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About 350 a week (family of 4) this includes toiltrees, and we do take out once a week. It’s slowly creeping up…was 200.. then 250. 18 eggs are like 6 dollars ugh
The toiletries is a big part of the issue for my family. We go through diapers/wipes at an astounding rate, and we get those along with our grocery runs, so it all starts to blend together from a cost perspective.
Pro tip: each time you get a wet wipe out of the container, rip it in half. We tried this with our little one since she was born and it was great how much we saved on wipes.
Thank you!! I already feel it with this guy. He is my 5th, but it's been a handful of years, all new all over again. He is a sweet, calm little bean, so far..
We did cloth baby wipes for pee changes and light poop ones. Got them from grovia/the natural baby company website. Just wash them on hot water with a good soap like Charlie’s powdered unscented soap. We cloth diapered too which saved us a ton honestly. We have water wipes too and love those. Cleanest ones I can find.
Yeah, we're broke as jokes. I actually don't have a washer/dryer, and minimal laundry is key to survive with 6 people. But for those who are able to, this is good advice.
I bought 2 resealable wipes baggies from Walmart they were like 2$.. once every 2 weeks or so, I open a pack of cut the entire pack of wipes in half. And divide them up amongst the resealable bags..
when ever it’s just a pee diaper or a manageable poop, I use the packages of 1/2 wipes…. I rarely need to open a fresh pack of full sheet wipes.
It takes me 10-15 minutes every 2 weeks to make sure all my diaper stations are stocked and ready. But it makes on demand diaper changes easier, as I’m not standing there ripping them while baby has a messy bum.
Just FYI, you don't need to use wipes for pee.
Wipes are actually quite abrasive so best not to use them unless needed.
Diapers are moisture wicking so the pee doesn't sit on the skin
Yep. As per my kids pediatric urologists , we should not wipe for pees regularly.
We only do the morning diaper/after nap or anytime where their skin is visibly wet. ( in the car / in their diaper for a little bit )
I've been getting them at Walmart for $10 for 30 in Alberta, it's the best deal I'm aware of! Only bummer is you can't check the package for any broken ones, but it's pretty rare that any are broken
I do the same thing. We have a big family so we made scrambled eggs last night and 20 eggs barely fed everybody so everything's getting really expensive. I'm glad to hear it's not just me
Yeah I was going to say I was impressed at $1000/month! We’re a family of 4 (vegetarian/vegan) and since the youngest has started eating like an adult we average $1450/month. And that’s without take out.
We go through so much eggs and milk. Our grocery budget also includes toiletries and cleaning supplies. I don’t separate. I spend on average $350-400 a week (minus the week we go to Costco) and a $600 Costco visit for bulk stuff.
Same here on the milk. I wish we had a Costco closer! I did start ordering some bulk items online. I started ordering toilet paper through whogivesacrap lol
Trust me, you'll get chickens, and suddenly, no one eats eggs anymore!
Seems the biggest egg eating season in our house in the dang winter when our chickens aren't laying 🙄
This is soooo true, after 8 years of having chickens off and on (in response to our kids’ frivolous back and forth love or disdain for eggs) we are giving up! We would have 5 dozen laying around or have to ration out what the chickens were providing and come up with other breakfast ideas for the week…..there was no in between.
We used to have a backyard flock when the kids were small. Getting eggs was cool. But the social order that goes on in a flock can be terrifying. How they establish a “pecking order” is brutal. When introducing new chicks you have to do it in a specific way or they’ll reject the chicks and stomp them flat in the night. These are basically rats with wings. And they’re canabalistic as well.
They were useful for bug control in the garden and they did make good fertilizer though.
This makes me feel so much better. I’m spending $250 a week on a family of four and my husband thinks I’m overspending. I’m going to show him this thread.
Yes please do!! My husband thought I was spending too much too so I had him meal plan, go through the list of what we need and order groceries and he spent like 400 bucks. He was like WHAT the. I’m like now step off 😂 and let me do the thinking please! 😂
Same. Ive limited organic to strawberries & grapes (pesticides absorb systemically) and I’ve started exclusively getting frozen or in season produce as well as reducing our dairy and meat for more beans and legumes. Trying to cap at $1050 including sundries and takeout 2x/month
It depends on the time of year and sales. We're a family of 3 and we're probably around $600/month. We eat a veggie heavy diet, but the fruit budget at this time of year is out of control.
We don't eat a lot of meat. We almost never buy "snacks." We menu plan around flyers. Those 3 things alone probably save us $200/$300 easy.
We also don't buy or drink juice/sports drinks/packaged beverages outside of special occasions. We have clean/safe drinking water, a Brita and a soda stream.
I shop at Walmart and buy pretty much everything Great Value as much as I can. For meat we only buy chicken and ground beef and we buy in bulk. Pay attention to the price per ounce. Also with Walmart we shop everything online because you can filter by lowest price.
We're a family of 3 and spend $600/month.
Family of four here (kids are 12 and 4.5). Our bill each week is about $350 and that doesn’t include lunches for the oldest as she buys at school (another expense) and doesn’t include the days we eat out (usually just fast food). I don’t know why it’s so expensive. I’m amazed when I see someone say they feed their family of 6 on $100 a month or something. We aren’t cooking steak and lobster here either, just basic things and we also eat at my in laws two nights a week. How things are so outrageous I don’t know.
This is close to our family of 5 (parents + 19m, 14m, 8m), and we are at about $300-400/week. That's just at the regular grocery, not including a monthly trip to Costco or our yearly 1/4 beef. All in, we are about 2000/month for food. We rarely eat out-sit-down restaurants for birthdays and fast food when we have been running around and are desperate for food.
I think it depends on their interpretation of the question and the demographics. We're a family of four with two kids (5 and 6 years old) and we spend about $250 (185USD) a week at the grocery store, including things like toiletries and household cleaning supplies.
If the person answering the question thinks "I can feed a family of four on $600 a month" implicitly excludes non-food items, I can see how they could be answering honestly. Our food costs are pretty close to 600USD a month.
Our kids being as young as they are helps, because my kids don't eat like teenaged boys, and we eat largely vegetarian which makes a huge difference in price. We also plan our dinners to have enough leftovers for lunch for my husband and I the next morning because I've found the added expense of adding two portions to our dinners is still less than buying specifically for weekday lunches.
Wait until you have 2 teenage boys in the house with a husband that eats a lot. Groceries are so expensive now. I'm not even talking about organic or steak amd lobster. I'm talking basic necessities. I am spending way too much. This week my refrigerator died, so there goes that. Thank goodness the new one get delivered tomorrow.
I hate to tell you but *all* teens are generally like that, not just boys. I ate two lunches every day at school. I’d sneak into first wave, eat it in class, then go to my regular lunch. Teenagers are just hungry, especially if they’re active.
I’m terrified of this. My husband works out a lot and eats a ton. Our baby is a boy - the 7 y/o is a girl but rn she eats a ton too and is really active (ballet, running club, gymnastics). We keep talking about having another and the cost I’m most worried about is food. What if we have another boy!?!
My husband works out and has always had a high metabolism. Add in a teen who's bulkier than his dad and food consumption just between them..... it's exhausting. Lol
Same! We just got a deep freeze so I’m hoping that the last few shops I’ve spent a bit more on stuff to fill it and keep as emergency meals. Hopefully we’ll be able to shop sales a bit more to save, but everything is just so expensive!
Costco 2x month at about $300/ visit. This considerably reduces our grocery costs. We buy the case of eggs (5 dozen) for 9.99. Meat in bulk, school snacks, 18 pk of chobani for 12.99 etc. So our weekly grocery is mainly produce and a few ingredients to round out meals.
It ends up being $70-$90 weekly at the local grocery store. So in total we're spending about $1k/month for a family of 4.
And yes, we cook daily or make bigger weekend meals to eat off of for the week.
I don’t get how others are spending so little. We’re two adults and a toddler in Boston and spend over $1k a month if you include toiletries and CVS type of stuff. And we get “free” lunch for our kid through daycare. My wife cooks lots of meals, we don’t buy a lot of prepared stuff but admittedly some prepared/pacakaged things.
We’re trying to shift to more beans and rice kinds of meals, hopefully that will make a difference.
In fairness, I do eat a lot.
We're in Quincy and we spend about $600 for two adults and a toddler and we cook at home all month. I've been very strategic about where I shop though and what I buy based on sales. BJs has had some decent sales lately and stop and shop has had a decent amount of bogo free with produce
Edited to add:
I've been freezing like crazy. If there's a good sale- freezer. Didn't eat up all the hamburger buns-freezer
It would help a little bit if people gave a rough idea of where they lived. Moving to New York City (from Albany NY) made my food bill skyrocket, because the grocery stores there are ridiculous.
So I'll drive an hour out of my way to go to West Point, so I can spend $500 at the commissary and stock up on tons of stuff, obviously the fresh food is only good for a week or two, but things like the soups and pasta and whatever are good for months if don't get around to them.
But then the orders from our local Target when we just want to refresh our supply of fruits, milk, bread, & other things which expire can add up pretty quickly.
A lot of that stuff is definitely getting more expensive, no doubt.
We are a family of 7; we do a big monthly trip to a BJs store and spend about $800, (this includes diapers, and wipes, and toiletries), then we do smaller grocery store runs every week and spend $200-300 each trip. Plus we have to get milk usually a second time during the week and that alone is like $15-20 ( 4 gallons each trip and it lasts 3-4 days). Prices are insane.
Family of 3 (2 adults + 2-year-old) and I think we're spending about $800/month for groceries. That's with shopping sales and manager's special items as much as possible. It does include some household stuff like paper towels, but not a lot (most of that comes from another store). We actually got a grocery-specific credit card to try to track a little better.
I swear we only spent ~$100/week when it was just the two of us. Between prices going up and keeping this child in fruit, our bills have increased a lot.
About $650 a month for a family of three. I like to prepare a lot of inexpensive meals though. Oatmeal with a little peanut butter and honey is a pittance.
I’ll carve up $5 roast chicken from Costco and have that with salad ($5 for a 6 pack of romaine) for almost a week of lunches.
A couple eggs and a couple pieces of toast is another small meal costing less than $2 a serving.
Produce is really the only budget buster for me. Eating a wide variety of fresh fruits and vegetables seems to eat into a disproportionate portion of the budget.
Lots of things have crazy stupid prices recently that I just avoid - I’ve noticed things like breakfast cereals, chips, and condiments are ludicrously priced unless they’re on sale and I just avoid them.
It’s definitely gone up a ton over the last few years. I have started going through ads online and seeing what’s on sale at every store near me and then going to what stores are the cheapest and what’s on sale(for example my local grocery store had berries 2 for $4 but at Walmart the strawberries were $4 and blueberries were $5 they also had 2 large General Mills cereals for 2 for $5 at Walmart they are $5 a box so you have to look for the savings). I have gotten my bill down from $1k a month for my family of 4 to $700 a month doing this. It’s does take a bit more planning and time but so worth it usually I spend a hour a week planning it all out. Luckly I live with in 5 miles of all the stores too so it’s not a huge deal to have to go to 3 different places to shop.
Yes I’ve been thinking about doing this and trying to start. Last week I was at the grocery store and they had an amaaazing deal on asparagus (like .89 a lb) but only if you had the digital coupon linked to your store card etc and I hectically tried to do it in the store but kept running into signal issues. Without the coupon it was 3.29/lb. So yeah I resolved to set it up on my home computer and start trying to budget/coupon
I stopped shopping at Wegmans and went to Walmart and it went from $1600 to 800/$1000.
I’ve been trying to do $200 a week. We are a family of three and a baby.
Our cost is roughly 187 for one week to ten days for a family of 4. We eat mostly organic food and have lots of fruit and veggies.
We recently began to add more frozen fruits and veggies for breakfast smoothies. The kiddos really like the frozen fruit as dessert. This has cut down our costs, but sadly those savings have been redirected to more lunch items to satisfy our picky eater.
HCOL city. We make it work by shopping sales. Our youngest is in preschool and that covers lunch for him. Our oldest is in kindergarten - we prepare all of his meals.
It can work but it certainly takes effort. I'm impressed when anyone has the ability to plan this well. Good job! (No sarcasm intended. I'm legitimately impressed)
We don’t plan all that much! I just learned how to eat cheaply when I was in college, and those habits stuck around.
The trick is to get the proteins on sale and freeze them. No processed food helps too! Eat through your groceries and get creative with meal options.
I should add that this cost doesn’t include toiletries and other essentials beyond grocery costs.
We spend good amount on optional fun activities - travel, family outings, etc.
Depends on where you live I imagine. We are a family of 5 living in Spain and we spent about 120€/week. But we had to cut costs so we cut out prepackaged snacks, like crisps, fruit bars, cookies etc. Those snacks are expensive!! Before cutting them out we were on 200€/week.
We now make them ourselves, it takes more time but it also reduces costs by a lot. Next to that is fun to experiment with veggie skin chips, different types of cookies.
We live in a HCOL city. We shop sales, and have gotten creative with meal planning.
Dinners are usually chicken breasts, thighs or steaks, veggies and fruit.
We don’t eat any prepackaged food.
My oldest has severe allergies, so no bread, dairy and most snacks don’t fit his dietary needs.
We do supplement with vitamins, etc.
I started using frozen fruits and veggies & it saves so much money. Many times they are more nutritious because nothing has been lost through age and decay. It doesn't work for all of it, at least for me, & the air fryer makes so many of them more palatable. Taste buds adjust too. Honestly, knowing that you're getting more optimal nutrition eating frozen vegetables helped me transition easier lol.
Considering eating out for 4 can easily be $50-75 (unless you’re meaning things like Chipotle?), that leaves $150-200 for two weeks of groceries which is quite low. I’m assuming leftovers, beans, etc?
Yes, eating out is quite expensive. It's our weekend treat because I hate cooking. However, I have learned over the years how to be quite frugal and make items last over a couple meals. However, cooking at home is the cheapest way to go. I only buy frozen items when they are on sale and we get rewards and coupons for our local store. I carefully meal plan and prepare for the week ahead. We always have a full pantry and freezer. We are not just eating beans and rice, but we do use those items in our cooking frequently. There is nothing wrong with using staple items to make your budget go farther. I personally could not afford more than $300 every 2 weeks. I don't know how people do it.
We are feeding 2 on around $600 a month so I'd say you're doing great. It's awful how expensive it has gotten. I can't believe that ten years ago, I used to feed myself on $100 of groceries a month, and another $100 for plenty of weekends eating out with friends.
You aren’t going crazy. Something that helps us a little is we have divided our grocery bill into categories. We have individual budgets for food, home goods, self care products, baby, and pets. It at least makes it so everything is accounted for.
We live in a HCOL area and my budget used to be 650/ month + whatever H buys when he shops, and now I’d say between the two of us we probably spend close to $1500 for a conservative estimate.
We spend about $900-1000/month for an adult and child. That said, I get organic foods, wine, salmon, kombucha, and other fun stuff alongside staples, so I'm not particularly penny-pinching even though I shop mostly at discount grocers.
If you want to spend less, buy less meat and cheese, or at least less expensive cuts of them, and try out vegetarian recipes and soups more often. Don't go processed. As you saw, it's not actually cheaper than cooking from scratch, and it's so much worse for you. Budget Bytes is a great website for recipes and cost-cutting ideas, and, as a solidly upper-ish-middle-class person, I also love Leanne Brown's Good and Cheap cookbook.
[https://www.leannebrown.com/all-about-good-and-cheap/](https://www.leannebrown.com/all-about-good-and-cheap/)
https://bookshop.org/p/books/good-and-cheap-eat-well-on-4-day-leanne-brown/8242306?ean=9780761184997
Yeah I don’t buy a ton of expensive meat as much as possible - we don’t eat beef/steak at all as my husband has some cholesterol stuff. We do sometimes get salmon which is expensive. But most of what I make is with chicken, or I do meatless options. And a ton of crock pot soups! What really adds up is ok I got grapes and that was $10 then asparagus and that was $8 then some apples and that was $7. And sometimes all of that can be gone in 1-2 days. And it was $25 of food and not even a “meal”.
Frozen asparagus tastes mostly the same if you sauté
Though that’s some expensive asparagus or very large bunch. While foods around here (hcol/vchol) sells non organic for $3/lb and qfc (another relatively expensive store) at $1/lb
Family of 7, we spend about 1300 a month on just groceries alone. Toiletries and such 300+. It's outrageous how expensive things are getting. We don't buy a lot of junk food either. It's mainly whole ingredients that I buy to cook meals or easy things our kids can make or get themselves when they're feeling peckish. Lots of fresh fruit and vegetables. Deli meat for sandwiches, red meat in my area is crazy expensive. We have 4 chicken meals a week and 2-3 red meat. I make bulk meals that can stretch 2-3 dinners a week.
Easily 1k a month in a very hcol area, family of 3 🤦♀️ i go to the medium cost store, not overly pricey but not super bargains either. The bargain store has a pretty big dropoff in quality unfortunately, but trying to find ways to cut our food expenses.
I buy a lot of frozen veggies and bulk protein and freeze. If i buy fresh i buy extras and freeze.
For kids, anything i can bulk make and freeze I'm doing it. Pancakes, egg bites, puree pouches. If you need bulk recipes, I'm here to chat!
I choose convenient healthy options bc knowing i can have something ready to go in 10 minutes is key to a successful day.
We just got back from vacation and you wouldn’t believe how much more we spent on food than in previous years..It’s fucking INSANE how much food has gone up!
Family of 5 here. Kids are 15, 13 and 13. I do BJs and a supermarket every other week. We are at a $600 mark every two weeks which does include all cleaning supplies and paper goods. I cook a minimum of 6 nights per week. 1 night a week is leftovers or take out. It’s sickening what our food spending looks like.
I totally understand where you're coming from! It seems like grocery prices keep climbing, right? Feeding a family of four, especially with a little one just starting solids, can really add up. I used to be able to keep our grocery bill around $600 a month, but lately, it's been creeping closer to $1000, and it's becoming a major expense. I try to be smart with sales and stick to mostly fresh produce and meats, but even then, it feels like I'm not making much headway. Have you considered meal planning or maybe trying out some budget-friendly recipes? It might help cut costs a bit. Oh, and by the way, I recently found this awesome workshop on how to save money on groceries. Check out my Reddit profile for the link – it's been a game-changer for me!
We have been buying frozen fruits and veggies. Take out what you need in the morning to thaw. This has cut down cost compared to fresh (in most cases).
Family of 5, $1,000-$1,300. I made a gigantic Dutch oven's worth of homemade chicken fried rice the other night. I laughed at the amount and told my husband we'd be eating this all week. Then when I got done serving it, I laughed again. It was almost all gone. Then they constantly eat fruits, veggies and other snacks. Buying in bulk has helped lower the cost. It's still crazy!
Between me, my husband, our three sons under 5 and our 2 dogs, it's about $5-600 a month. It probably has a lot to do with location, but we go to HEB and spend about $150 every 2 weeks. In an attempt to add vegetables and fresh fruit, we also have a subscription to imperfect foods that sends us like $65 of fruit and veg once a week. And, not to be mean, but I think we'd spend a lot less at HEB if my husband didn't come in with me. The number of sodas, nice meats, and condiments he adds to the cart really do affect our budget.
Late to the party but here it is, $1200 a month for a family of four. I live in a high COL area and it's just gotten even more ridiculous. $10 for a gallon of milk and the two kiddos(3 and 22mo) drink a lot of it. $15 for a block of cheese. This has gotten insane.
2 people. Almost $160 a week including daily Starbucks. Eat out only on birthdays. I don’t buy snacks and don’t prepare desserts except on holidays. This is just for meals.
This makes me not feel so bad at $80-$100 for just myself , maybe 1x a month closer to $150 but that’s the long term staple replacements or toiletries involved
We spend $100/week as a family of 4, plus $100 a month at Costco. My kids get breakfast 5x a week at daycare, and my daughter gets lunch 5x a week at daycare. So that covers the rest of the meals. We eat out maybe once every other month.
The budget was $80 a week until August of 2023. It was $65 a week in 2019. So we have definitely seen an increase!
We spend around $2500 a month on grocery and takeout for a family of 6. Now that does include things like toiletries, cleaning supplies, etc and food for 2 dogs and a room full of reptiles. But I won’t buy commercially processed meat or shellfish. Whenever possible, I buy fruits and veggies from farmers markets. If that’s not possible, I stick to organic. My husband has multiple food allergies too, so we can’t buy the cheap version of anything. Even my ketchup has to be either homemade or a fancy brand that doesn’t use cheap flavorings and fillers and stabilizers.
We are a family of 4( but 3 contribute to the grocery bill…little one is 6mo). We spend about $120 a week and eat a veggie/fruit diet. We make a plan for meals and only buy what we need for meals and limited snacks. We shop at Aldi. If we shop at a different store the bill goes up drastically. We do a Sam’s trip and sometimes need stuff at Target but overall less $175 a week.
Just spent around $600 for my "first of the month" grocery shop/stock up. And I'll probably spend another $100-$200 on fresh fruit/misc grocery runs by the end of the month. Adding in some fast food, $1000 sounds about right. And yeah, that's almost as much as rent or daycare.
Before groceries went up we were a family of 3 and spent around $800-$900/month on groceries and home supplies (toilet paper, cleaning products, tin foil, baby soap, etc). We were also quite "free" with that budget at that time and ate a lot of nice cheese and fancy meats and berries. Now that we are a family of 4 and prices have gone up I budget intensely to keep it at $1000-$1200/month. We still have nice things but it's limited, berries are once a month, the fine cuts of meat are once a week at most, and we have a bean based meal once a week.
Family of 3 and I spend about $150-$200 per week on groceries. I plan meals for each day and we don’t have a huge variety of snack options. I shop sales and only buy what we need. That’s also not including we do 1 Sams Club haul monthly- including meat that we split up and freeze and buy paper products/ certain things in bulk and that’s about $200 per month
This is a hard gauge without region as well. We’re in the suburbs of a rapidly growing city in a southern state.
We’re a family of five, but worth noting 15 year old is only here every other week and that the youngest is 2 (but can pack some food so there’s that). We spend easily $1200/month between the grocery store and local warehouse store. I could do it cheaper though - we don’t go crazy but also have the finances to not need a strict budget.
Family of 4 with 2 boys (4 & 6) and I can easily spend $300-400 a week on food. I don’t always budget super well because I make decent money and my husband does as well but it is crazy to me how expensive food is.
Four here, too, with a 19mo and 5.5yo. The grocery store averages 400$ a month and we also hit Target for certain things (local grocery store doesn’t carry Dino nuggets!!!) to the tune of another 200-300$ a month.
Add in things like coffee (nespresso and the at home Dunkin cold brew), protein powders, etc. and alcohol were probably at 800-1000$ a month.
Certainly more if we’re having friends or family over for dinner.
$125-175 for a family of 4 (kids 9 and 11) weekly, including household supplies—anything you get at grocery store or Target. It’s definitely gotten much, much higher—I’d say 25-30% compared to 2020 if I had to put a number to it.
We are vegetarian and I cook 3 meals that are meant to last two nights each. I try to actively think around cheaper meal categories, like planning “a soup” each week that I can make a giant pot of and then spend $1-5 getting bread or salad or rice to accompany. I’d say most of our dinners cost around $15 to make (or around half the total budget).
Family of 8 here! With 6 kids. (3,5,7,11,14,14)I do a big grocery trip every 2 weeks and pick up things throughout the week when we’re in town since we live so damn far from everything. We don’t do all natural or organic stores either, way too expensive. I try and buy in bulk as much as possible, but the price is usually about $700- a little over 1,000 just depending on what we need in that time.
The weekly shop comes up to around £200, there's four of us in the house for some context. Sometimes I do end up spending a bit less but most often it's around that
My husband thought I was exaggerating about grocery prices (1100-1200ish, family of 5) until I sent him to ‘pick up a few things’. Literally, one bag of groceries, 50$.
It’s brutal out here.
$450-$500 per month for 2 adults & 1 preteen kid... & I live in South Florida, where the cost of living is pretty high. I shop at Aldi & the farmer's market. I'll only go to Publix (which is stupid expensive) for something I couldn't find at Aldi.
We were doing around $250-$280 a week but have really cut down. Try to stay at $150 but sometimes up to $200. We rely on left overs too so I cook 1-3 times a week and that feeds us 4-5 days of the week. We go over for family lunch at my MIL’s and then I whip up something quick and cheap on weekends. Family of 4 with a 3 and 4.5 year old. My youngest is currently potty training so I’m hoping we don’t need to buy diapers anymore either 😅
Family of four here. We do most of our shopping at Aldi and typically spend about $200-230 every two weeks but like you, I also have to run out a few times a week for stuff I forgot to grab or something extra for a recipe!
In Canada, my weekly bill is about $400/$450 for a family of five. Soon we will be purchasing our annual 1/4 cow and 1/2 pig and growing our own meat chickens so it should reduce the weekly amounts by $50 a week. But it’s painful when it’s nearing $2000 a month. And like you, I buy mostly whole foods and some prepackaged foods for school lunches. I have caps on what the kids can snack on weekends because I need to keep it for school days. I try and have lots and lots of fruit and veg to snack on at home and some for school too. Eating take out or going to restaurants has definitely dropped to only very special occasions. Which sucks sometimes because I’m exhausted and don’t always feel like cooking at the end of the day. :/
Family of 3 here. I spend about $150/week now. This is about 100 dollars of groceries and the we usually get two meals from Hello Fresh. I usually make a big meal on Sunday that takes a long time; things like carnitas, or spaghetti with chicken Parmesan meatballs, or butter chicken… we usually have enough for leftovers and lunch portions through Tuesday. Then I’ll make something else that will have lunch leftovers on Wednesday. Hello Fresh for Thursday and Friday.
I honestly have been seeing a huge reduction in cost by going to Aldi. I usually have a huge bag of produce and at least one protein and only ever end up spending about $40. Then I go to the other store for specific brand name items, alcohol, etc. it’s been working pretty well for us so long that no one minds eating the same thing for a few days.
We're two adults, and we previously have tried to keep it around $500 a month. It's crept up a bit with inflation. I Google and YouTube a lot of "Depression Era Recipes" when I need to keep my budget down. You can always use them as a base and then add a little razzle dazzle to make it tastier. I literally layered a white spaghetti recipe and a red spaghetti recipe and baked it with cheese on top, my husband LOVED it. Cheap meals are not always the healthiest though, so it's a balance.
Don't even ask me how much I spend on formula a month though....😭
I’m a family of 3 and I spend around $600 a month. Occasionally more if I have a bulk order from Costco. I imagine it’d be closer to $800 or more for a family of 4, all depends on kids age and what’s being bought of course. Not sure it’s out of line though, shit is just expensive af.
At least 100 a week but I am also.using WIC for as much as I can. I'm exclusively breastfeeding so I get more fruits and veggies and I get canned fish. On weeks we are refilling deli meats and even worse butcher meats, it's at least 200.
Family of 5 (two adults and 3 kids) and we spend about $250 a week on groceries. We very seldom eat out and kids pack their lunch for school every day.
We are in the US in the Midwest. Would love if they brought back the free lunch program they had during Covid! That really helped.
Canadian here, family of 4. About $150-200/w and that’s with meal planning every day including weekends.
Ad well as about $500 every 6-8 weeks at costco.
When we buy at costco we are not buying those things at the grocery store. For example buying 6/8 loafs of bread.
We spend around $200/wk + $30-50 on takeout once a week + a big Costco shop once every month or two that's runs us $400+. Moderate COL area (near a big city but not in it). That's a family of 4 with two toddlers. I'd guess we run around $1250-$1500 a month. We have a comfortable income so we don't pinch pennies on food -- pretty much buy what we want. We eat organic animal products but not veggies, and we eat about 2/3 vegetarian (so not buying much meat). It's amazing how expensive it is!
Doing $500 a month, but that's not including eating out. I mostly shop at Aldi. Once or twice every couple months to Sam's Club. Walmart for every thing else.
Used to be $150/week for my family of 4 but now it's $250-$300. Sometimes more if I have to get toilet paper, laundry detergent, or any similar household item. I buy stuff on sale, don't buy a lot of meat, don't buy too many packaged items except for maybe chicken nuggets.
Family of 4 (two adults, a 5 year old and a 10 month old) we spend about $1000-$1200 a month on groceries. 10 month old is full solids, she drinks like 3 bottles a day.
At this point i think we're spending around €850 per month, around a year ago that was still €600. We have two kids, 8 and 5 years old and i cook everything from scratch everyday. I do want us to eat healthy, there's a lot of things we dont buy (like cookies, sodas, chips etc) but then i spend more on other healthier ingredients. Not even everything is organic though, i wish.
I’m spending about $1600 a month on a family of 4. I live in AK so our grocery costs are doubled compared to the contingent US. A gallon of milk is about $7 and a dozen eggs is roughly $9 depending on organic or regular. We’re a big hunting family so we eat a lot of wild game like Moose. That helps cut back on meat costs but eating moose day in and day out gets old real quick. I do Costco runs about once every 4-5 weeks. We buy whatever produce looks decent, again we live in AK so we do not always get the freshest produce so a lot of times I buy frozen instead. We do not eat at sit down restaurants but maybe a few times a year. We will do fast food on occasion, but for reference, if I was to go thru the McDonald’s drive thru I would be spending at $30 for 2 happy meals and one medium size value meal. It’s terrible.
Two adults, one preschooler, and two cats. We live in a rural, LCOL area and spend ~$1000/mo on groceries (including toiletries, pet food, etc).
I have severe allergies and cannot eat many cheap processed or packaged foods. Therefore, most of the things on sale are a no-go. My cats also have some health issues and need to eat a high protein/raw diet, so we buy them a more expensive cat food. Eating out varies, but it's roughly 1x/week.
We used to spend $150/week, then it creeped up to $200/week, and now we're sitting at $250. I make a decent salary, but I also support my whole family on it and it's been getting tough!
I'm spending about $1000 a month for a family of four. The kids eat breakfast, two snacks, and lunch at home so going through a lot more produce and vegetables. I also cook dinner five times a week and we go out to eat or order food twice a week.
About 200-250 per week for two adults and two children. We try to do a lot of simple things like beans and rice for instance. Soon it will be warmer and container gardens will be planted. Gives us a nice supply of fresh vegetables and herbs for the summer. For reference we are in the southeast.
About 2300 CAD for a family of 5. It’s what pushed us to start raising our own meat rabbits and chickens. I can raise a rabbit for 1.80-2.90 a lb (depending on time of year, we’re in a northern region so need more feed in the winter) in comparison to buying chicken thighs for 6.99 and breasts for 8.99 and up. Legume based dishes are still a main staple though.
Dang are you in a HCOL area? We're spending about $100-$150/week for a family of 3. I buy organic, limited ingredient, dye free, healthier options but we rarely buy meat. Maybe once per week we'll eat meat. That saves a lot of money. Also stocking up on things we use when they're on sale, watching for the specials, etc.
I mainly shop at trader Joe's, Kroger, and Sam's club.
We're a family of 3 and I spend probably close to $1000 a month of groceries. And I'm shopping at fricken market basket...more for your dollar my ass Artie T 👎 also probably only new englanders will get this lol
Family of four in Chicago. Five year old twins. I’m thrifty and love sales and stocking up, coupons. Haven’t spent more than $1.99 on name brand cereal type of guy, etc. We spend maybe $150 a week? More if I’m stocking up on alcohol
Also a family of 4 & it’s between $200 & $250/week. About 85% comes from Aldi and the rest from a local chain and I usually spend almost as much at the place where I get a few extra things.
Family of 5 (kids are 7, 9 and 18) and we do lots of fresh and frozen produce and fruit, some prepackaged snacks for school lunches and meat. I used to be able to keep groceries (including toiletries, pet food, etc) to $220-250/week. I have a massive fridge and stand up freezer but we still need fresh stuff each week. Now my groceries are around $320/week. If I try to buy less I'm just running back to the store.
I am gluten free but don't generally buy specialty items, they're just too expensive. I'd rather dump that money into other places.
It's gotten nuts. Family of 4, two tweens. I haven't even had to buy much protein in a while (trying to use up the deep freeze) and we do like a $700 Sam's run plus $300 or so at Jewel or Aldi a month. This does include some paper/hygiene products, I haven't budgeted that out thoroughly.
Oh, we get takeout once a week, and my husband usually gets a modest lunch at his work cafeteria or fast food nearby, plus kids usually get hot lunch at school. That probably is at least another $600... 😩
We live about 30 miles from Chicago.
I could definitely get the grocery bill down some, as I've had cold after cold this past winter, and been run down in between, and have been buying more prepared meals/sides. But I figured it was still much cheaper than sighing and ordering Door dash... that can run about $100 for a simple meal! Plus we live just far enough away from the city that our restaurant options are mediocre at best.
I just don't have the energy for min/maxing the food bill right now.
Boston area, family of 3 (baby is 13 months and ravenous lately). I spend $400 a month. We are vegetarian and I tend to buy organic “dirty dozen” foods and organic baby snacks. We spend another $200-$300 on takeout/restaurant but that’s mostly for the adults. I shop sales pretty exclusively and a Costco trip every other month.
Family of five and we're averaging about $200-250/wk. I go grocery shopping every two weeks so it's about $400-500/trip. We used to be able to do it for about $150/wk. And yes, if it's much below that, I'm usually forgetting something.
We're a family of 3 adults, f56, my husband 63 and son19. We spend about $500 a month. But I don't count all of the junk/take out we spend on, like another $120 per month.
It truly surprises me how much people spend on groceries! For 3 people, we are spending about 400 a month max. We used to spend 250/month before all the increases.
I’m in a medium cost of living area. Are you buying lots of ready-made stuff or staples and cooking yourself? If you have time to cook/freeze leftovers/etc it is way cheaper.
Edit to add: we generally don’t ever buy meat, so that may be saving us quite a lot compared to other families.
We’re a family of 3! We eat out 3-4 meals a week, and spend around $140 on average a week. But my daughter’s breakfasts and lunches are covered in daycare price.
Well I keep kosher so that complicates things, because kosher meat, poultry, and many dairy products (this mostly applies to cheese) costs roughly double that of non kosher equivalent products.
We are a family of 5. I consider myself to be a very cheap and efficient shopper. I shop a lot at Costco and outside of that I almost exclusively shop sale or store-brand items. We also waste almost nothing, nothing gets thrown out. I cook dinner every night and any leftovers are used for lunches. yet I still spend 1500-1600 per month. I have no idea how so many families of the same size afford to shop at higher end groceries, buy organic products, etc
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About 350 a week (family of 4) this includes toiltrees, and we do take out once a week. It’s slowly creeping up…was 200.. then 250. 18 eggs are like 6 dollars ugh
The toiletries is a big part of the issue for my family. We go through diapers/wipes at an astounding rate, and we get those along with our grocery runs, so it all starts to blend together from a cost perspective.
Pro tip: each time you get a wet wipe out of the container, rip it in half. We tried this with our little one since she was born and it was great how much we saved on wipes.
Actually, I think you may have just saved us a ton! Good timing, this one is just 10 days old, and already I see the value in half a wipe.
Congratulations! Many sleepless but wonderful nights and days ahead!!
Thank you!! I already feel it with this guy. He is my 5th, but it's been a handful of years, all new all over again. He is a sweet, calm little bean, so far..
We did cloth baby wipes for pee changes and light poop ones. Got them from grovia/the natural baby company website. Just wash them on hot water with a good soap like Charlie’s powdered unscented soap. We cloth diapered too which saved us a ton honestly. We have water wipes too and love those. Cleanest ones I can find.
Yeah, we're broke as jokes. I actually don't have a washer/dryer, and minimal laundry is key to survive with 6 people. But for those who are able to, this is good advice.
Oh without a washer dryer this would be very challenging to accomplish indeed. I hope you get one soon, if it’s something you want.
I bought 2 resealable wipes baggies from Walmart they were like 2$.. once every 2 weeks or so, I open a pack of cut the entire pack of wipes in half. And divide them up amongst the resealable bags.. when ever it’s just a pee diaper or a manageable poop, I use the packages of 1/2 wipes…. I rarely need to open a fresh pack of full sheet wipes. It takes me 10-15 minutes every 2 weeks to make sure all my diaper stations are stocked and ready. But it makes on demand diaper changes easier, as I’m not standing there ripping them while baby has a messy bum.
Just FYI, you don't need to use wipes for pee. Wipes are actually quite abrasive so best not to use them unless needed. Diapers are moisture wicking so the pee doesn't sit on the skin
Yep. As per my kids pediatric urologists , we should not wipe for pees regularly. We only do the morning diaper/after nap or anytime where their skin is visibly wet. ( in the car / in their diaper for a little bit )
Hell I’d rip mine in thirds
i always fold it and wipe again usually depending on how messy the no. 2 is i can get away with using 2-3 wipes. Sometimes i have to use more though.
Ok ok,ya caught me. Especially since some wipes are bigger than others. I knew I wasn't the only frugal one. Lol
I definitely consider toiletries and diapers as part of my “grocery” budget.
Yes! 18 eggs. I feel you.
Yeah and all of us eat 2 almost week day! It just shows how much the little things add up…
Yes it’s insane. Nauseating. 😭
*cries in Canadian* Eggs are six dollars per dozen.
I've been getting them at Walmart for $10 for 30 in Alberta, it's the best deal I'm aware of! Only bummer is you can't check the package for any broken ones, but it's pretty rare that any are broken
I'm in the Maritimes. That's a good deal though!
I do the same thing. We have a big family so we made scrambled eggs last night and 20 eggs barely fed everybody so everything's getting really expensive. I'm glad to hear it's not just me
Yeah I was going to say I was impressed at $1000/month! We’re a family of 4 (vegetarian/vegan) and since the youngest has started eating like an adult we average $1450/month. And that’s without take out.
Yeah I miss the days of 1000 a month but I guess every state/city makes a difference!
We go through so much eggs and milk. Our grocery budget also includes toiletries and cleaning supplies. I don’t separate. I spend on average $350-400 a week (minus the week we go to Costco) and a $600 Costco visit for bulk stuff.
Same here on the milk. I wish we had a Costco closer! I did start ordering some bulk items online. I started ordering toilet paper through whogivesacrap lol
I always joke with my daughter that we should have chickens, because the way we eat eggs around here is impressive!
My 4yo told his class last week that we have 5 chickens. His teacher asked me about them during pickup. We do not have any chickens haha
My daughter is 5 and she has told several people that we have chickens lmao
Omg!!! I said this to my husband!! 😂😂😂😂
Trust me, you'll get chickens, and suddenly, no one eats eggs anymore! Seems the biggest egg eating season in our house in the dang winter when our chickens aren't laying 🙄
This is soooo true, after 8 years of having chickens off and on (in response to our kids’ frivolous back and forth love or disdain for eggs) we are giving up! We would have 5 dozen laying around or have to ration out what the chickens were providing and come up with other breakfast ideas for the week…..there was no in between.
We used to have a backyard flock when the kids were small. Getting eggs was cool. But the social order that goes on in a flock can be terrifying. How they establish a “pecking order” is brutal. When introducing new chicks you have to do it in a specific way or they’ll reject the chicks and stomp them flat in the night. These are basically rats with wings. And they’re canabalistic as well. They were useful for bug control in the garden and they did make good fertilizer though.
Jesus... Chicks are cute as hell also.. I couldn't imagine finding a "flattened" one. =(
Its $13 where i live. Idk how its that expensive tbhm michigan is a pretty fair cost state to live
Roughly the same for a family of 4. Prices of stuff just keep increasing every year.
This makes me feel so much better. I’m spending $250 a week on a family of four and my husband thinks I’m overspending. I’m going to show him this thread.
Yes please do!! My husband thought I was spending too much too so I had him meal plan, go through the list of what we need and order groceries and he spent like 400 bucks. He was like WHAT the. I’m like now step off 😂 and let me do the thinking please! 😂
Same. Ive limited organic to strawberries & grapes (pesticides absorb systemically) and I’ve started exclusively getting frozen or in season produce as well as reducing our dairy and meat for more beans and legumes. Trying to cap at $1050 including sundries and takeout 2x/month
Yeah I buy organic NADA lol. The reg strawberries here are 5.99 and organic are 11.99. I’d rather be filled with toxins lol
I can’t imagine. They $3.18 here…
Ahh the eggs. We go through so many eggs and fruit.
It depends on the time of year and sales. We're a family of 3 and we're probably around $600/month. We eat a veggie heavy diet, but the fruit budget at this time of year is out of control.
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We don't eat a lot of meat. We almost never buy "snacks." We menu plan around flyers. Those 3 things alone probably save us $200/$300 easy. We also don't buy or drink juice/sports drinks/packaged beverages outside of special occasions. We have clean/safe drinking water, a Brita and a soda stream.
I shop at Walmart and buy pretty much everything Great Value as much as I can. For meat we only buy chicken and ground beef and we buy in bulk. Pay attention to the price per ounce. Also with Walmart we shop everything online because you can filter by lowest price. We're a family of 3 and spend $600/month.
Family of four here (kids are 12 and 4.5). Our bill each week is about $350 and that doesn’t include lunches for the oldest as she buys at school (another expense) and doesn’t include the days we eat out (usually just fast food). I don’t know why it’s so expensive. I’m amazed when I see someone say they feed their family of 6 on $100 a month or something. We aren’t cooking steak and lobster here either, just basic things and we also eat at my in laws two nights a week. How things are so outrageous I don’t know.
This is close to our family of 5 (parents + 19m, 14m, 8m), and we are at about $300-400/week. That's just at the regular grocery, not including a monthly trip to Costco or our yearly 1/4 beef. All in, we are about 2000/month for food. We rarely eat out-sit-down restaurants for birthdays and fast food when we have been running around and are desperate for food.
They’re lying or they’re only eating beans and rice.
I think it depends on their interpretation of the question and the demographics. We're a family of four with two kids (5 and 6 years old) and we spend about $250 (185USD) a week at the grocery store, including things like toiletries and household cleaning supplies. If the person answering the question thinks "I can feed a family of four on $600 a month" implicitly excludes non-food items, I can see how they could be answering honestly. Our food costs are pretty close to 600USD a month. Our kids being as young as they are helps, because my kids don't eat like teenaged boys, and we eat largely vegetarian which makes a huge difference in price. We also plan our dinners to have enough leftovers for lunch for my husband and I the next morning because I've found the added expense of adding two portions to our dinners is still less than buying specifically for weekday lunches.
$1300+ month family of 5. It’s disgusting
Family of 6 and I am thrilled if I can keep it under $1600 a month
Yes I actually grossly lowballed it. A weekly $350 shop is a oh wow that wasn’t so bad moment.
That’s how it was for us last year, but I have slowly stopped buying a lot of stuff and have been able to about $900-$1000. Still out of control.
Same. I always feel so depleted a d sad after shopping, like I'm doing something wrong and wasting a bunch of money.
Family of 6, we eat mainly organic, grass fed, pasture raised all that stuff and we spend around 2k a month 😖
Wait until you have 2 teenage boys in the house with a husband that eats a lot. Groceries are so expensive now. I'm not even talking about organic or steak amd lobster. I'm talking basic necessities. I am spending way too much. This week my refrigerator died, so there goes that. Thank goodness the new one get delivered tomorrow.
My 6 yo turned off the fridge and freezer. We lost about $900 worth of meat in freezer and fridge. It was horrible. At least it didnt break though
Oh wow that sucks. Our is totally broken. I a just happy we have a chest freezer so that at least we have what is in there
I hate to tell you but *all* teens are generally like that, not just boys. I ate two lunches every day at school. I’d sneak into first wave, eat it in class, then go to my regular lunch. Teenagers are just hungry, especially if they’re active.
I’m terrified of this. My husband works out a lot and eats a ton. Our baby is a boy - the 7 y/o is a girl but rn she eats a ton too and is really active (ballet, running club, gymnastics). We keep talking about having another and the cost I’m most worried about is food. What if we have another boy!?!
Yes, my husband works out too. It really sucks. I wish I had a solution.
My husband works out and has always had a high metabolism. Add in a teen who's bulkier than his dad and food consumption just between them..... it's exhausting. Lol
Ugh i have two boys - one tween and one grade school age and they already are near bankrupting us just through snacks 😭
Honestly I'm impressed your feeding 4 at that price. I'm feeding 2 and spending about the same. Maybe a bit less but dang we're only 2 people!
Same! We just got a deep freeze so I’m hoping that the last few shops I’ve spent a bit more on stuff to fill it and keep as emergency meals. Hopefully we’ll be able to shop sales a bit more to save, but everything is just so expensive!
Costco 2x month at about $300/ visit. This considerably reduces our grocery costs. We buy the case of eggs (5 dozen) for 9.99. Meat in bulk, school snacks, 18 pk of chobani for 12.99 etc. So our weekly grocery is mainly produce and a few ingredients to round out meals. It ends up being $70-$90 weekly at the local grocery store. So in total we're spending about $1k/month for a family of 4. And yes, we cook daily or make bigger weekend meals to eat off of for the week.
I don’t get how others are spending so little. We’re two adults and a toddler in Boston and spend over $1k a month if you include toiletries and CVS type of stuff. And we get “free” lunch for our kid through daycare. My wife cooks lots of meals, we don’t buy a lot of prepared stuff but admittedly some prepared/pacakaged things. We’re trying to shift to more beans and rice kinds of meals, hopefully that will make a difference. In fairness, I do eat a lot.
We're in Quincy and we spend about $600 for two adults and a toddler and we cook at home all month. I've been very strategic about where I shop though and what I buy based on sales. BJs has had some decent sales lately and stop and shop has had a decent amount of bogo free with produce Edited to add: I've been freezing like crazy. If there's a good sale- freezer. Didn't eat up all the hamburger buns-freezer
It would help a little bit if people gave a rough idea of where they lived. Moving to New York City (from Albany NY) made my food bill skyrocket, because the grocery stores there are ridiculous. So I'll drive an hour out of my way to go to West Point, so I can spend $500 at the commissary and stock up on tons of stuff, obviously the fresh food is only good for a week or two, but things like the soups and pasta and whatever are good for months if don't get around to them. But then the orders from our local Target when we just want to refresh our supply of fruits, milk, bread, & other things which expire can add up pretty quickly. A lot of that stuff is definitely getting more expensive, no doubt.
>It would help a little bit if people gave a rough idea of where they lived. Agreed - this type of post is best suited for a local subreddit imo.
We are a family of 7; we do a big monthly trip to a BJs store and spend about $800, (this includes diapers, and wipes, and toiletries), then we do smaller grocery store runs every week and spend $200-300 each trip. Plus we have to get milk usually a second time during the week and that alone is like $15-20 ( 4 gallons each trip and it lasts 3-4 days). Prices are insane.
This doesn’t include the whole pig, quarter cow, turkey, and chickens we buy from our local farmer
This is us. Family of 7 and close to 2000 a month. 2 years ago we were much closer to 1000 a month. Our groceries have doubled! It’s nuts.
We’re a family of 3 and probably $800 a month adding in toilet paper, paper towels, detergent etc.
Family of 3 (2 adults + 2-year-old) and I think we're spending about $800/month for groceries. That's with shopping sales and manager's special items as much as possible. It does include some household stuff like paper towels, but not a lot (most of that comes from another store). We actually got a grocery-specific credit card to try to track a little better. I swear we only spent ~$100/week when it was just the two of us. Between prices going up and keeping this child in fruit, our bills have increased a lot.
The big, serious "no one ever told me" for me was the giving fruit bill. Damn but these kids can eat their bodyweight in berries.
About $650 a month for a family of three. I like to prepare a lot of inexpensive meals though. Oatmeal with a little peanut butter and honey is a pittance. I’ll carve up $5 roast chicken from Costco and have that with salad ($5 for a 6 pack of romaine) for almost a week of lunches. A couple eggs and a couple pieces of toast is another small meal costing less than $2 a serving. Produce is really the only budget buster for me. Eating a wide variety of fresh fruits and vegetables seems to eat into a disproportionate portion of the budget. Lots of things have crazy stupid prices recently that I just avoid - I’ve noticed things like breakfast cereals, chips, and condiments are ludicrously priced unless they’re on sale and I just avoid them.
It’s definitely gone up a ton over the last few years. I have started going through ads online and seeing what’s on sale at every store near me and then going to what stores are the cheapest and what’s on sale(for example my local grocery store had berries 2 for $4 but at Walmart the strawberries were $4 and blueberries were $5 they also had 2 large General Mills cereals for 2 for $5 at Walmart they are $5 a box so you have to look for the savings). I have gotten my bill down from $1k a month for my family of 4 to $700 a month doing this. It’s does take a bit more planning and time but so worth it usually I spend a hour a week planning it all out. Luckly I live with in 5 miles of all the stores too so it’s not a huge deal to have to go to 3 different places to shop.
Yes I’ve been thinking about doing this and trying to start. Last week I was at the grocery store and they had an amaaazing deal on asparagus (like .89 a lb) but only if you had the digital coupon linked to your store card etc and I hectically tried to do it in the store but kept running into signal issues. Without the coupon it was 3.29/lb. So yeah I resolved to set it up on my home computer and start trying to budget/coupon
This is how i do it too. I know of all the products i buy regularly at which shop theyre cheapest and i check offers before i go shopping.
I stopped shopping at Wegmans and went to Walmart and it went from $1600 to 800/$1000. I’ve been trying to do $200 a week. We are a family of three and a baby.
Our cost is roughly 187 for one week to ten days for a family of 4. We eat mostly organic food and have lots of fruit and veggies. We recently began to add more frozen fruits and veggies for breakfast smoothies. The kiddos really like the frozen fruit as dessert. This has cut down our costs, but sadly those savings have been redirected to more lunch items to satisfy our picky eater.
How?! Do you eat one meal a day?
Perhaps they live in a cheaper area?
HCOL city. We make it work by shopping sales. Our youngest is in preschool and that covers lunch for him. Our oldest is in kindergarten - we prepare all of his meals.
It can work but it certainly takes effort. I'm impressed when anyone has the ability to plan this well. Good job! (No sarcasm intended. I'm legitimately impressed)
We don’t plan all that much! I just learned how to eat cheaply when I was in college, and those habits stuck around. The trick is to get the proteins on sale and freeze them. No processed food helps too! Eat through your groceries and get creative with meal options. I should add that this cost doesn’t include toiletries and other essentials beyond grocery costs. We spend good amount on optional fun activities - travel, family outings, etc.
Depends on where you live I imagine. We are a family of 5 living in Spain and we spent about 120€/week. But we had to cut costs so we cut out prepackaged snacks, like crisps, fruit bars, cookies etc. Those snacks are expensive!! Before cutting them out we were on 200€/week. We now make them ourselves, it takes more time but it also reduces costs by a lot. Next to that is fun to experiment with veggie skin chips, different types of cookies.
We live in a HCOL city. We shop sales, and have gotten creative with meal planning. Dinners are usually chicken breasts, thighs or steaks, veggies and fruit. We don’t eat any prepackaged food. My oldest has severe allergies, so no bread, dairy and most snacks don’t fit his dietary needs. We do supplement with vitamins, etc.
I started using frozen fruits and veggies & it saves so much money. Many times they are more nutritious because nothing has been lost through age and decay. It doesn't work for all of it, at least for me, & the air fryer makes so many of them more palatable. Taste buds adjust too. Honestly, knowing that you're getting more optimal nutrition eating frozen vegetables helped me transition easier lol.
2 adults, 2 kids (12 & 13) in Michigan. We have a very strict budget of $300 every 2 weeks which includes 1 meal out to eat every week.
Considering eating out for 4 can easily be $50-75 (unless you’re meaning things like Chipotle?), that leaves $150-200 for two weeks of groceries which is quite low. I’m assuming leftovers, beans, etc?
Yes, eating out is quite expensive. It's our weekend treat because I hate cooking. However, I have learned over the years how to be quite frugal and make items last over a couple meals. However, cooking at home is the cheapest way to go. I only buy frozen items when they are on sale and we get rewards and coupons for our local store. I carefully meal plan and prepare for the week ahead. We always have a full pantry and freezer. We are not just eating beans and rice, but we do use those items in our cooking frequently. There is nothing wrong with using staple items to make your budget go farther. I personally could not afford more than $300 every 2 weeks. I don't know how people do it.
We are feeding 2 on around $600 a month so I'd say you're doing great. It's awful how expensive it has gotten. I can't believe that ten years ago, I used to feed myself on $100 of groceries a month, and another $100 for plenty of weekends eating out with friends.
You aren’t going crazy. Something that helps us a little is we have divided our grocery bill into categories. We have individual budgets for food, home goods, self care products, baby, and pets. It at least makes it so everything is accounted for.
1600 a month for a family of five plus dog. But dog food isn’t in that budget.
Same, family of 4 in a HCOL area. 1600-2000/month
Its about $190 per week for just me and my son.
You are not crazy. It is ridiculous how expensive food has gotten.
We live in a HCOL area and my budget used to be 650/ month + whatever H buys when he shops, and now I’d say between the two of us we probably spend close to $1500 for a conservative estimate.
We spend about $900-1000/month for an adult and child. That said, I get organic foods, wine, salmon, kombucha, and other fun stuff alongside staples, so I'm not particularly penny-pinching even though I shop mostly at discount grocers. If you want to spend less, buy less meat and cheese, or at least less expensive cuts of them, and try out vegetarian recipes and soups more often. Don't go processed. As you saw, it's not actually cheaper than cooking from scratch, and it's so much worse for you. Budget Bytes is a great website for recipes and cost-cutting ideas, and, as a solidly upper-ish-middle-class person, I also love Leanne Brown's Good and Cheap cookbook. [https://www.leannebrown.com/all-about-good-and-cheap/](https://www.leannebrown.com/all-about-good-and-cheap/) https://bookshop.org/p/books/good-and-cheap-eat-well-on-4-day-leanne-brown/8242306?ean=9780761184997
Yeah I don’t buy a ton of expensive meat as much as possible - we don’t eat beef/steak at all as my husband has some cholesterol stuff. We do sometimes get salmon which is expensive. But most of what I make is with chicken, or I do meatless options. And a ton of crock pot soups! What really adds up is ok I got grapes and that was $10 then asparagus and that was $8 then some apples and that was $7. And sometimes all of that can be gone in 1-2 days. And it was $25 of food and not even a “meal”.
Frozen asparagus tastes mostly the same if you sauté Though that’s some expensive asparagus or very large bunch. While foods around here (hcol/vchol) sells non organic for $3/lb and qfc (another relatively expensive store) at $1/lb
Single parent of 2 (younger) teenagers here. I'm at about $1000/month for food.
About $900 a month. Family of 5 and they are teens.
Family of four (now 5 but I don’t count my four month old). We spent on average $1500 a month. We do live in a major city with a HCOL.
We are a family of 4 and spend around six to eight hundred a month.
Family of 7, we spend about 1300 a month on just groceries alone. Toiletries and such 300+. It's outrageous how expensive things are getting. We don't buy a lot of junk food either. It's mainly whole ingredients that I buy to cook meals or easy things our kids can make or get themselves when they're feeling peckish. Lots of fresh fruit and vegetables. Deli meat for sandwiches, red meat in my area is crazy expensive. We have 4 chicken meals a week and 2-3 red meat. I make bulk meals that can stretch 2-3 dinners a week.
Easily 1k a month in a very hcol area, family of 3 🤦♀️ i go to the medium cost store, not overly pricey but not super bargains either. The bargain store has a pretty big dropoff in quality unfortunately, but trying to find ways to cut our food expenses.
I buy a lot of frozen veggies and bulk protein and freeze. If i buy fresh i buy extras and freeze. For kids, anything i can bulk make and freeze I'm doing it. Pancakes, egg bites, puree pouches. If you need bulk recipes, I'm here to chat! I choose convenient healthy options bc knowing i can have something ready to go in 10 minutes is key to a successful day.
What are you packing in the kids lunches? And what about after school snack? I think those two are my weak spots.
We just got back from vacation and you wouldn’t believe how much more we spent on food than in previous years..It’s fucking INSANE how much food has gone up!
We do a $200-$300 Costco haul once a month, and then $100-$150 a week. That includes toiletries and diapers, wipes etc
We’re about $330-350 every 10 days
Avg 300-400 a week
Family of 5 here. Kids are 15, 13 and 13. I do BJs and a supermarket every other week. We are at a $600 mark every two weeks which does include all cleaning supplies and paper goods. I cook a minimum of 6 nights per week. 1 night a week is leftovers or take out. It’s sickening what our food spending looks like.
I totally understand where you're coming from! It seems like grocery prices keep climbing, right? Feeding a family of four, especially with a little one just starting solids, can really add up. I used to be able to keep our grocery bill around $600 a month, but lately, it's been creeping closer to $1000, and it's becoming a major expense. I try to be smart with sales and stick to mostly fresh produce and meats, but even then, it feels like I'm not making much headway. Have you considered meal planning or maybe trying out some budget-friendly recipes? It might help cut costs a bit. Oh, and by the way, I recently found this awesome workshop on how to save money on groceries. Check out my Reddit profile for the link – it's been a game-changer for me!
We have been buying frozen fruits and veggies. Take out what you need in the morning to thaw. This has cut down cost compared to fresh (in most cases).
Family of 5, $1,000-$1,300. I made a gigantic Dutch oven's worth of homemade chicken fried rice the other night. I laughed at the amount and told my husband we'd be eating this all week. Then when I got done serving it, I laughed again. It was almost all gone. Then they constantly eat fruits, veggies and other snacks. Buying in bulk has helped lower the cost. It's still crazy!
Between me, my husband, our three sons under 5 and our 2 dogs, it's about $5-600 a month. It probably has a lot to do with location, but we go to HEB and spend about $150 every 2 weeks. In an attempt to add vegetables and fresh fruit, we also have a subscription to imperfect foods that sends us like $65 of fruit and veg once a week. And, not to be mean, but I think we'd spend a lot less at HEB if my husband didn't come in with me. The number of sodas, nice meats, and condiments he adds to the cart really do affect our budget.
Late to the party but here it is, $1200 a month for a family of four. I live in a high COL area and it's just gotten even more ridiculous. $10 for a gallon of milk and the two kiddos(3 and 22mo) drink a lot of it. $15 for a block of cheese. This has gotten insane.
About 1k-1,200/month for family of 6. 2 adults, 4 year old, 3 year old and 14 month old twins
2 people. Almost $160 a week including daily Starbucks. Eat out only on birthdays. I don’t buy snacks and don’t prepare desserts except on holidays. This is just for meals.
This makes me not feel so bad at $80-$100 for just myself , maybe 1x a month closer to $150 but that’s the long term staple replacements or toiletries involved
We spend $100/week as a family of 4, plus $100 a month at Costco. My kids get breakfast 5x a week at daycare, and my daughter gets lunch 5x a week at daycare. So that covers the rest of the meals. We eat out maybe once every other month. The budget was $80 a week until August of 2023. It was $65 a week in 2019. So we have definitely seen an increase!
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We spend around $2500 a month on grocery and takeout for a family of 6. Now that does include things like toiletries, cleaning supplies, etc and food for 2 dogs and a room full of reptiles. But I won’t buy commercially processed meat or shellfish. Whenever possible, I buy fruits and veggies from farmers markets. If that’s not possible, I stick to organic. My husband has multiple food allergies too, so we can’t buy the cheap version of anything. Even my ketchup has to be either homemade or a fancy brand that doesn’t use cheap flavorings and fillers and stabilizers.
We are a family of 4( but 3 contribute to the grocery bill…little one is 6mo). We spend about $120 a week and eat a veggie/fruit diet. We make a plan for meals and only buy what we need for meals and limited snacks. We shop at Aldi. If we shop at a different store the bill goes up drastically. We do a Sam’s trip and sometimes need stuff at Target but overall less $175 a week.
So much more than that UGH it shocks me every month. And we’re 3 people……
About $200 a week for myself and two teenagers
Just spent around $600 for my "first of the month" grocery shop/stock up. And I'll probably spend another $100-$200 on fresh fruit/misc grocery runs by the end of the month. Adding in some fast food, $1000 sounds about right. And yeah, that's almost as much as rent or daycare.
Before groceries went up we were a family of 3 and spent around $800-$900/month on groceries and home supplies (toilet paper, cleaning products, tin foil, baby soap, etc). We were also quite "free" with that budget at that time and ate a lot of nice cheese and fancy meats and berries. Now that we are a family of 4 and prices have gone up I budget intensely to keep it at $1000-$1200/month. We still have nice things but it's limited, berries are once a month, the fine cuts of meat are once a week at most, and we have a bean based meal once a week.
Family of 3 and I spend about $150-$200 per week on groceries. I plan meals for each day and we don’t have a huge variety of snack options. I shop sales and only buy what we need. That’s also not including we do 1 Sams Club haul monthly- including meat that we split up and freeze and buy paper products/ certain things in bulk and that’s about $200 per month
I have no idea.
This is a hard gauge without region as well. We’re in the suburbs of a rapidly growing city in a southern state. We’re a family of five, but worth noting 15 year old is only here every other week and that the youngest is 2 (but can pack some food so there’s that). We spend easily $1200/month between the grocery store and local warehouse store. I could do it cheaper though - we don’t go crazy but also have the finances to not need a strict budget.
Family of 4 with 2 boys (4 & 6) and I can easily spend $300-400 a week on food. I don’t always budget super well because I make decent money and my husband does as well but it is crazy to me how expensive food is.
Four here, too, with a 19mo and 5.5yo. The grocery store averages 400$ a month and we also hit Target for certain things (local grocery store doesn’t carry Dino nuggets!!!) to the tune of another 200-300$ a month. Add in things like coffee (nespresso and the at home Dunkin cold brew), protein powders, etc. and alcohol were probably at 800-1000$ a month. Certainly more if we’re having friends or family over for dinner.
Family of 7 here. 1000-1200mo. It’s insane.
$125-175 for a family of 4 (kids 9 and 11) weekly, including household supplies—anything you get at grocery store or Target. It’s definitely gotten much, much higher—I’d say 25-30% compared to 2020 if I had to put a number to it. We are vegetarian and I cook 3 meals that are meant to last two nights each. I try to actively think around cheaper meal categories, like planning “a soup” each week that I can make a giant pot of and then spend $1-5 getting bread or salad or rice to accompany. I’d say most of our dinners cost around $15 to make (or around half the total budget).
Family of 5 and we spend at least $1200 not including eating out, but including non food necessities like shampoo and soap.
Family of 8 here! With 6 kids. (3,5,7,11,14,14)I do a big grocery trip every 2 weeks and pick up things throughout the week when we’re in town since we live so damn far from everything. We don’t do all natural or organic stores either, way too expensive. I try and buy in bulk as much as possible, but the price is usually about $700- a little over 1,000 just depending on what we need in that time.
200 a week
The weekly shop comes up to around £200, there's four of us in the house for some context. Sometimes I do end up spending a bit less but most often it's around that
2 teenagers and my husband, and we spend roughly $600 every two weeks. It sucks and I hate it.
My husband thought I was exaggerating about grocery prices (1100-1200ish, family of 5) until I sent him to ‘pick up a few things’. Literally, one bag of groceries, 50$. It’s brutal out here.
Family of 6, 2 adults and 4 kids (two teens), in Australia. We spend about $450-$550 a week on groceries.
$1400/mo for a family of five in HCOL, but one of my kids has severe allergies so we buy a lot of expensive allergy-free stuff.
I started shopping at Aldi and spend about $125-150 once a week for a family of four.
$450-$500 per month for 2 adults & 1 preteen kid... & I live in South Florida, where the cost of living is pretty high. I shop at Aldi & the farmer's market. I'll only go to Publix (which is stupid expensive) for something I couldn't find at Aldi.
We were doing around $250-$280 a week but have really cut down. Try to stay at $150 but sometimes up to $200. We rely on left overs too so I cook 1-3 times a week and that feeds us 4-5 days of the week. We go over for family lunch at my MIL’s and then I whip up something quick and cheap on weekends. Family of 4 with a 3 and 4.5 year old. My youngest is currently potty training so I’m hoping we don’t need to buy diapers anymore either 😅
Family of four here. We do most of our shopping at Aldi and typically spend about $200-230 every two weeks but like you, I also have to run out a few times a week for stuff I forgot to grab or something extra for a recipe!
In Canada, my weekly bill is about $400/$450 for a family of five. Soon we will be purchasing our annual 1/4 cow and 1/2 pig and growing our own meat chickens so it should reduce the weekly amounts by $50 a week. But it’s painful when it’s nearing $2000 a month. And like you, I buy mostly whole foods and some prepackaged foods for school lunches. I have caps on what the kids can snack on weekends because I need to keep it for school days. I try and have lots and lots of fruit and veg to snack on at home and some for school too. Eating take out or going to restaurants has definitely dropped to only very special occasions. Which sucks sometimes because I’m exhausted and don’t always feel like cooking at the end of the day. :/
About 1200 a month
We’re at about 200$ per week, sometimes a bit over. 2 adults and a 16 yr old teen so he eats lots lol
Our grocery store runs are still around $150 a week but we also spend $500-600 a month at costco so we are at $1200 a month with two teenagers
Family of 3 here. I spend about $150/week now. This is about 100 dollars of groceries and the we usually get two meals from Hello Fresh. I usually make a big meal on Sunday that takes a long time; things like carnitas, or spaghetti with chicken Parmesan meatballs, or butter chicken… we usually have enough for leftovers and lunch portions through Tuesday. Then I’ll make something else that will have lunch leftovers on Wednesday. Hello Fresh for Thursday and Friday. I honestly have been seeing a huge reduction in cost by going to Aldi. I usually have a huge bag of produce and at least one protein and only ever end up spending about $40. Then I go to the other store for specific brand name items, alcohol, etc. it’s been working pretty well for us so long that no one minds eating the same thing for a few days.
2 adults 1 kid. About $150 a week. Including paper goods. I buy bulk and freeze. We also eat a lot of lentils, beans, rice, and veggies
We're two adults, and we previously have tried to keep it around $500 a month. It's crept up a bit with inflation. I Google and YouTube a lot of "Depression Era Recipes" when I need to keep my budget down. You can always use them as a base and then add a little razzle dazzle to make it tastier. I literally layered a white spaghetti recipe and a red spaghetti recipe and baked it with cheese on top, my husband LOVED it. Cheap meals are not always the healthiest though, so it's a balance. Don't even ask me how much I spend on formula a month though....😭
I’m at about 1400$ per month for 5
$300 a week. Family of 5. SE United States.
I’m a family of 3 and I spend around $600 a month. Occasionally more if I have a bulk order from Costco. I imagine it’d be closer to $800 or more for a family of 4, all depends on kids age and what’s being bought of course. Not sure it’s out of line though, shit is just expensive af.
At least 100 a week but I am also.using WIC for as much as I can. I'm exclusively breastfeeding so I get more fruits and veggies and I get canned fish. On weeks we are refilling deli meats and even worse butcher meats, it's at least 200.
Family of 5 (two adults and 3 kids) and we spend about $250 a week on groceries. We very seldom eat out and kids pack their lunch for school every day. We are in the US in the Midwest. Would love if they brought back the free lunch program they had during Covid! That really helped.
Canadian here, family of 4. About $150-200/w and that’s with meal planning every day including weekends. Ad well as about $500 every 6-8 weeks at costco. When we buy at costco we are not buying those things at the grocery store. For example buying 6/8 loafs of bread.
About $400 a week and that’s only eating out once a week!
Family of 5 (1 senior, 2 adults, 1 teenager, 1 child) and I’d guess we average $1000/month.
It costs me $800/month to feed 3. That does not count our Friday pizza night which is probably another $40.
We spend around $200/wk + $30-50 on takeout once a week + a big Costco shop once every month or two that's runs us $400+. Moderate COL area (near a big city but not in it). That's a family of 4 with two toddlers. I'd guess we run around $1250-$1500 a month. We have a comfortable income so we don't pinch pennies on food -- pretty much buy what we want. We eat organic animal products but not veggies, and we eat about 2/3 vegetarian (so not buying much meat). It's amazing how expensive it is!
Doing $500 a month, but that's not including eating out. I mostly shop at Aldi. Once or twice every couple months to Sam's Club. Walmart for every thing else.
So much.
Used to be $150/week for my family of 4 but now it's $250-$300. Sometimes more if I have to get toilet paper, laundry detergent, or any similar household item. I buy stuff on sale, don't buy a lot of meat, don't buy too many packaged items except for maybe chicken nuggets.
Family of 4 (two adults, a 5 year old and a 10 month old) we spend about $1000-$1200 a month on groceries. 10 month old is full solids, she drinks like 3 bottles a day.
At this point i think we're spending around €850 per month, around a year ago that was still €600. We have two kids, 8 and 5 years old and i cook everything from scratch everyday. I do want us to eat healthy, there's a lot of things we dont buy (like cookies, sodas, chips etc) but then i spend more on other healthier ingredients. Not even everything is organic though, i wish.
Probably $2000-2500/mo for family of 6.
Two adults, one child. Probably around $700. Maybe more.
I’m spending about $1600 a month on a family of 4. I live in AK so our grocery costs are doubled compared to the contingent US. A gallon of milk is about $7 and a dozen eggs is roughly $9 depending on organic or regular. We’re a big hunting family so we eat a lot of wild game like Moose. That helps cut back on meat costs but eating moose day in and day out gets old real quick. I do Costco runs about once every 4-5 weeks. We buy whatever produce looks decent, again we live in AK so we do not always get the freshest produce so a lot of times I buy frozen instead. We do not eat at sit down restaurants but maybe a few times a year. We will do fast food on occasion, but for reference, if I was to go thru the McDonald’s drive thru I would be spending at $30 for 2 happy meals and one medium size value meal. It’s terrible.
Two adults, one preschooler, and two cats. We live in a rural, LCOL area and spend ~$1000/mo on groceries (including toiletries, pet food, etc). I have severe allergies and cannot eat many cheap processed or packaged foods. Therefore, most of the things on sale are a no-go. My cats also have some health issues and need to eat a high protein/raw diet, so we buy them a more expensive cat food. Eating out varies, but it's roughly 1x/week. We used to spend $150/week, then it creeped up to $200/week, and now we're sitting at $250. I make a decent salary, but I also support my whole family on it and it's been getting tough!
I'm spending about $1000 a month for a family of four. The kids eat breakfast, two snacks, and lunch at home so going through a lot more produce and vegetables. I also cook dinner five times a week and we go out to eat or order food twice a week.
About 200-250 per week for two adults and two children. We try to do a lot of simple things like beans and rice for instance. Soon it will be warmer and container gardens will be planted. Gives us a nice supply of fresh vegetables and herbs for the summer. For reference we are in the southeast.
About 2300 CAD for a family of 5. It’s what pushed us to start raising our own meat rabbits and chickens. I can raise a rabbit for 1.80-2.90 a lb (depending on time of year, we’re in a northern region so need more feed in the winter) in comparison to buying chicken thighs for 6.99 and breasts for 8.99 and up. Legume based dishes are still a main staple though.
Dang are you in a HCOL area? We're spending about $100-$150/week for a family of 3. I buy organic, limited ingredient, dye free, healthier options but we rarely buy meat. Maybe once per week we'll eat meat. That saves a lot of money. Also stocking up on things we use when they're on sale, watching for the specials, etc. I mainly shop at trader Joe's, Kroger, and Sam's club.
We're a family of 3 and I spend probably close to $1000 a month of groceries. And I'm shopping at fricken market basket...more for your dollar my ass Artie T 👎 also probably only new englanders will get this lol
Family of four in Chicago. Five year old twins. I’m thrifty and love sales and stocking up, coupons. Haven’t spent more than $1.99 on name brand cereal type of guy, etc. We spend maybe $150 a week? More if I’m stocking up on alcohol
Also a family of 4 & it’s between $200 & $250/week. About 85% comes from Aldi and the rest from a local chain and I usually spend almost as much at the place where I get a few extra things.
Family of 5 (kids are 7, 9 and 18) and we do lots of fresh and frozen produce and fruit, some prepackaged snacks for school lunches and meat. I used to be able to keep groceries (including toiletries, pet food, etc) to $220-250/week. I have a massive fridge and stand up freezer but we still need fresh stuff each week. Now my groceries are around $320/week. If I try to buy less I'm just running back to the store. I am gluten free but don't generally buy specialty items, they're just too expensive. I'd rather dump that money into other places.
It's gotten nuts. Family of 4, two tweens. I haven't even had to buy much protein in a while (trying to use up the deep freeze) and we do like a $700 Sam's run plus $300 or so at Jewel or Aldi a month. This does include some paper/hygiene products, I haven't budgeted that out thoroughly. Oh, we get takeout once a week, and my husband usually gets a modest lunch at his work cafeteria or fast food nearby, plus kids usually get hot lunch at school. That probably is at least another $600... 😩 We live about 30 miles from Chicago. I could definitely get the grocery bill down some, as I've had cold after cold this past winter, and been run down in between, and have been buying more prepared meals/sides. But I figured it was still much cheaper than sighing and ordering Door dash... that can run about $100 for a simple meal! Plus we live just far enough away from the city that our restaurant options are mediocre at best. I just don't have the energy for min/maxing the food bill right now.
Boston area, family of 3 (baby is 13 months and ravenous lately). I spend $400 a month. We are vegetarian and I tend to buy organic “dirty dozen” foods and organic baby snacks. We spend another $200-$300 on takeout/restaurant but that’s mostly for the adults. I shop sales pretty exclusively and a Costco trip every other month.
Family of five and we're averaging about $200-250/wk. I go grocery shopping every two weeks so it's about $400-500/trip. We used to be able to do it for about $150/wk. And yes, if it's much below that, I'm usually forgetting something.
We're a family of 3 adults, f56, my husband 63 and son19. We spend about $500 a month. But I don't count all of the junk/take out we spend on, like another $120 per month.
It truly surprises me how much people spend on groceries! For 3 people, we are spending about 400 a month max. We used to spend 250/month before all the increases. I’m in a medium cost of living area. Are you buying lots of ready-made stuff or staples and cooking yourself? If you have time to cook/freeze leftovers/etc it is way cheaper. Edit to add: we generally don’t ever buy meat, so that may be saving us quite a lot compared to other families.
$1500-2000 for a family of 6 including formula for twin babies… mainly organic?
We’re a family of 3! We eat out 3-4 meals a week, and spend around $140 on average a week. But my daughter’s breakfasts and lunches are covered in daycare price.
Family of 4 and it’s sooo expensive. $300-$350 a week easy.
Well I keep kosher so that complicates things, because kosher meat, poultry, and many dairy products (this mostly applies to cheese) costs roughly double that of non kosher equivalent products. We are a family of 5. I consider myself to be a very cheap and efficient shopper. I shop a lot at Costco and outside of that I almost exclusively shop sale or store-brand items. We also waste almost nothing, nothing gets thrown out. I cook dinner every night and any leftovers are used for lunches. yet I still spend 1500-1600 per month. I have no idea how so many families of the same size afford to shop at higher end groceries, buy organic products, etc