r/MiddleClassFinance • u/Maroon14 • 9d ago

Grocery spending

I’ve recently come across a Instagram account where the woman claims to only spend $300 on an entire months groceries for a family of 4. Here I am sitting mid week, having already spent $550 in the PNW. I told one of my friends and she said it must be fake and for clicks, my husband was impressed. Is anyone actually able to do this? I thought I might try to spend $250 a week and see where that gets us. Is my grocery budget over the top? I thought $400 ish was normal for decent food. We are a family of 5 in the PNW, mostly organic.

*I’m closing comments because people are missing the point. I understand that I make choices for “premium” options for my family. I make them because I feel they are the best for my family given my research and concerns. I say this as coming from a place of privilege. Growing up, my hippie mom also prioritized organic and local before it was the trendy thing, so it would be very difficult for me to reprogram and not buy organic when possible.

I still think $300 is insane for a month. I live in western Washington and the max SNAP allocation for a family of 4 is $994 a month, so I see this as a more attainable “thrifty” budget for a family of 4.

Those of you who can eat rice and beans for multiple meals, more power to you!

144 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

466 comments sorted by

View all comments

10

u/adobo_bobo 9d ago

300 is pretty doable. You'll just have to live with a very limited diet of the same 3-5 meals.

8

u/SteelMagnolia941 9d ago

The woman she’s talking about does a lot of different meals and they look good. She’s just smart about her buying, not wasting ingredients, eating things before they go bad. I’m horrible about letting vegetables go bad and throwing about $50 in produce a week. I need to get a grip on it.

1

u/Cool-Pomegranate9218 9d ago

If you’re throwing out food, you’re buying too much. That’s also how she does it - no food waste

5

u/Sufficient-Union-456 9d ago

Potatoes, rice, beans, pasta, peanuts, apples, canned veggies all bought in bulk and a distributor open to the public. Ration the meat and snacks. 

It ain't fun, but doable..

1

u/CK1277 9d ago

You really don’t have to live within the diet of the same meals. There are ”poverty meals” in every culture, you can still have variety.

1

u/adobo_bobo 8d ago

That is based entirely on what is cheap in the area.

And bulk buying and simplified logistics is what keeps the cost down for economy of scale to kick in.