Your Savings, Your Needs

I have been couponing for over a year now. I haven't been too diligent with it lately as things were kind of crazy around here. I'm slowly working my way back into it.

I hosted a coupon workshop for the first time several weeks ago. One of the comments brought up, and something a lot of people wonder is, 'How can I get all my groceries for a few dollars'. Honestly, in my opinion, it depends on you. Here's what I mean. My family eats whole, fresh foods with the addition of frozen vegetables and grain products. We do not eat a lot of prepared, processed foods, because I do not like to feed them to my family. That is not to say I am stuck up and won't buy them or eat them ever, but I try to stay away from those type of things.

In our local area, we don't have too many options as far as getting fresh fruits and vegetables in bulk from local farmers. However, I'm finding out more and more farmers around this area are trying to get into the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) subscription arena. That is another topic though!

The point of me mentioning the prepared foods vs the fresh foods is that the cost is notably different. If you're looking for boxed, canned and bagged foods, then yes, there will be a lot of coupons available to you, because convenience foods are the food of America right now. This is sad, but true. Finding coupons for milk, produce and meat is much more difficult. So, if you buy the products that have abundant coupons, then you will be saving a lot more than I do.

I also think the way you stockpile affects the savings as well. I do stockpile some, but since we use a lot of fresh ingredients, I can't really stockpile. This is where I hope one day a garden will come into play, or participating in the CSA exchanges.

Savings are subjective. Your needs are different than mine as far as your desires of what to buy and cook, as well as how much your budget is and what you want to save/spend. I am fine with saving 50-60% on groceries and spending $80 OOP each week, you may want to save that much or more and spend less OOP. I know that I will probably never spend $1.20 OOP, because of the foods I buy, and I am fine with that. When you are couponing, the biggest thing is to be aware of your personal and financial needs and go about what works best for you. Don't let anyone try to sway you different, because each person is entitled to their own opinion and of course everyone has different needs!