The Grocery Game is a website set up to help people with buying groceries. For the last four weeks I have been trying it out to get a feel for how it works. At first glance this is one of the best ideas I have come across, however I came in completely unprepared so I ran into some pitfalls. The site goes out into the world and gathers information about coupons as well as weekly specials run at your local grocery stores. It compiles this information into a ready to read sheet that allows you to shop in a very inexpensive and efficient manner.
The service is relatively inexpensive. You pay $10 for two months of service for one grocery store and $5 for each additional grocery store and you get a trial period of 4 weeks for $1. I would risk a buck to try most things that may save me money.
The downside to the site is you really need to be collecting coupons for about a month before you are ready to use the service effectively. You also should consider having a large stand alone freezer for buying in bulk. My wife and I had neither of these so I started out bare and was not able to take advantage of the best deals. Also, since we have not ventured down the path of children yet, we do not really like having a bunch of one item since it usually goes bad before we can get around to using it (yes, even in the freezer). I personally found the site informative but relatively useless for my family.
Now I know that I have a limited perspective so I employed the help of my older sister (the one who broke rule #1 on Mattress Myths) since she has three children in her family. She really likes the site. For her it cuts down the time she is in the grocery store, helps her save on groceries every week, and lets her know when to stock up on a specific item. And somwhere out there there is a single person happy that she is not spending as much time in the grocery store with her three children.
So overall I think this is a pretty good site and would recommend anyone try it to see if it works for their family.
3 Responses to “The Grocery Game” Leave a reply ›
As a fellow DINK it's pretty hard to save using coupons. But your sister should check out http://www.thecouponmom.com it's a free site. Why pay for something you can get for free?
livingalmostlarge,
. The biggest negative for me with grocerygame is that with some stores you only have two or three shopping days so that made it hard. Fortunately, the one store I really needed, I have five days to shop.
Thanks, I actually use both couponmom and grocerygame. The Grocerygame is more detailed and lets you know when something is at the rock bottom price as opposed to Couponmom that just tells you the percent saved at that particular store and the final cost after the coupon. As you know saving 50% at certain grocery stores is not as good as saving 20% at others.
I do like couponmom in that it really encourages giving to charity. I use coupon mom for the grocery store that is right around the corner but is usually too expensive. I did not want to pay the 5.00 for that extra store when I use it so infrequently. With three kids at home I had just about quuit trying to use coupons and was doing most of my shopping at a super Wal-Mart. Now using grocerygame I can get some really good deals that beat superstores and warehouses. You know it has to be good because I HATE going to the store with three kids!
I've saved hundreds so far using the grocerygame! I also was shopping superwalmart- now I cringe when I go b/c I know I'll spend $60 w/o even filling my buggy whereas at Publix and Kroger I can spend the same and stuff is spilling out over the sides of the buggy. My kids love the variety of stuff we have on hand all the time. And yes, if we didn't have kids- not sure it would be worth the trouble- but I don't think I'm going to be able to ever go back to paying full price for groceries. I confess I looked over at a fellow shopper's savings the other day at Publix- saved $4 spent $60- I felt so sorry for her! =)