back to doing what I was doing because it saves so much more money.

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