Continuing from the previous article- Another way to cut your grocery bill is to explore grocery stores that are not as well known.
ALDI: Have you ever heard someone rave about a store called Aldi and at the end of the conversation they say “Make sure you take a quarter!”. Aldi is a discount grocery store that has all of the choices an average grocery store would have but not all the name brands and the prices that go with them. And YES, you need a quarter to get a cart. You put a quarter in the lock, and the cart comes loose. You go your merry way and buy your groceries, empty the cart and take it back to the cart corral. Stick the lock back in the slot and a quarter pops out. Saves the store a little money by not having to send an employee to gather the carts and maybe a couple of extra quarters in your pocket from the shoppers who decided it wasn’t worth the trek to the doors to retrieve their quarter.
Once you get past the fact that you have to “rent a cart,” you will find that Aldi has a great selection and quality products. The produce department is a little smaller than you may be used to but they do have most of the basic items and what they do provide are top quality and great prices with many of the items locally grown and plenty of organic choices as well. Their meat selections are fresh, and you will find choices for chicken, beef, and pork. Plus, there are a variety of frozen entrees, pizzas, baking items, gluten free and much more from which to choose.
BAKERY OUTLETS: Check around your local area to see if there are any bakery outlets. These small stores stock baked items such as bread, rolls, snack cakes and other items that have been pulled off the grocery store shelves because the expiration date is close or packaging has been changed. The prices are unbelievably inexpensive for usually top brand items. Grab a cart full and when you get home pop them in the freezer. If you go on the right day, there could be bags of donuts or high end organic whole wheat loaves of bread for a dollar. Which may be the only drawback, you never know what items will be for sale.
DOLLAR STORES: Dollar stores can have great deals on name brand items, frozen foods, and snacks. Some of them have produce for sale and have even started accepting coupons. However one needs to be cautious, make sure the quantity that you are getting is actually a good deal. Yes, you can get a burrito for a dollar, but if you went to the grocery store and bought a box of burritos, they could cost fifty cents each instead. Plus, knowing everything is a dollar tends to put people at ease, and they end up grabbing way more than they intend to and those dollars can add up.
