Buying in bulk saves money right?  The correct answer is not always.  There are two things you need to consider when buying in bulk.  Will you use all the product by the sell by date or at all?  What is the unit price?

The photo above was taken at Dunnes last night.  I wanted to buy some cheese snacks for my daughter’s lunc. h I’m well aware that these are not a frugal choice, but it’s one of the few treats I allow her to indulge in and as so try to pick them up when they are on sale.  Unfortunately they were not on sale last night, but instinct told me to buy the “value pack.”  As you can see from the picture it is clearly labelled “value pack” inferring that the consumer is saving money by upgrading to said size.

8 cheese snacks worked out €2.99 or roughly €0.37 per snack.  The 12 snack “value pack was” €4.99 or roughly €0.42 per snack.  Not so valuable, eh?  As most of us don’t have the time or mathematical skill to calculate this on the spot, you can look at the unit price which is displayed on the price card.  On the smaller pack this was €17.99/kg and on the “value pack” it was €19.99/kg.  This is a good example of what to look out for.

I wonder how many people, like me, instinctively reach for the “value pack” and don’t think to check the details.  It’s a nice little cash cow for the companies.  Shame on Dairylea for trying to profit from misleading packaging and even more shame on Dunnes Stores for stocking such misleading product.

I have written to the manager of my local shop and expressed my concern about this tactic.  In tight times the last thing we need is manufacturers purposely misleading consumers to make a profit.  But if you’re a calculated and savy shopper, you won’t fall for it!

• Super Six: 4 pack kiwis, seeded mixed grapes, button mushrooms, queen potatoes, 2 pack sweetcorn, 6 pack red apples all €0.69.

DUNNES

• Pork fillets €6.79/kg
• Half Price Haagen-Daas €3.17/500ml
• 24×33cl Miller Genuine Draft €19.99
• Half Price Tropicana €1.75/1.5L
• More…

LIDL

• Pork Chops €6.64/kg
• Chicken Fillets €9.68/kg
• Premium Sausages €4.04/kg
• Premium Thick-cut rashers €7.96/kg
• Hot cocoa jar €0.75
• Dove Shower Gel €1.99
• More…

TESCO

• 20% off Tesco Finest Wines
• 25% Off + 30% back on Halloween Costumes
• Half Price Deep River Rock 6×1.5L €2.95
• 24×33cl Miller Genuine Draft €17.99
• More…

Image by chrischapman via Flickr

First of all apologies for not finishing off the €50 challenge post… kids got sick and things got out of hand.  Am working on same menu this week, so expect updates soon.

Do you like reading as much as I do? If so, you know how expensive the habit can get, especially if you anxiously await certain authors’ latest hardbacks!  I thought I’d outline a few ideas on how to stop spending or at least save a little bit.

• First and most obvious, but not often used, is the library!  Your library is free after a small joining fee and usually allows you to keep up to four books at a time.  Even if you live in a smaller town with less catalogue, you can use the BorrowBooks service to reserve and request titles from any library in Ireland.

• Another free and obvious one is to find people with similar taste in books and swap with them!

• If you don’t mind hitting the post office to support your habit, you can use the free service BookMooch.  Bookmooch basically allows you to send and receive books to other members.  For every book you send you get a point which you can use to request another book.  If you are willing to send abroad you get three points.  It’s a great service and if you keep things local you can save a lot of money on decent copies of books you read whilst helping out other readers as well.  Did I mention it’s environmentally friendly too?

• You can purchase discount books online as well.  You won’t save as much, but it’s certainly cheaper than hitting Easons.  Amazon can save a bit of money, although personally I won’t touch them out of principal.  Most of the books are shipped from Dublin, yet Irish orders do not qualify for their free shipping options, when UK orders do.  The Book Depository works out SLIGHTLY more expensive than Amazon, but has free shipping worldwide which will usually save you in the long run.  If you don’t mind buying second hand, Better World can save you a fortune.  It is a US site, but ships globally for $2.97.  It’s a great cause too, as a portion of profits go to support literacy programs around the world.  I have literally gotten 7 books for under $10 here before.  You’ll wait a little longer on shipping, but it’s worth it in the long run.

How do you save on books?  Any tips and tricks we can learn from?

UPDATE: I just went to place an order with Better World (see above) and not only have they raised shipping costs to $3.97 (which would be more than acceptable) but they changed it to $3.97 PER BOOK!  Not such a feasible international option any more.  I won’t withdraw my recommendation, they are a decent company to deal with, but they have lost this customer.  I’ll let you make your own decision.  I think we’d be better off sticking to The Book Depository.  My only complaint is that they don’t accept Paypal!

Monday:

• Breakfast: Cheerios (60c) & Bananas (54c), Milk (55c)
• Lunch: Leftovers from Sunday (0)
• Dinner: Chicken w/ Dumplings (Chicken €3, carrots 12c, celery 13c, onions 15c, flour 22c, lard 21c, cream 69c)
• TOTAL: 6.21

Tuesday:

• Breakfast: French Toast (eggs 66c, leftover bread from previous week 0, butter 5c, Maple Syrup 8c)
• Lunch: Leftover Chicken from Monday (0)
• Dinner: Black Bean & Chicken Stew (chicken €3, black beans €2, carrots 12c, celery 13c, onions 15c, peppers 24c, garlic 16c, corn 49c, tomatoes 29c)
• Baking: Sandwich Bread (Flour 48c, honey 20c, yeast 12c)
• TOTAL: €9.34

Am I mad?  Maybe.

You’ve probably been living in a hole if you haven’t heard of the fabulous Lidl Eats blog by now.  Kate is showing Ireland how they can eat well and dispel their ill-placed brand loyalty by looking no further than their local Lidl.  She features Lidl products, incredible recipes and thought-provoking posts.

Early on in the blog, Kate decided to do a €50 challenge to see if she could feed two people on €50 a week.  I was especially amazed at how well she did, as they eat low-carb which automatically adds quite a bit of expense to any budget.  Not only did she succeed, but she posted some wonderfully creative recipes and thoughts throughout the week.

We purchased a new (ok old, a 2000) car this month and as such, things are very tight until pay day on the 28th, so I thought, why not keep things tight and try to survive on our own €50 challenge next week.  So that is what I am going to do.

Next week I will attempt to feed our family of four on a mere €50. I don’t eat low-carb (although maybe I should) so there will be lots of pizza, pasta and home made breads.  I will post a meal plan on Monday and a few thoughts throughout.

I will not be limiting myself to Lidl.  Indeed most of my meat is already in the freezer.  I stocked up on Sulmeat’s incredible chicken fillet deal earlier this week and have plenty of mince to keep me going.  Of course I will include said cost in the €50.  I will shop around accordingly to get the best deals I can.

If there are any other bloggers out there who want to join in, let me know and I will add links accordingly.  I am fairly sure I can do this and look forward to the learning opportunities! In the meantime I will be planning menus and testing bread recipes! See you Monday!

Just a few freebies and almost-freebies on the web at the moment.  Enjoy!

Lenor are looking for people to test new full-size products.  You need to take a survey to qualify.  It took me about 2 minutes and my full-size trial is on the way.  Click here to take the survey.

Tesco have €10 vouchers for online grocery shops this week and next. Click here.  Of note, these will also work in store at the self-checkout.  You may think this is dishonest, but really Tesco wins, they’re not paying labour for shopping and delivery nevermind costs such as petrol.  So it’s in their interest for you to use these in store as opposed to on a delivery.

Guinness are offering a free BBQ set which is quite sharp (mine arrived last week) and comes with a coupon for two free cans, with two more coupons coming just days later.  Six free cans and a barbecue set with an intriguing recipe booklet.  What’s to lose?

Barbecue not your thing? Try Poker.  Guinness are also offering a free poker set with the same coupons.  You can’t claim this if you’ve done the BBQ one, but what’s to say your spouse or partner can’t!?

Drynites are offering a free sample of their overnight nappies.  With one in potty training bootcamp as I type, this was a welcome offer for me!

How about a free sample of Lacoste Elegance?

Any other freebies out there we should know about???

The Inventory

The first step is to do a wardrobe inventory, make a list of everything you have, organised by garment type, trousers, skirts, tops, sweaters, jackets, shoes bags etc.  It is worth trying them on too, anything that doesn’t fit or that is past it should be donated or dumped.   When they are all out of the wardrobe, try to make outfits out of them…it’s all well and good having 5 lovely tops and 5 lovely pairs of trousers but if none of them can be worn together, they are useless.

What your AW (Autumn/ Winter) wardrobe will consist of, will depend on your lifestyle.  Mine is mostly Monday to Friday 9-5 Office Work. I don’t have a strict dress code but I like to look smart and business like so I keep the jeans for the weekend.  This year, I looked at my wardrobe and discovered that I had the following items that were suitable for AW08 (by suitable I mean they are warm enough, they fit me and they are not worn to a thread).

1 cropped black pants from River Island that could be worn with boots or tights inside.

1 bootleg black pants from Dunnes

1 pair of grey wool knee length shorts/pants from River Island worn with a Green cardi from Monsoon.

1 pair of Denim Trousers for more casual days from Wallis worn with a green and white v neck from Espirit.

2 cream sweaters, one v-neck from Mexx and one boat neck from Espirit.

The List

The problem with the list above is that as far as I’m concerned there is only 2 full outfits there, I think black pants are boring and I think cream jumpers are boring so I didn’t want to wear them together.  So with the addition of this for the two black pants (2 more outfits)

and this for under the two cream jumpers another (2 outfits)

We have now gone from two full outfits to 6 and all I’ve spent is €92.  You might think that is a lot on two items but I have had great experiences with Wallis clothes, they wash in the machine really well and really suit my pear shaped figure.

I also have two Wallis dresses and a Savida dress that I got in the Spring this year that I think can be worn well into Autumn with the addition of some tights and a cardi! By the way, skirts and Knee-High boots have become a wardrobe staple for many women these days but I am cursed with obsecenely large calves and knee-high boots are a no go, hence all the trousers!

The Externals - Coats, Bags and Shoes

Due to careful planning in other years, I’m  ok in the externals department, shoes, bags, coats.

1 pair of black comfy (ish) court shoes from Dorothy Perkins and a black DKNY handbag.  The shoes will probably have to be replaced before the year is out, but for now they are ok.

1 pair of tan shoe-boots also from Dorothy Perkins and a tan leather bag from River Island

As far as shoes go I can’t recommend Dorothy Perkins enough although if you need a bit more support and comfort then I had a look on the Clarks website and they have some pretty nice stuff.  I haven’t seen too many coats in the shops yet, give it another few weeks.

Something for the weekend

Like I said, most of my time is spent in work clothes so I didn’t want to go overboard on buying casual clothes, however I did want something to update my wardrobe.   I was delighted to find a sleeveless tanktop in a chunky yarn in Savida and a white long sleeve t-shirt for inside for €53.  The t-shirt is a lovely lycra one and will also be worn inside some other short sleeved t-shirts.

I’m not big into going out to clubs and bars at the weekend so this didn’t really come into my budget,  I have some tops from previous years and a dressy pants and a dress or two which will get me through the season.  I had a quick look in Dorothy Perkins and they have some really good value fashion pieces for going out or casual wear at the weekend.  Worth a look if you’re a socialite on a budget.

The big change to my lifestyle has been weekly trips to the farmers market in Limerick, a wonderful but cold place in the winter so I have added a casual coat/jacket to my “to-buy” list, I’m thinking a really nice fleece, something warm and cosy but not too sensible .

The Moral

The moral of the story is if you’re on a budget, you don’t have to stop buying clothes, you just have to buy more carefully.  By looking at what’s in your wardrobe and making out a list of “outfits” that you can put together out of your seperates you will see the gaps.  What you need to do is fill those gaps instead of wandering around shops buying whatever takes your fancy.   If you do the “wandering” method of shopping you will  find that, the top that you were so in love with and was only €30 will actually cost you another €100 to make an outfit, because it doens’t match your pants or any shoes you have.

As for where to shop, my favourite place for reasonably priced pants is Wallis, especially if you are a pear shape (aka you have a big bottom/thighs and small shoulders/chest).   If you are apple shaped, Next is definitely the place to go, I never have any luck there but I know others who swear by it.   For Knitwear, if you can stretch to it, Monsoon always has beautiful stuff, but Wallis and Savida have lovely collections this year.

The first thing to mention here is the money that the Government give to parents and guardians who are on certain social welfare allowances or are on low wages and help defray some of the costs involved in going to school. This Back to School Allowance is not applied for by all those who are entitled to it for a variety of reasons including lack of information and misinformation about entitlements and income thresholds.

For those up to 11 years of age the allowance payable is €200 and for secondary school students (11-18) it is €305. The income limit per week for a couple with one child is €497 per week and for a lone parent is €348 per week. The higher allowance is also payable to those with sons and daughters in third level education under the ages of 22. Other limits for larger families and full details of the allowance are available on the Citizens Information Board Website page on the allowance and also on the Department of Social and Family Affairs Website.

It’s important to note that rent supplements, child benefit and many other allowances are not considered income.

Food coupons in Ireland are rare as hens teeth in comparison to the resources available to US and UK based shoppers, but some of you may find the coupon that Low Low have issued for their new cheese stick product useful, (buying the cheese in a block yourself and cutting it into amusing shapes could really do the trick on the money saving front though - I can feel Deborah patting me on the back from here!)

Maybe you do not have contacts in terms of exchanging school books and with schools currently closed and few book sales available and the cost of new books being excessive you might find the book you are looking for on School Book Exchange for half the price or less. I’d be interested to hear the experiences of anyone who uses this or any other book selling or exchanging service in Ireland. Local papers, shopping centre notice boards and community centres might also be good places to advertise books for exchanges.

The Department of Education funds a School Book Grant Scheme which you may be entitled to apply for via your child’s school. More information is available on the Citizens Information Board Website and also via the Department Circulars which are issued to schools on the subject - primary schools and secondary schools.

What tips do you have in terms of cutting back to school expenses?

Budgeting - the mere mention of the word makes me cringe, unless of course it’s government spending we’re talking about.  In a time where prices are increasing every day and belts are tightening, it’s really important to know exactly where your money goes.  I am no expert on this by any means, but this will walk you through how we created and handle our budget.

I wish it’s something we’d done and figured out before we ever got married as it’s true what they say - money does cause the most arguments!

Month 1

Come up with a first draft budget.  Look at what you normally spend in a month.  Take into account regular outgoings like TV, Internet, Insurance, Rent/Mortgage, loans, credit cards as well as variable expenditures like petrol, groceries and entertainment.

It does not have to be exact, just a very rough estimate, this will be refined as you move forward.  Look at last month’s bank statement for direct debits and standing orders to make sure you have everything covered.

Make a list of all incoming money - salaries, children’s allowance, rebates etc.

Compare your initial outgoings to incomings.  Is it realistic?  Do you find that you should have a lot of money leftover at month end based on your intial figures, yet in reality you rarely do?  If so, look again at your outgoings.  Is it really indicative of what you spend?  Think that morning coffee, lunch on the go, newspapers etc.  Refine the list as necessary.

Start tracking your expenditures.  This means receipts, receipts and more receipts.  Get a receipt everywhere you go and bring it home with you to track.  You can use something as simple as a ledger to an excel spreadsheet.  Personally, we like the Pear Budget, an incredibly simple online application that we can access anywhere.

I find it’s easier to work with a laser card, as you are more likely to keep or even get a receipt.

Keep track of all your outgoings for the month.  At the end of the month compare your actual expenditures to your first draft budget.

Month 2

Redo your budget based on the comparison between actual outgoings and predicted outgoings.  Generally you will find you spend a good bit more than you thought.  That’s ok, just re-adjust the budget and go at it again.

Track all expenses during the month

Compare your actual versus predicted again at the end of the month.

Month 3

Refine your budget again if necessary, but you should find you’re not too far off.  This is the time where you can start setting goals.  Are you spending too much on groceries?  Figure out where you can save.  Maybe you want to call around and save on insurance?  Whatever it is, name a goal and work on it this month.  At the end of the month if you meet your goal, put the money saved on a credit card or loan or into a savings account, or even treat yourself to a night out. It’s up to you and will be dependent on your personal financial situation.

Continue to track and continue to refine.

Month 4 and beyond

At this point the previously painful receipt input should be fairly automatic.  Keep at it.  It’s an excellent exercise in restraint and a fantastic way to know where your financial situation stands at any point in time.  Keep setting goals and tracking your progress.  You will be amazed at the difference this makes in your life and to your bank balance!

What are your budgeting tips???

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It’s not all about saving money these days, a little extra in our pockets is also good.  I use Envirofone every year when I upgrade my mobile.  I usually choose and upgrade that will cost me nothing with the contract I am on and then send my old phone to envirofone.  You can choose to receive a cheque or Argos credit.  I always go for the Argos credit, because you actually get more money that way and let’s face it, I will eventually need something at Argos!  The amount received varies according to phone model, age and condition.  I usually get around forty euro back.  So if you have any old mobile phones lying around, why not swap them for cold hard cash!