Sunday 23 March 2014

Yellow sticker challenge.

Good evening from Tightwad Towers. I hereby claim my title as Queen of Mean. No one can live as cheaply as I can, unless you are living in a tent. Every meal I make has to be below the £1 mark, often it is way below, a few pennies sometimes. Cheap food doesn't mean it is rubbish food. Healthy food is what I look out for when I go shopping. I don't take a list, I go shopping with an open mind. I am not a fussy eater, as long as it isn't meat, and not stodge or junk, I'm ok with whatever I can find that is a good price. I happily buy Value or Basics, and search out yellow stickers in the supermarkets, out of date food at the cash and carry, and any other reductions I can sniff out. More and more shops are reducing stuff when it is near to going out of date. If I see a good buy I will stock up on it. I buy on price, not what I fancy having for dinner. 
So, what's for dinner tonight. I've started another stew, there were a few dregs from the last one finished yesterday, so I've added it to this one. Reduced celery hearts, reduced swede, reduced spinach, three onions from a big sack, a tin of red kidney beans 21p, a handful of Quorn mince, and the usual curry powder, sauce mix, garlic powder, turmeric, and porridge oats. There's three big size meals in this pan, could easily stretch to four if I had it for lunch as well. I will eat it on three consecutive days. I won't be bored with it because it is delicious, and I won't have to bother with cooking until Wednesday, so saves on gas and time.  
Just out of curiosity I have been saving these yellow stickers, to add up how much savings I have made. I started collecting at the beginning of January, but these are not all of them. I haven't cut them from the yogurt pots, or other packaging which made it difficult to remove them. These are from mainly fruit and veg, and bread. The total value of these items was £63.72, I paid £11.89, a saving of £51.83.

We still have some days to go before the end of March and I may well do another yellow sticker shop, so at a guess, if I saved another £10 that would take it to £60 approx saved in three months, £240 per year. I consider that the effort I make in searching out the best prices is well worth it.

Starting on April 1st, I am going to keep a diary of my yellow stickers only. Noting everything I buy which has been marked down because it is going out of date. I'll do it for three months, and it will give me a more accurate figure. I get a feeling my above estimate might be a bit out, and I am saving more than I think. We shall see. I'll add a separate page at the top for it and you can follow my progress. If you don't have yellow stickers, why not challenge yourself to search out the bargains wherever you are. Make it a new rule, don't just pick up the first thing that comes to mind, the same thing you buy every week, look for something which is better value, where you get more for your money.
That's all, thank you for visiting, Toodle pip.

EDITED TO ADD.
LATE NEWS.
Can you see what I have been waiting for these past few nights? 10.30pm, nearly there.

YAY.....SUCCESS

It's creeping up.

a few more. Wonder how many it will get to by midnight. Then it will drop back down to start another day.

Big grins :o))  :o))  :o))

24 comments:

  1. Amazing savings. That stew looks delicious!

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  2. I already buy for the best value I can get as well as the best price for it.
    But, as hard as I might try, I never find such high reductions here on the
    yellow sticker items. I would possibly do better if I was the only person I had to cater for. As DB and stepson are meat eaters I now buy my value
    meats from a local halal butcher that always delivers in high quality for me. His prices are a fraction higher than supermarket products but the supermarket anaemic meat products don`t warrant spending the money anymore. Quality products and reasonable prices definitely rule for me.

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  3. Although we do eat meat I only buy what is one sale or with stickers and completely agree, no meal planning, we eat whatever is in season or on sale. I think we save far more in the long run than meal planning(plus I am lazy :))

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  4. And that Ilona is why you are my hero. I aspire to be like you, you really give me a goal. Thank you.

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  5. hope to see your progress!

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  6. Ilona, you are an inspiration! You talk a lot of common sense and your ideas are do-able for everyone :) The best way to shop is to see what is on offer and plan meals around that. I never have any luck with yellow sticker items though ....what time do you go to get such great marked down stuff???

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  7. Congratulations on your page views and your savings!!

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  8. You are one inspiring classy lady

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  9. You inspire me to try harder to save money.

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  10. Thank you, Ilona, for your daily inspiration to keep at living a brilliant life! Congratulations on your page views. I recently found you, but am a regular. You are quite the shrewd shopper setting the bar high for the rest of us:) Now you have me wondering . . . just when does my local store mark down and where do they hide it? Til tomorrow, toodle pip!

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  11. When I look at all those yellow stickers I see you stitching them together to make a new shopping bag!
    Nancy from Northern California

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  12. Danneke here, An early bird today as I am going to a meeting in Wakefield, the Housing Assc are sending a taxi for me. This evening when I get home I will have to go to Sainsbury's as I neeed milk, I will see if there are any yellow stickers about, I can hardly ever find any and when I do see them it is for foods I do not eat or like. I did notice that the flowers had all jumped up by £1 in price, typical for Mothering Sunday. Stew looks good Ilona, and like you I always make enough for a couple of days, just having a mushroom omelette this evening as there will be a sandwich lunch at the office today.

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  13. What fabulous savings, thats fantastic. Just imagine how much you could save across the year? Your far from tight, more frugal and create. A perfect combination.

    This is why your blog is so popular my friend.

    X x

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  14. I love your frugal ways and your lifestyle. Healthy, wealthy (in the way that counts!) and wise. We can all learn from you. I was wondering, did you ever go through a point in your life where you weren't so frugal? It seemed to take me until middle age to pull myself together and be properly frugal.

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  15. Congratulations, 100,000 views in a month! Yellow stickers have really been poor in my local M's lately. Gone are the days when I can get things for pences. We now just eat less to save money, we all need to lose weight here. We have cut out all the stuff we don't need in between meals and dessert is fruit. We only eat meat on a Sunday now, the rest of the week is beans and pulses, eggs, surprisingly no-one really misses it that much. Maybe we should go veggie. I am spending much more time in the kitchen preparing meals and I agree with you that healthy meals are far cheaper than junk. Since we started saving money on groceries our diet has really improved and we all feel better for it. Debbie

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  16. Wowzers that is allot of yellow stickers and big savings :) Ilona i have a question for you, i will email it .. AFM xx

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  17. Yeah I'm not surprised I find this blog so interesting there is such a mix I never know what is gonna happen lol I went to the shopsl last Friday 3 hours before close and got marked down free range eggs and hot cross buns:) could have got cheap bread also the white fluffy kind ha I'm finding I can live on very little I have cut cut cut back on spending on petrol food cut my ph bill by more than half cut my working hours again lol Louise

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  18. Wow, I love yellow stickers, when we shopping we have to travel about 20 mins or 35 depending on which town, so usually go a few times a month, I do try only buy the yellow stickers and offers , but you have to be there at the right time, I am not suprised you get so many blog views, your inspirational !

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  19. Your yellow sticker finds are my favourite part of your blog, I look forward to your shopping trip posts. I am feeding my family on markdowns and making do and using up so I can get r8d of my debt and i feel a bit more in control of life now I have a plan to stick to.
    I get some brilliant ideas from your blog.
    Thankyou from Ruth in Australia.

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  20. Well done on your Blog success Ilona, fully deserved so 'keeeeeeeep blogging' !!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you Richard. I'll see you Down the Lane.

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