I tried Dream Dinners last year and blogged about it several times. At first, I was quite pleased, but by the end, I felt that only a few of their dishes met our rather high (some might say picky) standards. Still, my brother-in-law, who works long hours and lives alone, found it the quality sufficient for the convenience.
Although I do not participate in the grocery game website, I do "play" a savings game with myself. I get the paper everyday, esp. Sun. I cut coupons for products I use or may use and compare all the sale flyers in my area. I manage to spend harly anything on groceries or personal items. Perfect example: today I went to Walgreens. Between their sale, their coupons/rebates and my manufacture coupons, I saved $67. Same thing at Publix. Went grocery shopping and saved $50. I usually save about 50-75% of what I would have spent.I also don't buy alot of processed food, unless you count cereal :). Which by the way, I got 3 boxes of cereal today for $4. The stores here do not double coupons, but if they did, they would have been free. So, do I like shopping, no. But since I make a savings game of it, then, yes, I can deal with it.
I want to write a post on hedonic adjustment. I don't doubt that it is producing a bogus CPI, but it's really hard to know by how much. I mean, hedonic adjustment is a legitimate concept--a car that lasts for 20 years really is worth more than a car that last for 4 years, and a $3000 computer bought this year is almost immeasurably more valuable than a $3000 computer bought in 1984.
The grocery game is fairly labor intensive, however The payoff is huge- its SO satisfying to get groceries for free or 15- 20 cents a piece while shopping at my favorite Safeway (Philip I totally agree that the store makes a big difference in the shopping experience) I typically sit down for a few hours on Sunday afternoon, review the grocery game, plan meals for the week based on the deals, and then build my grocery list and go shop. This has made the cooking when i get home from work job significantly more doable, since i always have a plan, and always have the ingredients (that I've bought for cheap!). also- the grocery game could still be advantageous even if you aren't clipping coupons, because it tells you which products are currently being sold at their lowest price.
Online shopping, with the supermarkets delivering to your house is really popular in the UK. After the first couple of times it is really quick, and now some supermarkets over here deliver in 1 hour time slots, so you don't even need to be in all evening, and others will deliver it literally to your fridge door.
I did it when I was a student and no-one in my house had a car. It worked out as a really good way to save money, because you weren't tempted so much to make impulse purchases, and you could choose to shop at the cheapest supermarket rather than the closest one. And with delivery at about £5 ($10), split between 4, the savings from not buying any donuts/drinks cans etc. easily saved money.
The bad is that sometimes they give you really naff fresh food, particularly fruit and veg which might be bruised, or just unpleasantly squiggy, so you might have to go shopping separately for that.
For me, which store is "my favorite" has a lot to do with things that mostly don't matter if I'm having my groceries delivered:
The store is clean and well-lighted.
It's organized so that I can find stuff.
The parking lot is easy to get into and out of.
In fact, it might be for the best if a non-favorite store offered delivery. Then I could get staples from them delivered, while continuing to go to my favorite store for things I wanted to pick out myself and fresh stuff that I want to buy the day I'm going to use it.
For thegrocerygame, you can just put the date on top of the circular, file the whole thing, then pull it out to clip from when/if you need it. I don't use many processed foods, so this is easier for me. Also, check out couponmom.com. It's similar to grocerygame, but free (lots of ads, though, and a lengthy sign up process. Just get through it, it's worth it!). They do different stores, so they may have stores in your area. You could also check out hotcouponworld.com, but they are hard core couponers who get a months worth of groceries for $25, and regularly get everything for free at CVS. You can check it out for tips, at least.
Actually, I should have followed up on this - it totally worked! He is doing much better now. We've only had one infection since the face lift, as opposed to one or two a month before. So it's been a worthwhile investment.
unfortunatly I get alot of copouns but I haven't been able to figure them all out. I did manage to get 2 for 1 on a large pack of toliet paper. From everything I've read copouning can save you a ton of cash, the reward far outweights the effort. For example Lynnae over over at beingfurgal.net saved $40 on a $100 shopping bill. That's quite an accomlishment.
As a side note, pre-packaged foodstuffs (canned tomato paste, boxed cereal, dehydrated fruit, bottled wine, etc) have never, even once, fallen in aggregate annual retail price over the last 50 years. This investment advice has a proven track record.
It seems to me that guest's non-negotiable way of life is threatened. As a professional engineer, I must sadly tell you that most of the "solutions" proposed to date are simply magical thinking at work.....no quantity of recycled french fry oil or zero-point energy is going to replace fossil fuels in the quantity required to continue operating civilization as it exists today, much less as forecasted to be required in the near future, and no amount of magical thinking/Jiminy Cricket syndrome trumps the laws of physics and thermodynamics.
The first option sounds similar but a little more labor intensive than the coupon sense program in Arizona. You don't clip there. You just file them until the best time to use them comes up, which the web site service does for you. I was getting ready to leave when they were just getting started, so I didn't end up using them. But my neighbor did and she was RAVING about all the money she was saving. We tend to spend money and save money in very similar ways, so I basically trust her judgement on it. Others might want to check out for themselves.
Why dont you take this information and try doing some of your own research along with it. If you just sit and take any old person's financial advice without fully understanding it and knowing it then you will get what you deserve. So take a little time and do some independent research on this. Take notes of what you find and why not report back here with your findings?
When one compares the present cost of goods and services that have remained essentially unchanged in form or functionality since the 1950's (example: postage stamp, ice cream cone, haircut, gallon of gas, gallon of milk), one can easily see that the government is massaging the numbers. From BLS unemployment statistics to hedonic adjustments to monetary and credit expansion, the US has an entire Ministry of Propaganda hard at work on misleading and misdirecting anyone interested in the economics of the matter.
Welcome to the Ministry of Propaganda. Of course you won't find any sign proclaiming a building in Washington D.C. the Ministry of Propaganda, but the ministry exists in a decentralized fashion, reaching into every fiber of the government and the private sector.
Like the Devil, the MOP's most successful propaganda campaign is the one denying its own existence.
The US has become a giant Enron, nothing but lies, lies, and lies.
1) Bogus inflation numbers.
2) The unemployment rate is also manipulated down.
3) GDP is back-adjusted lower every quarter.
4) Balance sheets of corporations, pension funds and government agencies massively understate liabilities and overstate assets/future earnings.
5) Visibly laughable lies are mouthed by top officials with a straight face.
The Propaganda Ministry has waged a successful campaign. It has convinced people that apathy is concern, liabilities are assets, inflation doesn’t exist, debt is money and growth, peace is war, terror will be ended by war, and any news is good for stocks. The Prop Min has gotten people to accept that the only way to support soldiers is to keep them in harms way and to suggest otherwise is unpatriotic.
Apparently people also believe that recessions are evil, destruction of purchasing power creates a strong currency, discouraged workers are not unemployed, and that people in this country illegally are entitled to the rights and privileges of legal citizens. All but a few believe the Fed is both omnipotent and omniscient, and craven morons have Ph.D’s or Nobel Prizes so they must be smart and capable of governing effectively.
Now the Prop Min is working on getting us to accept that worthless assets are worth what ever mythical value assumed so long as the assets are never subjected to price discovery in an open market.
How do fundamentals have meaning in an environment where reality and truth have little or no value? How does one prosper and protect that prosperity?
Welcome to the world of the market technician.
The best single source for information on the "real" rate of inflation (roughly 6-7%, not the phony 2% cited by our government agencies and the Fed) is John Williams' Shadow Government Statistics Analysis Behind and Beyond Government Economic Reporting. http://www.shadowstats.com/cgi-bin/sgs?
This is a quote from the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon:
"Commercial dehydration methods oxidize cholesterol in powdered milk, rendering it harmful to the arteries. High temperature drying also creates large quantities of cross-linked proteins and nitrate compounds, which are potent carcinogens, as well as free glutamic acid [MSG] which is toxic to the nervous system" (p. 35).
Real milk* is actually the more frugal choice. Especially after we count their effects on human health and the environment, nonfat dry milk and other processed foods don't look much like bargains. By seeking out local supplies of fresh or cultured grass-fed raw milk, people can protect the health of their own families and--by supporting small farmers--the health of their environments and communities. That's a real bargain.
Last year in October a gallon of skim at my local store was $2.29. A 10 quart box of instant milk was $5.99, which works out to $2.40/gallon. I think my local stores carry it more as a novelty (I only buy it because my bread machine recipes call for it), so the price is higher.
Right now a gallon of skim is up close to $3 (over or under depending on the store I go to). I don't know the current price of instant, but I'd bet it's still comparable to fresh.
I'm in a suburb of Boston, I'm not sure how that impacts prices.
This can also be seen as a tremendous blessing to those who produce milk locally (oranically-grassfed-or at least small family farms.) There was a day when travel was costly (time) and not practical, so these kinds of staples were commonly purchased locally.
Also, to add my two cents to the belief that ethanol production is raising the coast of corn: In the larger market there is additional coast if directly relating to the obvious increase in the cost of corn (currently around $3.40 bushel locally). However, the ethanol industry is actually very effecient in that while producing the alcohol it is making a more perfect by-product of usable feed for livestock. Cargill locally adds vitamins and minerals and sells it as Sweetbran by the semi truck-load to producers. Again, the smaller producer is likely utilizing the grass-fed option.
Powdered milk still cheaper here. At Sams club it's $13.66 a box (makes 5.5 gallons)--still cheaper than fresh milk by a dollar a gallon, or so. And making evap milk with it is less tha na can at the store.
I understand that children need to eat healthy and learn good eating habits, however, people cannont blame WIC, or government help for children not eating healthy. Parents are the ones who need to teach good eating habits. I am tired of hearing from so many people that WIC does not do enough and neither does the LINK card. WIC gives so much juice, eggs, and milk becuase those are the BASIC foods that children need, and the parents are supposed to provide the rest.
I do not mean to disrespect anybody who uses government money, but people cannot be so picky about what they get for free. I work at a grocery store and probably about 98% of the people using WIC complain that they cant get the fancy cheese, they forget its not for them, its for the kids. What about the baby formula that costs $20 a can, thats not doing enough? Also, people with link and WIC almost always have nice clothes, have their nails done, and get unrealistic foods such as candy and birthday cakes, let their friends use it and so on. I dont work to support other people and their friends, i work to support myself. And the time when one of my customers told me i was taking advantage of the government because my register did not work, i think she and some other people as well need to rethink that, arent they taking advantage of the government, if anything, that customer should be thanking me for working, so she can get her groceries that week.
I am tired of people taking advantage of government money, and other people should be too, because its not only the governments money, its my money from when i stand there for 8 hours a day and i am working, i pay for their groceries and so do you by working. People just need to be a little bit more appreciative for FREE food.
Milk powder in Calgary runs around $25 for a large bag. I buy a bag every month. I've done it for years, like my mother before me. For me it's not the price factor so much as the convenience factor. I don't have to deal with the recycling aspect. I don't have to lug home containers of milk on my bike. Milk powder is just the way I do life. If you are on your own, small containers of milk do cost more and often, I found, went sour before I used them up!
I tried Dream Dinners last year and blogged about it several times. At first, I was quite pleased, but by the end, I felt that only a few of their dishes met our rather high (some might say picky) standards. Still, my brother-in-law, who works long hours and lives alone, found it the quality sufficient for the convenience.
Comment 16 talks about yeast quantity.
how much yeast should be used in making the batch which uses 5lbs of sugar and 3 gallons of water?
Although I do not participate in the grocery game website, I do "play" a savings game with myself. I get the paper everyday, esp. Sun. I cut coupons for products I use or may use and compare all the sale flyers in my area. I manage to spend harly anything on groceries or personal items. Perfect example: today I went to Walgreens. Between their sale, their coupons/rebates and my manufacture coupons, I saved $67. Same thing at Publix. Went grocery shopping and saved $50. I usually save about 50-75% of what I would have spent.I also don't buy alot of processed food, unless you count cereal :). Which by the way, I got 3 boxes of cereal today for $4. The stores here do not double coupons, but if they did, they would have been free. So, do I like shopping, no. But since I make a savings game of it, then, yes, I can deal with it.
I want to write a post on hedonic adjustment. I don't doubt that it is producing a bogus CPI, but it's really hard to know by how much. I mean, hedonic adjustment is a legitimate concept--a car that lasts for 20 years really is worth more than a car that last for 4 years, and a $3000 computer bought this year is almost immeasurably more valuable than a $3000 computer bought in 1984.
The grocery game is fairly labor intensive, however The payoff is huge- its SO satisfying to get groceries for free or 15- 20 cents a piece while shopping at my favorite Safeway (Philip I totally agree that the store makes a big difference in the shopping experience) I typically sit down for a few hours on Sunday afternoon, review the grocery game, plan meals for the week based on the deals, and then build my grocery list and go shop. This has made the cooking when i get home from work job significantly more doable, since i always have a plan, and always have the ingredients (that I've bought for cheap!). also- the grocery game could still be advantageous even if you aren't clipping coupons, because it tells you which products are currently being sold at their lowest price.
Online shopping, with the supermarkets delivering to your house is really popular in the UK. After the first couple of times it is really quick, and now some supermarkets over here deliver in 1 hour time slots, so you don't even need to be in all evening, and others will deliver it literally to your fridge door.
I did it when I was a student and no-one in my house had a car. It worked out as a really good way to save money, because you weren't tempted so much to make impulse purchases, and you could choose to shop at the cheapest supermarket rather than the closest one. And with delivery at about £5 ($10), split between 4, the savings from not buying any donuts/drinks cans etc. easily saved money.
The bad is that sometimes they give you really naff fresh food, particularly fruit and veg which might be bruised, or just unpleasantly squiggy, so you might have to go shopping separately for that.
Rob, it sounds like something like the grocery game might really help you. I wonder if they have anything where you live?
Rebecca, hotcouponworld.com sounds like an interesting place...defininately checking it out.
Thanks, Philip--you make a good point, and one I hadn't thought of. It gives me something else to weigh, anyway!
For me, which store is "my favorite" has a lot to do with things that mostly don't matter if I'm having my groceries delivered:
In fact, it might be for the best if a non-favorite store offered delivery. Then I could get staples from them delivered, while continuing to go to my favorite store for things I wanted to pick out myself and fresh stuff that I want to buy the day I'm going to use it.
For thegrocerygame, you can just put the date on top of the circular, file the whole thing, then pull it out to clip from when/if you need it. I don't use many processed foods, so this is easier for me. Also, check out couponmom.com. It's similar to grocerygame, but free (lots of ads, though, and a lengthy sign up process. Just get through it, it's worth it!). They do different stores, so they may have stores in your area. You could also check out hotcouponworld.com, but they are hard core couponers who get a months worth of groceries for $25, and regularly get everything for free at CVS. You can check it out for tips, at least.
Actually, I should have followed up on this - it totally worked! He is doing much better now. We've only had one infection since the face lift, as opposed to one or two a month before. So it's been a worthwhile investment.
unfortunatly I get alot of copouns but I haven't been able to figure them all out. I did manage to get 2 for 1 on a large pack of toliet paper. From everything I've read copouning can save you a ton of cash, the reward far outweights the effort. For example Lynnae over over at beingfurgal.net saved $40 on a $100 shopping bill. That's quite an accomlishment.
Who are you addressing your comments to Jeremy?
As a side note, pre-packaged foodstuffs (canned tomato paste, boxed cereal, dehydrated fruit, bottled wine, etc) have never, even once, fallen in aggregate annual retail price over the last 50 years. This investment advice has a proven track record.
It seems to me that guest's non-negotiable way of life is threatened. As a professional engineer, I must sadly tell you that most of the "solutions" proposed to date are simply magical thinking at work.....no quantity of recycled french fry oil or zero-point energy is going to replace fossil fuels in the quantity required to continue operating civilization as it exists today, much less as forecasted to be required in the near future, and no amount of magical thinking/Jiminy Cricket syndrome trumps the laws of physics and thermodynamics.
The first option sounds similar but a little more labor intensive than the coupon sense program in Arizona. You don't clip there. You just file them until the best time to use them comes up, which the web site service does for you. I was getting ready to leave when they were just getting started, so I didn't end up using them. But my neighbor did and she was RAVING about all the money she was saving. We tend to spend money and save money in very similar ways, so I basically trust her judgement on it. Others might want to check out for themselves.
I've never tried the other two options.
Why dont you take this information and try doing some of your own research along with it. If you just sit and take any old person's financial advice without fully understanding it and knowing it then you will get what you deserve. So take a little time and do some independent research on this. Take notes of what you find and why not report back here with your findings?
Well, since that attempt to link didn't work, here it is in simple format.
http://www.shadowstats.com/cgi-bin/sgs?
When one compares the present cost of goods and services that have remained essentially unchanged in form or functionality since the 1950's (example: postage stamp, ice cream cone, haircut, gallon of gas, gallon of milk), one can easily see that the government is massaging the numbers. From BLS unemployment statistics to hedonic adjustments to monetary and credit expansion, the US has an entire Ministry of Propaganda hard at work on misleading and misdirecting anyone interested in the economics of the matter.
Welcome to the Ministry of Propaganda. Of course you won't find any sign proclaiming a building in Washington D.C. the Ministry of Propaganda, but the ministry exists in a decentralized fashion, reaching into every fiber of the government and the private sector.
Like the Devil, the MOP's most successful propaganda campaign is the one denying its own existence.
The US has become a giant Enron, nothing but lies, lies, and lies.
1) Bogus inflation numbers.
2) The unemployment rate is also manipulated down.
3) GDP is back-adjusted lower every quarter.
4) Balance sheets of corporations, pension funds and government agencies massively understate liabilities and overstate assets/future earnings.
5) Visibly laughable lies are mouthed by top officials with a straight face.
The Propaganda Ministry has waged a successful campaign. It has convinced people that apathy is concern, liabilities are assets, inflation doesn’t exist, debt is money and growth, peace is war, terror will be ended by war, and any news is good for stocks. The Prop Min has gotten people to accept that the only way to support soldiers is to keep them in harms way and to suggest otherwise is unpatriotic.
Apparently people also believe that recessions are evil, destruction of purchasing power creates a strong currency, discouraged workers are not unemployed, and that people in this country illegally are entitled to the rights and privileges of legal citizens. All but a few believe the Fed is both omnipotent and omniscient, and craven morons have Ph.D’s or Nobel Prizes so they must be smart and capable of governing effectively.
Now the Prop Min is working on getting us to accept that worthless assets are worth what ever mythical value assumed so long as the assets are never subjected to price discovery in an open market.
How do fundamentals have meaning in an environment where reality and truth have little or no value? How does one prosper and protect that prosperity?
Welcome to the world of the market technician.
The best single source for information on the "real" rate of inflation (roughly 6-7%, not the phony 2% cited by our government agencies and the Fed) is John Williams' Shadow Government Statistics Analysis Behind and Beyond Government Economic Reporting.
http://www.shadowstats.com/cgi-bin/sgs?
This is a quote from the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon:
"Commercial dehydration methods oxidize cholesterol in powdered milk, rendering it harmful to the arteries. High temperature drying also creates large quantities of cross-linked proteins and nitrate compounds, which are potent carcinogens, as well as free glutamic acid [MSG] which is toxic to the nervous system" (p. 35).
Real milk* is actually the more frugal choice. Especially after we count their effects on human health and the environment, nonfat dry milk and other processed foods don't look much like bargains. By seeking out local supplies of fresh or cultured grass-fed raw milk, people can protect the health of their own families and--by supporting small farmers--the health of their environments and communities. That's a real bargain.
*http://www.realmilk.com/why.html
www.westonaprice.org
Last year in October a gallon of skim at my local store was $2.29. A 10 quart box of instant milk was $5.99, which works out to $2.40/gallon. I think my local stores carry it more as a novelty (I only buy it because my bread machine recipes call for it), so the price is higher.
Right now a gallon of skim is up close to $3 (over or under depending on the store I go to). I don't know the current price of instant, but I'd bet it's still comparable to fresh.
I'm in a suburb of Boston, I'm not sure how that impacts prices.
This can also be seen as a tremendous blessing to those who produce milk locally (oranically-grassfed-or at least small family farms.) There was a day when travel was costly (time) and not practical, so these kinds of staples were commonly purchased locally.
Also, to add my two cents to the belief that ethanol production is raising the coast of corn: In the larger market there is additional coast if directly relating to the obvious increase in the cost of corn (currently around $3.40 bushel locally). However, the ethanol industry is actually very effecient in that while producing the alcohol it is making a more perfect by-product of usable feed for livestock. Cargill locally adds vitamins and minerals and sells it as Sweetbran by the semi truck-load to producers. Again, the smaller producer is likely utilizing the grass-fed option.
Powdered milk still cheaper here. At Sams club it's $13.66 a box (makes 5.5 gallons)--still cheaper than fresh milk by a dollar a gallon, or so. And making evap milk with it is less tha na can at the store.
I understand that children need to eat healthy and learn good eating habits, however, people cannont blame WIC, or government help for children not eating healthy. Parents are the ones who need to teach good eating habits. I am tired of hearing from so many people that WIC does not do enough and neither does the LINK card. WIC gives so much juice, eggs, and milk becuase those are the BASIC foods that children need, and the parents are supposed to provide the rest.
I do not mean to disrespect anybody who uses government money, but people cannot be so picky about what they get for free. I work at a grocery store and probably about 98% of the people using WIC complain that they cant get the fancy cheese, they forget its not for them, its for the kids. What about the baby formula that costs $20 a can, thats not doing enough? Also, people with link and WIC almost always have nice clothes, have their nails done, and get unrealistic foods such as candy and birthday cakes, let their friends use it and so on. I dont work to support other people and their friends, i work to support myself. And the time when one of my customers told me i was taking advantage of the government because my register did not work, i think she and some other people as well need to rethink that, arent they taking advantage of the government, if anything, that customer should be thanking me for working, so she can get her groceries that week.
I am tired of people taking advantage of government money, and other people should be too, because its not only the governments money, its my money from when i stand there for 8 hours a day and i am working, i pay for their groceries and so do you by working. People just need to be a little bit more appreciative for FREE food.
Milk powder in Calgary runs around $25 for a large bag. I buy a bag every month. I've done it for years, like my mother before me. For me it's not the price factor so much as the convenience factor. I don't have to deal with the recycling aspect. I don't have to lug home containers of milk on my bike. Milk powder is just the way I do life. If you are on your own, small containers of milk do cost more and often, I found, went sour before I used them up!