How Bargain Grocery Stores Can Cut Your Grocery Bill in Half

$200 dollars later and only carrying a few grocery bags. Sound familiar?

With the recent rise in inflation everything from cars and trucks to simple entertainment has become more expensive. Sadly, groceries are no different.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic I remember being able to walk out of the grocery store for under $100 dollars with enough food to feed myself for the entire week.

Fast forward to today and I’m walking out of the same grocery store spending hundreds of dollars more for many of the same items I used to buy.

The cost has gotten so crazy that I started looking for ways to reduce my grocery bills, and I learned a valuable lesson that made me wish I started doing this sooner.

Bargain Grocery Stores!

These grocery stores will often offer the same products you find at traditional grocery stores, but for a fraction of the price.

What allows these stores to reduce prices compared to other grocery chains is their business model. They tend to get ahold of items that were overstocked, items approaching their sell-by date, seasonal closeouts, and store brand names. The food and products are usually the same, but the way these are sourced and priced is completely different.

Sure, the storefront, the ambiance, and the overall feel of the store might not be as impressive. There’s no smell of fresh-baked bread, or a piping hot pizza coming out of the oven looking incredibly delicious. They might not always have all the products you are looking for, and sometimes the store is a little further away from home than we would like.

But that’s not really the point.

These stores offer incredible deals that can save you thousands of dollars a year. You just have to be willing to give them a shot and put a little extra effort into capturing those savings.

Some well-known examples of bargain grocery stores are:

• Grocery outlet
• Aldi
• WinCo
• Food 4 Less

Personally, Grocery Outlet has been the place to go for me and my wife to save a lot of money on groceries.

The “Whole Paycheck” Grocery Store Problem

Grocery stores like Whole Foods, Nugget (if you’re from Northern California), or even Albertsons, Safeway, and Raley’s all have great storefronts. Their aisles are packed to the brim with everything you could possibly need under one roof.

The stores are spacious, the lights are bright, and the bakery is constantly pumping out bread and cookies that smell incredibly delicious.

But all of that convenience and presentation come at a cost.

Because while these stores are great to shop in, you’re often paying a pretty large premium for the experience.

What Shopping at Bargain Grocery’s Stores is Like

The big thing with shopping at these stores is the revolving door of products. Some weeks they have exactly what you need, and other weeks they are missing key items on your list.

Additionally, you learn to stop shopping by brands. For example, my wife and I bought frozen meatballs from Grocery Outlet that were very good. Fast forward a month later when we tried to buy them again, and no such luck, they had a different brand that just wasn’t as good.

Another thing to consider is that the store layout can be a bit chaotic. In general, they follow a stocking pattern, but at times the shelves can look picked over or disorganized. And you will need to spend more time looking for a specific product than you would in other grocery stores.

Lastly, some products don’t ever seem to make a return. And yes, I’m talking about those meatballs, we haven’t seen them since. Hopefully, one day they make a return to Grocery Outlet.

Strategies My Wife and I Use for Grocery Shopping Now

1. Start my Grocery Shopping at the Bargain Stores.

The main point here is we make the bargain grocery stores our first stop, not our last. By doing this it causes us to buy as much as possible from the bargain store to save as much money as possible. Some weeks the store may have everything on our list, meaning there’s no need to visit another grocery store at all. Other weeks they might be missing a few items, but they will usually still carry the majority of what we need.

2. Find Substitutions

The Bargain grocery might not have the specific item you are looking for, so we try to find potential substitute items. For instance, if we are looking for meatballs for a pasta dish and they don’t have them, we will grab some ground beef and make a meat sauce instead. Or if they don’t have a specific type of bean you need, we look to see what beans they do have that could easily be swapped in.

3. Shop at the Pricey Stores Last

If we come to find that the bargain store doesn’t have the item of a good substitution, we will then stop at a pricier store on my way home and pick that item up. That’s okay, because at the end of the day we saved the bulk of our money by buying everything else at the bargain grocery store.

How Much it Has Saved my Wife and I

Prior to shopping at bargain grocery stores my wife and I would typically spend about $200 – $240 dollars a week on groceries for the both of us. That usually entails a good number of fruits, vegetables, and protein choices to produce three or four dishes, which could be used as leftovers for the next night’s dinner. Additionally, this haul would provide us food for breakfast and lunch to bring to work.

However, after going to Grocery Outlet we were able to start bringing our cost down to about 110 dollars week.

That’s a savings of $90-$130 dollars, and if you apply that savings to an entire year, that equates to $4,680 to $6,760 total.

Why People Don’t Shop at Bargain Grocery Stores

Speaking from experience, there is a number of reasons why people don’t shop at these stores.

1. Convenience

One of the main reasons people avoid bargain grocery stores is convenience. In many people’s cases, the closest bargain store isn’t the closest grocery store and requires more time and extra driving. In my case an extra 10-minute drive was enough for me to say no thank you. While that may not seem like much, it can still be enough to discourage shoppers, especially when other grocery stores are within walking distance or located right around the corner.

2. Habit

Habits can be difficult to break, especially when they have been built over many years. Many people grow up shopping at the same grocery stores their families used, and that routine tends to stick. Once someone becomes familiar with a store’s layout and knows exactly where everything is located, it becomes much easier to keep returning to that same store rather than trying something new.

3. Perception

Another reason people avoid these stores is perception. Many assume the quality of the products isn’t on par with more expensive grocery stores. In reality, that often isn’t true. Bargain grocery stores frequently carry the exact same products, but they acquire them through different sourcing strategies, which allows them to offer lower prices.

There is also sometimes a perception that shopping at discount stores reflects poorly on someone’s financial situation. In reality, there is nothing wrong with spending less money on groceries while building a stronger bank account.

4. Predictability

Predictability is another major factor. Many shoppers prefer going to one store that consistently carries all the items on their list. They want to know those products will be available week after week. While bargain grocery stores can be less predictable with their inventory, this challenge can usually be managed by using a flexible shopping strategy like the one discussed earlier.

Final Thoughts

Most people tend to think cutting out that daily coffee or candy bar will present immense savings. And while that’s not a bad thing, it won’t produce as much savings as you think.

You need to find the big-ticket items and make cuts there to really see big impacts.

Switching to bargain grocery stores can do just that. If done correctly, you can save thousands of dollars a year.

Instead of eliminating or reducing your eating, try shopping elsewhere, and you’ll be surprised at the rewards that come with it.

If your looking for other budgeting tips check out my other blog post Good Budgeting Tips That Actually Work in Real Life