FMOOD 0305: Using Cash to Better Control Grocery Spending

Using a cash envelope for grocery spending is a great way to control how much you're spending in this budget category in any given month. There's something about driving to the bank or the ATM to fill an envelope with a pre-determined amount of cash that physically and psychologically sets a limit as to how much we're going to spend at the grocery store.

 

There's no doubt that the grocery line item in the budget is typically one of the larger line items for most of us. If we can be in better control of this particular line item and be able to prevent going over what we had previously budgeted, this will almost always put us at an advantage financially. What's more, if we do go over in the form of running out of cash and need to reach for our debit card to make up the difference, we can utilize this information to tweak our grocery budget for the following months. Over time, we will vastly improve our chances of correctly estimating how much we are going to be spending on groceries in any given month.

 

I've noticed that when we had decided to go back to using cash to pay for groceries rather than using our debit card, we found ourselves being more focused on our grocery spending overall. Personally, I've put back snacks or desserts that weren't really essential to have for the week because I didn't want to run the risk of overspending what was already determined by the amount of cash in our grocery spending envelope. My wife and I find ourselves coming up with shopping solutions to lessen our grocery bill, and it's all because we want to stay in bounds with the amount of money that is in our envelope each and every week.

 

If you're currently using a debit card to pay for groceries every week, take a few weeks and try spending from a cash envelope instead. You may be pleasantly surprised by how much you can save on groceries by just making this small adjustment. God bless.