First of all, ALWAYS check the "quick sale" rack or "discount" rack. Usually things will be 30%-50% off and sometimes even 75%-90% off!!! Usually there are clothes items missing a button or a zipper (super easy and cheap to fix) or food that expires that day or within a few days. This is no big deal because you can just freeze the stuff! I once bought 14 huge bananas for 1,50$! That's a steal!
Secondly, try to only shop on the "outer aisles" of the store. You pass through the deli counter, fruits and vegetables, breads, meats, frozen things and milk products. We do groceries like this most of the time and actually go "in" the middle aisles once a month for things like canned soups, pasta, or cereal! These middle aisles are usually processed stuff or prepackaged things that you can prepare yourself at home.
Next is: price match. Stores like Walmart, Maxi and I'm sure they are more in Ontario price match. You just bring in flyers from other stores and they will match the price! We always save about 25% of the total grocery bill because of this!
We usually try to plan meals around specials (if zucchini is on special, then we can make a zucchini bake, stir fries, zucchini sticks, zucchini muffins or freeze them!) You have to be flexible, but it makes things a little less boring!
Moving along, we have coupons. Within the last few weeks, I have been following blogs (like MrsJanuary) and Facebook pages (SweetCoupons) and been checking out sites like save.ca or websaver.ca . I also joined many sites to see upcoming deals, specials or coupons. I have also contacted most companies we use by email to tell them how much our family enjoys their products and if they had any coupons to send to us. And most of them did! I wrote them back to thank them all. I only emailed the companies we buy from (or would), so there's no waste. The next way to get good coupons are from newspaper inserts. I have none of these because we don't read the newspaper (prefer reading online or for free at work), but I have asked a few people that don't use coupons but that buy newspapers to save them for us! I will also contact newspaper stands and other places to see if I can buy some (or get them for free) the next day. If not, I will start buying newspapers! The next good insert is due to come out on August 4th by the way! Stores also have coupons. Walmart accepts all stores' coupons, so you don't necessarily have to shop at 10 different stores to get the discounts.
So without any further blabbing from me, here are our best deals!
First trip - Walmart - Total 30$ before coupons or price matching
We bought all this and we got BACK 2,50$!
Next shopping trip was at Walmart again but this time we got 30$ worth of stuff for only 13$
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