How much would you spend on groceries for 1 adult, 3 young kids for a month?

1 adult… 100 pounds per month

3 young kids 150 pounds per month

total=250 pounds per month.

final total= 250 pm + 50 pm (extra) = 300pm

I would say between $250—$350 a month

About $75 a week, but it depends on how frugal you want to be. I have been known to feed a family of four on $50 a week when I had to.

I ask because my wife is insisting that we need to spend $400 a month on groceries after she’s gotten us into some horrible debt.. I’m trying to make her understand that $300 a month is plenty enough .. so I wanted to make sure I wasn’t being ridiculous.

@NaturalMineralWater To take an active role in this you could access some of the excellent frugal grocery shopping sites and make up some shopping lists. Our biggest savings is using store brands (generic) instead of brand names, and buying meat ½ price meat that has to be cooked same day.

Some of the money saving ideas require extra work, and she might appreciate your offer to help. In particular, using powdered milk ½ and ½ with whole milk can save a bundle, but someone has to “make” the milk. Same with frozen orange juice over bottled.

My family of 5 only spends $300 a month/$150 every 2 weeks, and we have plenty for that time period.

How do you people manage on so little? I easily spend $150/week, when I’m feeding 5 of us. Now, I know that I buy some things that others wouldn’t because I don’t much like to cook (so I need to have lots of healthy snacks on hand) but still!

Wait. Are we talking just groceries? Because health and beauty and household cleaners rack up a hefty sum, too! My total supermarket bill for just my son and I was easily $400.00 per month, and that was a couple years ago!

And why do you say one adult and three kids? You don’t consume/use ANY of the products she’s purchased at the store? If not, how much are you spending on food and cleansers and personal items for one?

I suggest that you try doing the grocery shopping and all the meal preparation and service for three months and see if you can do it.

@augustlan I shop for a family of five too, and spend about the same as you do, even though I do like to cook and bake from scratch. Of course, like @hearkat mentioned, that often includes more than just food. When I have to buy cleaning products, paper towels, toilet paper, shampoo…ugh, those are the $200 weeks.

I try to make meals that allow me to turn the leftovers into different meals. Leftover meatloaf ends up as shepherd’s pie, roast chicken ends up as chicken pot pie, pasta and Italian sausage goes into a fritatta, etc. So if I spend six bucks on a whole chicken, we get two main dishes out of it. I buy meats in large packages at a discount, divide it up and freeze it.

Also, keep an eye on what cuts of meat a recipe calls for, and adjust it for something less expensive. Instead of boneless, skinless chicken breasts, try a whole cut-up chicken, just legs, or just thighs. The other day I made pulled pork from a recipe that called for pork tenderloin. Instead, I used a much cheaper pork roast and got the same results.

Instead of buying cookies, frozen waffles, pancake mixes, or things like that, I make my own. I’ll make a double batch of pancakes or waffles from scratch on the weekends and then freeze the leftovers in single-serving batches. Warm them back up in the oven on weekday mornings for a quick breakfast. If you plan on stretching what you buy to get the most out of it, you can save money in the long run.

A lot of our savings comes from buying only on sale, generic instead of brand name and having a set price which we only revise when zero stores sell at our price. We buy a lot at the membership, warehouse type stores, and bargain outlets.

I limit meat servings to no more than ¼ lb per person, add oat meal to meat loaf, serve lots of rice, fresh vegetables and fruits. I buy eggs only when they are $1.20 a dozen or less. I mix the tasty, expensive cereal in a large container with the cheaper, bagged type. We do not add sugar or salt to anything.

We drink zero sodas and I make all our fruit juice from concentrate. I also ‘make’ flavored water by blending an apple or maybe six – eight grapes with two quarts of water, which is kept in the refrigerator.

I’m in the process of making up a menu and shopping list to share, but it’ll take awhile, because I’m going to include prices which, of course, variable around the country.

I live in NYC so prices are high
I’d say about $300—$400 for the case given

@NaturalMineralWater You are talking about food only, right, not all the other household items one might buy at the grocery store. That would add between $25 – $50 a week to my estimate.

Wow, we’d be rich if I could get away with what some of you spend! We spend anywhere between $150 and $200 a week for a family of 4! Of course that’s for ALL needs, not just food!

With me and my two parents we spend around $200 a week on food. A lot of it is fish, chicken and misc. items.

Yeah, my totals include everything, not just food.

@hearkat No I don’t. Currently I’m 6000 miles away from her doing my good old fashioned Army job.

And yes @All I’m only talking about food alone.

@ShanEnri I’ve had to do that before.. when I was a janitor for about a year we were spending around that much for everything too. Luckily I can spoil my family with $300 a month now(just for food). I would love to buy all the nicest things but reality is that we have debt.. and spending money on stuff we don’t need.. like that extra bag of chips or whatever is simply not an option right now.I wish more than anything that I could get my wife to understand that I mean the best. Tough love gives me a headache.

@NaturalMineralWater If you are in the military, it should be easy to save money, because the groceries at the base exchange are always cheaper than anywhere else.

@YARNLADY Right now my wife is nowhere near a commissary unfortunately.. when I finally get to leave where I’m at in a couple months we’ll have one though. Either way I just don’t understand why I don’t get much support from her on this.

@NaturalMineralWater I have a lot of help from my Hubby here at home. He is here when I do most of the meal preparing, so I don’t have to get distracted with the millions of other daily tasks. On weekends, when we have our toddler grandson, I wouldn’t be able to get anything done without his help. It takes a lot of uninterrupted time to do the tasks of being frugal, such as finding the sales prices in the newspapers, and making up the shopping list and planning the menus.

@NaturalMineralWater: I respect and appreciate your choice to serve your country. Your wife is alone raising three young children… I doubt you have any idea how difficult (mentally, physically AND emotionally draining) that is, and it is a 24/7 job! I raised my one son alone and sometimes thought that was more than I could handle – I can’t even imagine having 3.

As noted, one’s location has much to do with prices. I see California, Oregon, and Connecticut on your profiles. If she is in CT, the cost of living here in the Northeast is criminal. Are you certain that both you and she are speaking about ONLY food and not other health and beauty and household items?

Is she sending you the receipts for you to review, or are you just going by the total amount of the check/charge? Seriously – have her mail you a bunch of the receipts and go over them line-by-line. Since you have internet access, you might go on websites to price compare – just enter in the zip code of where your wife is living to ensure accuracy.

Since she is alone, I guess she has to take the kids to the store with her – she does not have time to stand there and read labels or compare unit prices – she needs to get in and out before someone has a meltdown or someone starts poking at someone else. There isn’t much that will make a person break a sweat faster than having crying, whining or bickering children in public places.

I appreciate how tight finances are these days, but I get the impression that you haven’t put yourself fully in your wife’s shoes. Please try to see things from her perspective; allow her to open up and vent about how tired and stressed-out she is. Work on respectful, empathetic communication, because right now, that is all you have.

Long-distance relationships are extremely challenging, and I understand that you wish you could be there to help her. But you can’t, and it seems that you might be trying to micro-manage from halfway around the world. If you develop a pattern of getting on her case about things, and she gets on the defensive, it will very likely carry over when you get home. Proceed with caution, and good luck to you both.

@hearkat Thanks for that. I know she is stressed. I understand what it’s like to be alone with the kids. I raised them alone for a time while she went to work and for four years we raised them together as I worked nights and she worked days. It’s not so challenging that I lost all sense of reality.. yes it can be interesting at times.. stressful.. sure.. but never so much that I couldn’t read a price tag..

When we have debts to pay that are preventing us from buying things (like a house, a new car and all the crafting supplies she can get her hands on) insisting on certain luxuries is a problem..

I don’t see it as micromanagement .. I see it as financial planning.. if her shoes are telling her that it’s just micromanagement and that there is no wisdom behind it than we’re doomed to suffer further debt.. further stress.. further disappointment.

@NaturalMineralWater: I hope it’s not the case for you, and that you can find a way to work it all out. Being home with the kids while she’s at work is not the same as being the ONLY one 24/7 (unless like you, her work was thousands of miles away). And the kids are older now which always brings up new challenges.

Financial planning is going over the needs and wish-lists and agreeing on priorities and agreeing on what can be cut down—it is one of the toughest things for a young family! What you may consider a necessity vs. a luxury might be very different in her perspective or the kids’ perspectives.

Perhaps you could each work out a budget for the entire family on your own, based on the past 6 months, then email it to each other, and then negotiate compromises from there. Again, you want to be sure that you are comparing apples to apples.

Communication and really listening to each other still needs to be the main priority. After all, stuff is just stuff; love is what really matters.

@hearkat You’re right I do need to work with her on it and we need to decide together.. but by “deciding together” it doesn’t mean “whatever she wants to do” .. which is often the case.. xD

Maybe I don’t know how stressed out she is.. maybe it’s not the same unless it’s 24/7 (I’ve done that too… I actually loved it) .. my point is that it doesn’t matter how stressful it is.. you have to get over it and make tough decisions for your family.. being stressed out is not a good reason to plunge into financial depression.

@NaturalMineralWater: True enough – because it only creates more stress! I’ve been through bankruptcy from being a single mom, losing my job, and trying to put my kid through Prep School. Best wishes for you and your family.

@hearkat Thanks for your input! Regardless of how right I think I am it is important for me to step back and see things from her perspective. Being reminded of that from time to time is good for me. From me to you many props for being a single mother and making it. For those that haven’t done it, being a mom is easily one of the toughest jobs in the world and everyone who survives such an endeavor deserves the highest respect.

Depending on what services the grocery stores in your area offer, your wife might be able to stay aware of what she’s spending as she shops, instead of getting to the register and realizing she built up more of a bill than she wanted.

I don’t know how many stores do this, but the grocery store here has this “ScanIt” thing that lets you scan and bag your groceries as you shop. It’s a handheld device that you use to scan each item’s barcode as you go along. The display screen gives you a running total for your grocery bill. I like it because after I’ve purchased all the necessities I can tell if I have some wiggle room and can splurge on some items I’d consider luxuries. Another way to keep within budget is to take cash and only cash to the store. Believe me, if you have exactly $100 on you, you make sure you buy only what you need and plan the shopping trip to get the most for your money.

Our grocery store also has online shopping with local delivery. The day before you want the groceries delivered, you select and pay for everything online. The next day, the truck comes by with your groceries, and they even bring them right into your kitchen. This is helpful because you are less tempted to buy things on an impulse. The cost of the service is $7, which might be worth it if shopping with kids leads to buying extra foods (everyone wants their own cereral, their own ice cream flavor, etc.) or just buying something because it looks good while you’re shopping.

My last suggestion is something I could never do, considering that I usually have three kids with me when I’m in the store. Your wife might be able to do it if the above options aren’t available. She can bring a calculator along and add up her grocery bill as she shops. It’s a good way of staying aware of what you spend as you go through the store. If one of your kids is old enough to work the calculator, he or she could be Mommy’s acountant and be responsible for entering the prices and adding them up. It’s amazing how fast a grocery bill climbs into the three digit range!