Search results for Groceries
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Posted
Sep 29 2009, 02:59 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
A whole year's worth of food for one person for only $799.99? And that's after a $200 discount. Is this too good to be true, or should we order?
Well, there is one small catch. The offer is for 78 one-gallon cans of dehydrated and freeze-dried food, plus a wheat grinder. Now, that's an emergency fund you can eat.
Actually, the ad exposed us to a movement we weren't very familiar with. Called "food storage," it's about amassing enough food on hand to survive common disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes, or "economic crisis" or for "religious reasons," according to a Web site called Food Storage Made Easy.
While most people would consider enough food for a few days or a few weeks to be a sufficient emergency supply, these folks think in terms of a complete year.
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Posted
Sep 24 2009, 02:00 PM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Americans are crazy for coupons again -- clipping at rates not seen in years, and the attraction is not just the 30 cents off the canned corn, The New York Times reports. It's a psychological boost, a feeling that we're proactive and therefore better than those who pay full price.
As the Times puts it, "Because it takes more work to acquire them, the people who do so feel they have outsmarted other shoppers." It's kind of like that "delicious feeling of self-denial" inherent in frugality that our pal Frank Curmudgeon likes to write about at Bad Money Advice. We're saving money and feeling good in a way that's kind of creepy.
Our collective renewed love of the coupon is also good timing. Food prices have fallen by 2.5% since an ugly high point last November, with the biggest single decline between July and August.
Here are some interesting coupon factoids from the Times and other locations:
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Posted
Sep 21 2009, 04:14 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from Jon Hood at partner site ConsumerAffairs.com.
Dannon has settled a consumer class-action lawsuit alleging that ads for certain brands of its yogurt overstate their claimed health benefits. The settlement will shell out $35 million to affected consumers.
The suit alleged that ads for both Activia and DanActive yogurt exaggerated their beneficial effects on human health. The ads promote the yogurt as improving digestion and have become well known for their goofiness; a recent Activia iteration features actress Jamie Lee Curtis, seated on a couch, noting that "our busy lives sometimes force us to eat the wrong things at the wrong times," and promoting Activia as the solution to "digestive issues."
A voiceover in the ad claims that Activia is "clinically proven to help regulate your digestive system in two weeks" if eaten every day.
The ads credit Bifidus Regularis, a Dannon-created name for bacteria found in mammals' large intestines, with Activia's positive effects on digestion.
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Posted
Sep 21 2009, 01:13 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
The jack-o'-lantern outlook in New England and parts of the Midwest looks a fright. A combination of wet and cold ruined a bunch of the pumpkin crop, and what's left in some fields is taking its own sweet time to ripen.
Not to worry, Halloween fans. The crop in most of the country's pumpkin patch looks fine, The Associated Press reports.
What's aggravating people is a shortage of canned pumpkin on store shelves.
"Holy smokes. Our stores have big empty shelves where the canned pumpkin should be. What's going on?" "CarolynF" wrote at lowcarbfriends.com.
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Posted
Sep 21 2009, 05:48 AM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from J.D. Roth at partner blog Get Rich Slowly.
The October 2009 issue of Consumer Reports contains an article extolling the virtues of generic store-brand products. While shoppers used to sacrifice quality when choosing generic, that's no longer the case. From the article:
If concern about taste has kept you from trying store-brand foods, hesitate no more. In blind tests, our trained tasters compared a big national brand with a store brand in 29 food categories. Store and national brands tasted about equally good 19 times. Four times, the store brand won; six times, the national brand won.
In other words, store brands offer roughly the same quality as national brands, but at a much-reduced cost. How much reduced? Consumer Reports says the store brands they tested cost on average 27% less than the name-brand equivalents.
How much can you save?
Sometimes theory is one thing and reality another. It's nice that Consumer Reports can score great deals on store brands. But could I? Last week, I walked to two local grocery stores to do my own research. First I looked at Safeway, where Kris and I shop most often. Next, I walked across the street to Fred Meyer, a store we usually try to avoid. (The store is huge and its layout makes little sense to me.)
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Posted
Sep 16 2009, 05:15 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from Alex Wayne at partner blog Wise Bread.
Looking for more money-saving ideas during these tough economic times? Dig that food dehydrator out of storage. This is a frugal living tip that almost everyone can act on. Just by reducing or eliminating food waste, you can save quite a bit of money.
Don't have a dehydrator? These days, you can buy a brand new one for less than the cost of a PlayStation game. Or, visit the flea market or yard sales around the neighborhood. Still can't find one? Try Craigslist. Don't have any money for another kitchen appliance? Alton Brown will show you how to make one.
Bing: Choosing a food dehydrator
Here are nine ways a dehydrator can help you stretch your budget:
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Posted
Sep 10 2009, 04:41 PM
by
Teresa Mears
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
We've all done it: stopped by a store or restaurant unexpectedly and then realized we had a coupon at home. Now there's an app for that.
More retailers are making coupons available via cell phone. Mobile coupons -- usually text messages with discount codes -- are becoming the blue-light specials for the digital age, promoting last-minute clothing sales, two-for-one entrees and cheap tickets to the theater, The New York Times reported. The mobile deals particularly appeal to young people, many of whom have never used paper coupons.
We've written about several food deals with a mobile phone version of the coupon. T.G.I. Friday's coupons nearly always have a way to get the coupon via text message. Then you show the message to your server. Cheap Stingy Bargains has some tips on how to get coupons on your mobile phone.
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Posted
Aug 27 2009, 06:43 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from Trent Hamm at partner blog The Simple Dollar.
As I've discussed many times before, eating at home is a huge money saver. Even if you use expensive ingredients all the time (like saffron or morel mushrooms), it's still cheaper to cook at home than it is to consistently eat out (assuming you're eating better than the McDonald's Dollar Menu).
Similarly, it's cheaper to make a meal out of basic ingredients than it is to use prepared and processed ingredients. The closer to the raw ingredients you are, the cheaper the meal is (usually).
Along the same lines, I've come to realize that I tend to snack on and eat whatever's convenient. For lunch, I'll usually eat leftovers because it's easy -- it's sitting in the fridge and usually requires only a bit of pepper and a trip to the microwave. At snack time, I'll look at the fruit bowl and open the refrigerator door and grab whatever's quick and at hand.
So why not combine the two -- basic ingredients and convenience -- to really crunch your food budget?
I was inspired to try some of these things by Mark Bittman's interesting "Food Matters." He suggests a similar idea: If you make good, healthy food as convenient as possible, you won't be as tempted to eat processed, unhealthy foods.
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Posted
Aug 25 2009, 01:55 PM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
What's the line between being frugal and doing something that's unethical or downright illegal to save money?
That question surfaces from time to time at personal-finance blogs. Here's an oldie but goodie example from Penelope Pince at Pecuniarities:
In a forum Penelope reads, a woman wrote that she'd neglected to use half of the jars of pasta sauce she purchased at a buy-one-get-one sale, and the date stamped on the jars was quickly approaching. She returned them to the store, said she'd lost the receipt, and got a $10 store credit.
"She knew that what she had done was dishonest but said that she thought it had been worth it," Penelope wrote.
What do you think about that? And while you're mulling it over, here are a few more examples:
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Posted
Aug 21 2009, 12:47 PM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
We wish that Jenn at Frugal Upstate lived next door to us. We grew enough lettuce for one modest salad a day, but she has an abundance. Lettuce overkill.
If you planted a victory garden to help survive the recession or routinely grow your own vegetables each year, you'll appreciate her tips for extending the life of loose-leaf lettuce in the fridge, as well as the many ways you can cook it.
"Yes, I know. Heresy," Jenn writes. "But what do you have to lose? It's just going to wind up in the compost pile at this rate, right?" (Who knows. Maybe your family won't realize they're eating lettuce yet again if it's cooked in heavy cream.)
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