47 Tips and Tricks for Saving Money at the Grocery Store

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There are A LOT of posts online about saving money on groceries. Hundreds of them.

But this post is the best and most thorough grocery store tips post on the internet.

Why? Because on this list, you’ll see 47 of the best tips and tricks to help you save money and learn to become a smarter grocery store shopper.

Aside from the years of experience of being frugal and trying to save at the grocery store, I’ve spent hours scouring the internet and have found just about every grocery store tip that I could. A lot of research went into this post so that you could save more.

So if you want to learn all of the tips, tricks, and grocery store hacks that I’ve found, check out the list below and start saving money in your grocery budget!

47 Tips and tricks for saving money at the grocery store

1. Where you shop matters

One of the biggest grocery budget busters is a person’s choice of grocery store. So where you shop REALLY matters. Because some grocery stores are fairly cheap while others are insanely expensive.

Now there are a lot of people that shop at those expensive stores. Usually because it’s “classier” and the experience is more upscale. But you’re buying the same grocery products for ridiculously high prices. And there’s no reason for this. Stores like Whole Foods, Lowes Foods, and Harris Teeter are a ripoff.

Instead, find your local Aldi, Lidl, Trader Joe’s, Walmart or Food Lion for the best grocery store prices. Don’t waste your money at those expensive stores.

2. Join a wholesale club

Joining a wholesale club like Costco or Sam’s Club can be a fantastic idea if you like buying in bulk to save money in the long run. These places offer phenomenal prices on just about everything you can think of. So it’s very easy to save a lot of money if you stay reasonable with your purchases here. Between bulk values and cheaper gas, most memberships usually pay for themselves.

But be careful because you can easily overspend at these places. They offer deals on everything so overspending can mean that you’re wasting more money than you really need to. Don’t buy stuff here just because it’s on sale. Buy it because you need it AND because it’s a good bulk buy.

This post here on synchronybank.com will show you 7 secrets to saving money at warehouse clubs.

3. Don’t shop on the weekend!

Another tip to save at the grocery store is to NEVER shop on the weekends. Now I know that most people have to just because the week is so busy. But if you can find a way to get your groceries during the week, you’ll not only save money, but free up part of your weekend as well for more fun!

For more, check out thepennyhoarder.com’s post here on why you shouldn’t get groceries on the weekend.

This post here from delish.com will show you the cheapest days to go grocery shopping for certain items.

And this post here from tasteofhome.com will show you the best day to actually go get your groceries (hint: it’s Wednesday).

4. Don’t grocery shop with your kids!

We all love our kids, but if you have the option of leaving them at home while you shop for groceries, do that. Here are two reasons why:

Kids can be a major distraction. After an hour of trying to wrangle your children through a crowded store, you might stray from your list and start buying extra things on impulse.
Kids are also kids. They want candy, snacks, drinks, and everything else that’s put in front of them at the grocery store. And they’ll drive you nuts until they get what they want.

So if it’s at all possible, leave them at home.

5. Have a grocery budget

Another way to make sure you’re not overspending on groceries is to have a set grocery budget amount. Now I’m not saying that once you hit this, you starve and don’t buy any more groceries for your family. But you need to have a goal that you try to shoot for every month.

If you’ve never done this, I suggest adding up your grocery expenses for a month and then trying to lower those expenses. If you’ve spent $800 dollars this month, try to set a budget amount of $750 or $700 and stick with that. Then you can tweak it as you get better with your budget and as you learn more about saving money at the grocery store.

6. Meal planning

Meal planning is a great way to save money on groceries. The goal is to buy a lot of food for really cheap and make that into enough meals to last a week or longer. Meal prepping is awesome and perfect for people with busy schedules. Plus, it’s fantastic for the grocery budget.

If you’d like to learn more about meal prepping, check out this guide here on budgetbytes.com.

7. Dinner planning

Dinner planning is a great way to plan out all of your meals for a week or a month. All you have to do is write out what meals you want for each day and then go and get only the food needed for each meal. This is a decent way to keep grocery costs down and already have meals planned out. Then you just pull out whatever food you need for that day and make it for dinner. Simple and easy.

8. Plan your trip in advance with a list

You can already see that planning is a huge part of keeping your grocery budget in check. Well, planning your actual grocery trip is important, too! Before you go, make sure you create a list of what you need. This means physically getting up and checking to see what you do have and what you’ll need from the store.

This is very important because you don’t want to just “wing it” at the grocery store. That’s dangerous because you’ll end up buying stuff that you don’t need and spending way more money than you really needed to. Make a list and stick to it.

9. Don’t eat out after your grocery trip!!

The meme above shows some of the humor in our society because it’s so true. Grocery shopping can be exhausting. And I can easily say that I’ve been guilty of getting fast food after. But as funny as that meme is, if you’re trying to save money, don’t go out to eat after grocery shopping!

What I suggest is to have a plan for your next meal. If you want, figure out something simple to make or just buy a pre-made meal to pop in the microwave. My wife and I used to always get a pizza to eat after we shopped. It was cheap and it kept us from going out to eat. Have a plan for after you shop so you don’t spend extra money on fast food.

10. Rotisserie for dinner

One easy way to save money on a family meal is to get a Rotisserie chicken from your local grocery store. Normally I’ll say to stay away from the pre-made food section because it can be overly expensive. But those dang rotisserie chickens are the freakin’ bomb. Some local stores will even do a meal deal for like $10-12 dollars. That’s a heck of a deal for like 2-3 people. We usually do one of these a week and I’ll even get it at my job sometimes and eat off of a rotisserie chicken and vegetables meal for a day or two. Worth it.

11. Eat before you shop

This is one of the biggest tips that I can give you before you go to the grocery store. You need to eat at least something before you go for any kind of grocery run. Even if you’re just grabbing a few things. If you go to a store that sells a lot of food and snacks and you’re hungry, it’s game over. Forget saving money. You’ll grab anything and everything that sounds good. Anything that you could eat. Usually this means overspending on food you probably don’t need.

All you need to do is make a sandwich or have a snack before you go. Or just eat a full meal about 30 minutes before your shopping trip. If you do that, you’ll shop with your list, not with your stomach.

12. Don’t shop tired

You should also be fairly rested when you go to the grocery store. Nothing good ever happens when you’re tired so don’t even try to grocery shop. This is a horrible idea because you will often think about what kind of food is the easiest to make while shopping. You’ll end up buying snacks, junk food, and more expensive, pre-made food. At least that’s what I’ve done in the past. Try to go early in the day or after you’ve been able to rest up a bit.

13. Take advantage of sales

Another brilliant way to save money at the grocery store is by taking advantage of their daily and weekly sales. Most of the stores I listed above in the first section (tip #1) feature a weekly sales flier that you can get at the store or get sent to you. Some places, like Food Lion, often have an online email newsletter that features these sales as well. Sign up for that.

Also, check out the website of your favorite stores. We go to Aldi and Food Lion the most and they always feature the weekly sales AND sometimes other secret or special limited time deals. All of that can help you plan your trips better which normally equals more savings.

14. Figure out your store’s sales day

Sometimes a store will feature a specific day for either sales or coupons. If you can figure out your store’s specific sales day, this can be big. Some stores don’t do this. But there are a few that will always have sales on a specific day or offer more money for your coupons. Harris Teeter is one that specifically offers double and triple coupon days but you have to know when it is. We don’t shop there otherwise but you can get ridiculous deals (and sometimes free stuff from couponing) on those days. I’ll put more on this in the next section.

15. Couponing

Couponing can be a great way to save a small chunk of money at the grocery store. However, the coupons just aren’t what they used to be. So you’ve really got to look for coupons these days. Check all of your local papers. Also, some websites allow you to sign up and print them off.

Once you find your coupons, use them wisely. Don’t buy stuff just because you have a coupon. Buy the groceries that you know you will need and what you will actually use. Also, take advantage of double and triple coupon days at local stores like Harris Teeter, Walmart, and CVS.

For a comprehensive list of stores that double coupons based on your state, check out this guide here on grocery-coupons-guid.com.

You can also check out this post here on thekrazycouponlady.com about stores with the best coupon policy.

16. Shop with a calculator

Even though this takes a little bit more time at the store, I love doing this one. All you need is a regular calculator or your phone calculator. Simply set a goal for how much you aim to spend and start adding up every single expense that you put into your cart. Take the prices as shown under the item and add up each item as you put it in your cart. This will continually let you know how much you are spending up to that point. Don’t add the tax in yet.

At the end of your shopping trip, add in your state and local sales tax. For example, my state of North Carolina has a total of about 6.75% sales tax with the added in local tax. So I add up everything in my cart, let’s say it comes to $100 dollars. Add in the sales tax and the total of my groceries should be about $106.75.

This is a great way to keep track of your expenses and it keeps you from impulse purchases and buying anything frivolous. It forces you to look at how much you’re spending for almost the entire shopping trip. Nothing like being guilted out of buying that huge tub of ice cream.

17. Price book

The price book is an interesting concept that I saw when researching tips for this post. It’s actually something that I already spoke to my wife about but not in the form of a book.

A price book is a literal notebook where you keep track of the prices of different groceries across the different stores that you shop at. You compare prices and then choose where you’re going to buy certain items at.

But be careful and make sure you’re not going to like 12 different stores just because you’re saving a dollar here or there. We shop at two different stores: Aldi and Food Lion. We’ve already compared prices and know what to get where. Occasionally, with double and triple coupons, we go to Harris Teeter.

But the price book is an interesting tip to try out. We might give it a try as well.

18. Freeze your meat

Because inflation has caused EVERYTHING to go up in price, meat prices have become astronomically high. So it’s a good idea to bulk buy as much meat as possible, in as big of an amount as you can, and then freeze it. Meat lasts a LONG time in the freezer and can help you save money for the next couple of months.

19. Freeze your meals

Freezing your meals and already made food can help you save just a little bit of money in the long run. We always make a lot of food for certain dinners, eat off of the leftovers for about 2-3 days, and then freeze whatever is about to go bad. That food is still good and the freezer helps us keep those extra meals for a month or two extra.

For example, we make a huge pot of chili and eat that for a couple of days. Then we take anything that’s left and freeze it for a couple of extra meals in the future.

20. Use a smaller cart or basket

Another way to make sure you don’t splurge or impulse buy at the grocery store is to use the smaller carts or handheld baskets. These carts and baskets only hold a limited amount of items so use them to stick to your list!

21. Quick trip with no cart

This tip is very similar to the last tip but takes away any convenient baskets. If you need to run into the store for just a couple of things, skip the basket and just carry those items to the register. This sounds highly inconvenient but that’s the idea behind this. Making yourself carry only those couple of things guarantees that you won’t pick up anything extra along the way.

Skip the cart and save a little bit of money while you’re at it!

22. Buy in bulk

If you can swing it, buying some of your groceries in bulk can really help you save money in the long run. You might pay a little more up front, but it can help you save a lot over time!

23. Price per unit

Whenever you buy something at the grocery store, the price tag will usually show you how much something costs per unit (per ounce and what not). The less per unit, the better the deal.

Buying in bulk is one way to pay less per unit. Another way is to simply compare the price per unit between similar foods. For example, the name brand crackers might cost .15 cents per ounce while the store brand crackers cost .12 cents per ounce. If they’re just about the same thing, you would obviously get a better deal with the store brand because the price per unit is a few cents cheaper.

24. Learn how to cook

How does learning how to cook help lower your bill at the grocery store? Simple: you’ll buy less of the pre-packaged, expensive food items and frozen meals and cook more healthy, fresh meals. That fresh food that you cook is WAY cheaper and easier on your grocery budget.

25. Simplify your cooking

Further, keep your cooking simple. A lot of different kinds of food, ingredients, and spices can really run up your grocery bill. I’m not opposed to you buying food and other stuff for meals, but you can keep meals simple AND still make delicious food. We try to only cook a protein, a vegetable, and a carb with each meal. I’ll add a little bit of spice or sauce to it and that’s it. And it usually tastes pretty good. Keep cooking simple to save more money on your groceries.

26. Expand your palate

Just expanding your palate can easily save you money at the grocery store. There are SO many healthy foods that people never eat because they’re healthy. Or that they might not have tried yet. There are also foods from other cultures that are relatively inexpensive. So don’t just keep eating the same stuff over and over again. Try something new and you might find something both delicious AND cheap.

27. eat more veggies

If you don’t eat vegetables now, you need to start. Not only are they extremely good for you, but reasonably cheap as well. Add more veggies into your life and watch you grocery budget start to shrink.

28. Try to buy in-season

Normally fruit is fairly expensive, but if you can find it on sale or in season, I’d highly recommend taking advantage of this (just like with the veggies in the last section). When fruit is in-season, that means that this is the prime time when the certain fruit or vegetable is grown or harvested. Now we know that vegetables are almost always cheap. But when fruit is in season, it’s bountifully available and always on some kind of sale.

Here’s an infographic that shows you when fruits are in-season. I really like this quick guide.

29. Farmers markets

Farmers markets are another way to get just about anything grown at very reasonable prices. Even if you’re paying the same as the grocery store, the quality of the fruit, vegetables, and other locally-produced goods are going to be much higher quality than the grocery store. Check around for your local farmers market. You can get great, quality produce for awesome prices!

30. Prep work

Before you go to the store and buy that $7 dollar pre-sliced fruit tray or that $6 dollar pre-made salad, think about what you’re paying for: convenience. Normally, the ingredients required to make that already prepped food will cost the same, if not less, than that pre-made food.

You can buy all of the stuff to make about 5 of those salads for around the same price. And if you bought the fruit to make that fruit tray, you might pay a couple dollars more for all that fruit, but you’ll have twice or three times as much.

Another thing that my wife loves is called overnight oats. It’s simply oatmeal and milk with some fruit and spices that sits in the fridge overnight. It makes a great breakfast and can be made at home for like .50 cents to a dollar. But if you buy that in the store already made, it will cost you like $3-5 dollars per meal.

If you’re willing to spend a little bit of time prepping certain foods and meals, rather than buying them in the store, you can save A LOT of money.

31. Day old or almost expired

Day old bread and bakery items are amazing. They’re not bad just because they’re called “day old.” It just means one day past the sell by date on the package. Grocery stores don’t want to get sued so they either sell it as “day old” or trash it. That means you can get a discount up to 90% off on that stuff.

Almost expired food is another great route. Meat is sold for very cheap and you can buy it in bulk and freeze it for later. Or you can buy a little bit of almost expired food and make it for dinner within a couple of days. Normally, you can get 50% percent off or more on this stuff.

So take advantage of either of these options and save some cash!

32. Try before you buy

Did you know that stores will often allow you to taste bakery or pre-made food before you buy it? Yep, if you just ask, they’ll usually let you try it if at all possible. Lunch meat, some leftover bakery items, food trays, fruits, and other non-packaged food is all fair game. All you have to do it ask. That way, you’ll know if you like it and don’t have to bring it back!

33. Store brand over name brand

This is an easy way to save money on your groceries. These days, most food made by store brands is surprisingly similar to the other food made by big name brands. If you can switch some of the name brands that you buy to the store brand of those products, you can normally save A LOT of money throughout the year!

34. Bottom of the shelf and outer aisles

Here’s a quick tip – when shopping for your groceries, try to avoid stuff in the middle of the aisles and at eye level. All of that tends to be the more expensive, name brand stuff. Next time you go to the grocery store, just look at what’s being sold in every aisle in those spots. You’ll see what I’m talking about.

After that, start looking at the bottom of the shelves and the outer aisles for more of what you need. Those areas are generally cheaper and will help you save money on groceries.

35. Shop around for some items

Don’t be afraid to look at other grocery stores for grocery items that you buy a lot. Also, consider what I said in #17 and consider keeping a price book. Do whatever it takes to save money!

36. Rice and beans (and other cheap foods)

There are SO MANY foods that can help you keep your grocery expenses in check. The obvious choice, from the followers of Dave Ramsey, is rice and beans. A super cheap budget meal that is fairly quick to make. I also lived off of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for a long time when I was younger. Not the healthiest, but it was cheap, fast, and it helped me pay off a lot of debt. Aside from those two meals, the list of cheap foods is endless.

Check out this list here on frozenpennies.com.

37. Avoid pre-packaged and processed food

Pre-packaged and processed foods are not only unhealthy, they’re usually more expensive, too. Stay away from this stuff as much as possible and eat more fresh fruits, vegetables, and whatever else you can cook that’s healthy. On top of keeping your grocery budget financially fit, avoiding these foods will keep you mentally and physically fit as well.

38. Be careful of shrinkflation

We’ve all experienced shrinkflation in the last couple of years. If you don’t know what shrinkflation is, let me enlighten you. Shrinkflation is when a company sells less of a product, makes a product smaller, or shrinks the contents of a product but keeps the price the same. So basically, you pay the same price for even less of a certain product.

For example, you’ve probably all seen a bag of chips in our day and age. You open the bag and there seems to be more air than actual chips in the bag. They’re giving you less chips and charging you the same price. Sometimes, companies will just make their product and the packaging a little bit smaller than it used to be. You don’t really notice it because your price hasn’t gone up at all and because, “hasn’t it always been that size?”

Companies do this so that they can make more profit while keeping the product at the same price point (i.e. so consumers don’t notice this happening). But we’ve noticed. Because you can only make stuff so small before you have to raise the price up.

So watch out for shrinkflation. It’s bad for your grocery budget.

39. The potato conspiracy

Did you know that the weight on produce is the minimum allowed by law? Oh yeah, so check those pre-packaged fruit and potato bags because you might be able to get a little bit more than what the bag actually states.

So if you’re looking for a 5 pound bag of potatoes, take a couple of bags and weigh them. Find the one that weighs the most and get that one. You might even get an extra potato out of the deal!

40. Store loyalty card

Store loyalty cards can be fairly lucrative if you use them every time you shop. I love loyalty cards because it’s basically free money. We use our Food Lion card at every single purchase because it gives us discounts on the actual purchase and free “shop and earn” money applied sporadically to other trips.

Every time we spend a certain amount of money in a category like produce or frozen foods, they give us between $1 and $10 dollars toward the next purchase. I love getting that money applied every so often. They send you emails about it but I just wait until I get that nice little “shop and earn” money surprise at checkout.

Use your store loyalty card at every visit. It can help you save a lot of money and earn you a lot of loyalty points over time.

41. DON’T use a grocery rewards credit card

I know that most blogs will tell you that “using a cash back rewards credit card will save you money at the grocery store.” But this isn’t one of those blogs. I believe that credit cards are extremely dangerous and using them for a small amount rewards is just dumb. You’re playing a very dangerous game and thinking that you’re winning by earning some credit card rewards.

The truth is that most people aren’t disciplined and are paying way more in credit card interest than they’re earning in rewards. Why? Because getting rewards back feels like a good idea. But instead of going the credit card route, just skip that and use the other 46 tips on this list to save money on your groceries.

42. Cash back apps

Cash back grocery store apps can be a fun way to save a little bit of money over time. If you’d like to take advantage of these, go for it. You’re probably not going to earn much money. But I would rather you use these than a rewards credit card.

There are two apps specifically that I’d like to mention in this section. The first is Fetch Rewards. This is a cash back app that gives you points for simply uploading your grocery store and restaurant receipts. After a certain amount of points, you can cash in for different gift cards like Starbucks and Target. If you’d like to learn more about Fetch Rewards, check out this review post here on michaelsaves.com.

The second app is Ibotta. This has been the unofficial king of grocery apps for a long time and is the one my wife currently uses. They offer cash back on certain purchases at the grocery store. They won’t give you money back on everything, but some items can offer a dollar or two cash back so it kind of balances out to around the same amount of money back as the Fetch Rewards app. To date, my wife has made over $100 dollars in this app and you can cash out every $20 dollars.

Check out a great Ibotta review here on thesavvycouple.com.

43. Try not to pay full price for anything

I know this is probably impossible to do, but one of my last tips In this post is to try and not pay full price for anything you buy at the grocery store. Now you can get a deal, discount, or sale on A LOT of stuff at the grocery store so challenge yourself to always try and get everything (or as much as possible) on sale. This can easily save you hundreds of dollars per year.

44. Learn how to say, “NO!”

“NO!” is the most powerful word in the world. And if you want to be successful at saving money at the grocery store, or just saving money in general, you need to tell yourself, “NO!”, more often. Most people won’t, so they just grab whatever they want as they shop through the grocery store. They don’t stick to the list and they impulse purchase a bunch of stuff. That sucks. Because you’ll spend way more than you need to and your budget will suffer because of it.

Instead, you need to be ultra-disciplined. Stick to your list and stop impulse buying everything you want. I’m not saying don’t ever buy yourself anything. Just be disciplined and get the groceries you need first.

If you get all your groceries and decide you’d like a pack or Oreos or a tub of ice cream, get it. But that’s it. Don’t buy 10 other things that are just a waste of money. My wife and I usually buy groceries and each get some kind of snack or sweet treat that we like.

Learning how to tell yourself, “NO!” can be a powerful way to discipline yourself.

45. Pay attention at checkout

As much as I’d like to trust the cashiers because they may seem like good people, I always pay attention to the items being rung up at checkout. And after I get the receipt, I ALWAYS go over it for a couple of minutes to make sure there were no issues.

You really never know if there’s a mistake or not until you check. Those cashiers are ringing stuff up ALL DAY. They want a paycheck. They aren’t worried about you and whether everything rings up correctly unless you say something. If you see an incorrect price, tell them. Discount didn’t get applied? Tell them. Normally, the problem can be easily fixed. But it’s up to you. YOU have to pay attention so that you don’t lose money at checkout.

46. Don’t like it? Return it!

Did you know that many stores offer a 100% percent money back guarantee if you don’t like something you bought? Yeah, I actually didn’t know this until I started researching for this post. Obviously you can take food back if it’s opened or it was expired when you bought it, but check you local grocery store’s policy. You could be surprised to learn that they will give you your money back if you bought something and didn’t like it. All of those dollars count, right?

47. Go pantry shopping

One last trick to save money on your groceries is to go shopping through your pantry! Yes, before you hit the grocery store for another full shopping trip, check out the pantry first. I know it may not seem like you have a lot of food left, but get creative. Try to come up with at least one of two more meals based on what’s in there.

Normally, we can find about two to three small meals to get us through at least another day. It may not save much, but in the long run, this can save you hundreds of dollars.

So what have we learned

Buying groceries is a necessity. But losing money because of poor impulse control or overspending is not. These days, with prices as high as they are, we need to be able to save as much money at the grocery store as possible. This list is where you start. Use each and every tip on here to save money and tighten up your food budget. After reading this post, you should be a pro at grocery shopping. No excuses. Now get out there and go win with your money.