do you save money by online food shopping?

[Whitewater]

Question for those who use online shopping - is this a realistic expectation? Do you have better control of your spending by shopping online, or do they just bait you in different ways?

Yes. I shop online at [supermarket] and use their rewards scheme. They offer bonus points for certain items (bright red/yellow logos, etc.) and flag up “stuff I might like” during the checkout process, so in that sense it’s the same as shopping in store. However, you can submit your basket online a few days in advance and revisit it when you’re feeling less impulsive. I’ve done this a few times when I’ve filled out an order while hungry and added loads of junk then gone back a day or so later and just bought what we needed (also, avoid falling into the rewards scheme trap).

Even taking into account the extra charge for home delivery it’s absolutely worth doing and has saved us a bunch of time and money.

 

[jpaul]

If you eat fresh vegetables(evidently most don't if you saw childrens food report, in news, last week) - not sure how you avoid visiting the shop to buy what looks decent,
and adjust recipes/dishes based on that - people have enough time to watch Netflix, so spending an hour a week at the supermarket isn't taxing.

Like Netflix content - packaged meals gastro&co mediocrity have become normalised (the power of advertising over dietary knowledge) all part of the fast/processed food dietary debasement,
Thought starmer is meant to be fixing this, which would improve nations health.

 

[slinxy]

Personally, I only tend to buy the same stuff every week.. going to the supermarket allows me to buy stuff on offer in bulk. It’s normally stuff that I don’t need but I would like, like jars of sauce or cans of soup. The tip here is not to buy stuff that you wouldn’t buy normally.

I’ve also just decided to go back to Huel for my daily lunch meal, I only stopped due to lockdown shortages and working from home, not sure if it will save me cash.. it’s more for health reason and boredom of thinking of stuff I can/want to eat at lunch time.

What does save me cash, is buying gift cards via peaks at work, it earns points.. I use the points for Amazon gift cards and manage to get around £100 pounds of points for money I would normally spend anyway plus I still get Tescos points.

Pay for vouchers on my credit card… cash back on the credit card. Get star points with peaks at work.

Use the gift card at Tescos.. get Tescos points..

Convert the star points to Amazon vouchers…
Shame it doesn’t work for fuel, but there’s some sort of tax reasons for that.

 

[Street]

We've been doing our weekly shop exclusively online for years and couldn't go back to shopping in person. We plan our weeks meals in advance and just buy the things we need. Because of this, our food wastage is pretty much zero and we eat a lot healthier as it means I won't be wandering around the shop stuffing things I like the look of in the trolley. It also saves us an hour of moping around the supermarket at the weekend or evening when I've got better things to do. We can get the shopping done in 10mins while watching TV and then unloaded in a couple minutes.

 

[Hagar]

Using the local market (tues, thurs, sat.), for veg, cheese and meat, I don't save money however grocery shopping at Aldi I do. Online is a lottery and expensive when adding delivery on top. There is more choice and I do the choosing when not shopping in the virtual domain. And you can discuss the relative merits of cauliflower or cabbage on the day with an expert.

 

[ristac]

Less online as zero temptation to get things you don’t need

 

[b0rn2sk8]

My approach is simple:

1) Write a list with the things you need.
2) only buy things on the list*

*the only extras are things with a yellow sticker which I can freeze at >40% discount.

That’s it, not exactly rocket science but it is the only way to not spend any more money than you need to. I’m not sure how people struggle with the concept.