Not just supermarkets

Good morning. For those who are wanting to cut their spending on their every day living expenses, especially food, here's a little tip. Get into the habit of checking out the chiller cabinet in every food shop, discount store, supermarket, and corner shop, for stickers like these. At some point all food will go out of date. It will be sold off cheap or dumped, and with the publicity surrounding 'Love food, hate waste',  more and more shops are eager to get at least a few pennies for their products before writing them off at a loss. 

Think of your eyes as a scanning machine. Don't walk around the shops bleary eyed, with your mind elsewhere, concentrate on what you are doing. Make it a game, a challenge to pick up at least one item that has a reduced sticker on it. It might seem too time consuming, too much of a hassle to do this, but a few pennies saved here and there, and you will be quids in at the end of the year. 

Check out the chiller cabinets for dairy, salad, veg, and meat. A quick glance is enough, you don't need to spend time searching. Eventually these stickers will jump out at you because you are ignoring everything else around them. 

I go in Wilko to see if they have any offers on pet food, I walk past the chiller. This is what jumped out at me on Saturday. Now I wouldn't normally buy fresh milk, and definitely not semi skimmed, but at this price it would be daft to leave it on the shelf.  

I walk through the car park in search of cat food at Poundstretcher, and I know they have a couple of baskets of reduced near the tills. Most of it sugary sweets but worth a look. Weight Watchers choccy drink. I don't watch my weight, but I can still buy their products, 25p for five sachets, that's 5p a drink. Would be daft not to buy it.

I do this scanning in every shop. I get to know the layout of the shop and make a beeline for where I might spot a bargain. It doesn't take hours of trawling to do this, it's just a controlled way of shopping and can be done quickly. Now this is a contradiction of my usual advice of not impulse shopping, only buy what you set out to buy. Budgeting your finances is not only about controlling spending urges, but also taking advantage of big reductions in price, which would be beneficial in longer term planning.

The key to savvy spending is only buy what you can realistically use before it becomes inedible, or you become bored with it. Looking for reduced stickers can become an obsession, no need to take it to extremes. Yes, I get a buzz when I empty my bags out in the kitchen, and I feel like I am beating the system, but I would not be saving money if half of the food had to be thrown away. I buy what I need, what I can eat in the time scale, and no more. By the way, I am still eating strawberries, but I also gave some away.

Make savvy shopping your new hobby if you need to cut your food bill. Aim to beat the supermarkets by shopping around, by spotting these reduced stickers in all the shops. If you can't find any ask an assistant to direct you to the right section. Don't be embarrassed to ask for bargains, it's your money, you decide what you want to spend it on.

It's going to be a hot one today, so I am just off to do my walk now, before it gets too hot. I have started taking a bottle of watery juice with me to keep me hydrated.

Thanks for popping in, we'll catch up soon.
Toodle pip.