Sign of the Times?

[Pooker]

Yesterday I paid over $42 for paper towels, toilet paper, and 5 cans of cat food!

Welcome to the 21st century, Evie

[SoCalGalcas]

I have come to believe that those who write on the economic page and say “prices are dropping “ haven’t been doing the grocery shopping! Lyn

[Cudedog]

I have come to believe that those who write on the economic page and say “prices are dropping “ haven’t been doing the grocery shopping! Lyn

Lyn, I agree with you 100%.

I don't think that many of those "in high places" regularly set foot in a grocery store!! And maybe might not even know where the closest grocery store is located, not to mention the bread aisle!!

Anne

[BarbaraRose]

Yep! Price of food out here is nuts! I am very selective now days.

[snowball]

I'm always shocked when I get home and realize how much I spent... and I don't buy extravagant stuff either...
has anyone seen the ads that say seniors can get a food allotment ? is it just if you have Advantage or is there more accessibility?
sheila

[MandysMom]

Sheila, from what I read, it's on,y certain Medicare Advantage plans.
Velda

[Pooker]

It is tough for us "old folks" to make grocery choices as prices go up, but I was almost brought to tears the other day when I mentioned how hard it was to the gal checking my groceries. She said she has a blended family of 5 children and both parents work. A year ago she started cutting back - not as many treats, making meatless dinners, etc. Then she had to decide to cut some more by only getting store brands, and basic generic things like not getting brand cereals, etc. Now she is at the point where she has to decide which things they normally eat have to be cut out entirely, like fresh fruit and veggies and depend on canned. Her question to me was, "I've cut down to bare necessities, what do I do next?" My heart just went out to her.

Evie

[Cudedog]

Sad story, Evie, thanks.

Here in my part of Northern California the price of gasoline is again over $5.00 (not a typo, five!) per gallon.

One wonders how people are affording to put gas in their cars to get to work.

It's tough all over. Not good.

Anne

[Colliemom]

I’m glad I have my grocery stores charge card, as I automatically get 10 cents a gallon off on gas. I am also signed up for MPerks, (I shop at Meijer) and every time I shop and use my card, I accumulate points that I can use however I wish. Right now I have about 16,000 points. That’s $16 in cash equivalent. They have varying specials on all the time, like $3.00 off my laundry soap, $4.50 off my dry dog food, maybe $2 off a certain size paper towels package, 50 cents off here, 45 cents off there etc., you get the idea. And every tine I spend $175 They send a $10 reward coupon. I have one here right now. So I actually have the equivalent of $26 to spend. The MPerks are electronic coupons you can clip and right now I have a $4.50 off on my dry kibble and a few other things. I also have a $10 reward coupon here. So I can either take that to the store and claim, say 6,000 of my 16,000 points along with that $4.50 and take that $34 bag of Kibble down $10 to $24 or the 4.50 along with the $10 reward, and take it to roughly $20 depending on how I want to do it. It does save me some green. I whacked $5 off the bill today from an MPerks coupon and a buy $15, get $3 off on Pupperoni. Grabbed one of the large bags. Sometimes I have whacked off as much as $15. Doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up. It is automatically deducted at the register when I key in my phone number and 4 digit code before I start ringing up my purchases. The $10 coupons I just scan through. But even so, doesn’t take much to add up tbe bill.

Plus our gas prices are dropping and I paid $3.03 a gallon today. Couple weeks ago I paid $2.87 and then the prices shot up over 50 cents a gal but are dropping back again, sorry Anne. Tourist season is over, demand is low this time of year.

[Bethers]

I paid $2.89/gallon today. My credit card I use for gas gives me 5% off. I purchase my gas using an app called Upside whenever possible. Today it gave me 10 cents off a gallon at the station I went to. Both those discounts are off the price. When I'm in Arizona or by a grocery store where I get the stores discount I have to figure what's the best to use. I can use the store discount and my credit card together, but the credit card only sees the discounted price and is thus adjusted to a lower dollar amount for the 5%.

Like Sue, I have multiple ways to get discounts and good food prices. It's way easier than the old days with coupons but there are some similarities. It's so much easier because I can figure it out say, at night when I can't sleep. Velda mentioned what she paid for ground beef. I still have some in my freezer that I was able to get at Safeway for about $2/ lb. If any of you do Safeway, most stores have a cooler case with some fresh meat packages discounted to $5 a package. They are not out of date. You have to pay attn as some packages are great deals and some less or not really deals. But some are fantastic. If I had more freezer space I'd be always buying to much meat lol. But I'm still eating pork chops and using ground beef from the last purchases in July. HEB here has been giving deals of buying certain products and being able to get certain other products drastically discounted or free. Of course it's only worth it if they're all products you use and like, but I can quickly scan to figure that out, and then quickly figure out if it's a good deal. That half an apple pie was one of the freebies I got. That was a nice treat.

[snowball]

I usually check the discounted areas first did you know that there is (at least at Smith's in Jackson) a discounted cheese area ? also they have a basket (not cart) in the cheese area (not the preshredded ect cheese area) of cheese 5 and under I look there a lot and find cheese that is fun to try a bit cheaper than the bigger wedges or blocks or whatever it cut into...
it is hard and that cashier's story is so sad a been there do that time.... I'm sure it's a story that is more common than we know
sheila

[Acadianmom]

Sheila, where my sister lives there are several places giving out food. I'm not sure if it's a state thing or church. If she gets her phone fixed I'll ask her. I know they let her pick up food for several families. If there are any senior centers where you live they might could tell you if there is anything like that. She gets a lot of canned goods and sometimes apples and oranges.

Martha

[Colliemom]

Beth, when you mentioned you figure out how you want to use your discounts, during the night when you can’t sleep, that gave me a laugh. We seem to do our best thinking at night. No wonder we are all dragging around half asleep all day. I think I’ve created some of the best solutions or ideas when I should be sleeping. So now you know the secret to my creative streak

I haven’t seen ground beef that cheap in a long time. I took a drive over to a Meat processor/grocery store earlier this fall when they had ground beef in sale for $3.29 a pound. Here I as more like $5 a pound. So I came home with 13 pounds. And it’s good fresh next too. Nice and dark red. Freshly processed right off the hoof. They process a lot of beef, pork, chicken etc. for local and northern area farmers including some here. Plus they buy cows, pigs etc. at county fairs too. They have their own smokehouse too for making smoked meats and jerky. Also came home with a couple English pot roasts. Can’t find them around here. It’s at least a 60 mile one way trip, but worth it to me. Plus I like the drive. Something to do on a nice day. I stop in Houghton Lake and have lunch too.

Here’s an interesting look at labeling of ground beef and fat content
https://meat.tamu.edu/ground-beef-label ... und%20beef.

[SoCalGalcas]

That was a very interesting article Sue. Thank you for posting. I was one of those who didn’t know all that information. I will use that information the next time I go to the store! Lyn