Some Thoughts on Bulk Buying

I thought that since I was advocating buying in bulk a couple of weeks ago, that I should expand on it and what works for us.  I didn't always like buying in bulk, but my thinking and our needs have changed over time.  It used to be that I didn't want to fork out so much money at a time.  Bulk buying can seem expensive when one item is ten dollars a pop.   We had a very limited grocery budget and I needed to make sure it got us through the week. Over time though with growing kids who have growing appetites what used to be a week's worth of groceries now only gets us through a few days.  Needless to say, I've had to up the budget.

Broccoli Cheese soup - recipe coming soon :)

Up-ing the budget is not something I was happy about so of course I looked for ways to cut - sales, coupons, and cooking from scratch. Still things seemed expensive.   I was always trying to downsize my list and the quantities purchased so that I felt like I was saving money.  But what really happened is that we'd run out of things quickly and I'd be back at the store spending more money.  I realized that what I needed was to buy in quantity to keep myself out of the store.  It was this point that I took another look at bulk buying.  

Normally, foods bought in bulk are cheaper when compared to their counterparts in terms of price per ounce.  So though you pay a higher cost for a larger package, you save money in the long run by not paying that higher price per ounce on a more frequent basis.  I definitely had to change my mindset regarding how I shopped and spent money.  Plunking down more money on shopping trips was hard at first until I saw that I could spend less in the long run.

Don't get me wrong though.  I don't advise buying anything and everything that is sold in bulk.  Some items are just not worth it.  It works best if the food you buy in bulk is something you use on a regular basis.  For example, as someone who likes to bake, a ten pound bag of sugar costing $5.50 is a savings when compared to a 4 pound bag at $2.79.  It's not huge, but the savings do add up.  Other examples can be found here in a recent post about saving money through bulk buying.

Buying in bulk also means that you have food on hand for longer than a week.  This potentially cuts down on trips to the store which means less money spent.  I also find that I can better stock my pantry for at home cooking.  I feel compelled to cook from scratch knowing that I have what I need on hand.  

But, there are bad things about buying in bulk too.  If you don't plan accordingly you could possibly end up with food that goes to waste.  For example, if I bought the one and a half pound package of lunch meat and just put it in the fridge, we would end up throwing away half of it.  Only two of us eat sandwiches for lunch and only twice a week at that.  So in order to make the savings work, I portion it out and freeze it.  

Also bad about buying in bulk is that you sometimes get stuck with something you really don't like.  For us, it's cereal.  Bulk packages come with three varieties in the package.  I don't think it's coincidence that the combinations always include a less popular cereal in the box.  It doesn't make sense for us to buy bulk cereal for this reason.  If no one in the house like the third type of cereal in the box than any amount of money saved is wasted  since the cereal won't get eaten.  

So what do we buy in bulk?

We do buy things that get used routinely such as pantry items - flour, sugar, yeast, rice, pasta noodles, tortillas,and mac and cheese.  We also like to buy garbage bags, laundry soap, dish soap/dish washer tablets, vinegar, baking soda, toilet paper, gallon and quart size storage bags, and bar soap - household stuff that gets used everyday.  Additionally, there are the things that can be  portioned out (to avoid waste) and frozen for future use- cheese, lunch meats, buns, and butter.

How about you?  What are some things you like to buy in bulk?

This post is shared with Raising Homemakers.