Hello!

25 Comments

The mum who spends just $100 per week on groceries for her family of three has revealed how they still manage to eat delicious meals on a tight budget.

Clare Reilly, 30, from Portarlington, south of Melbourne in Victoria budgets for her family over a two-week period told Daily Mail Australia she never goes over her $200 grocery budget.

That money buys the family’s meat, vegetables, nappies for their two-year-old and cleaning products as well as all toiletries except for their toilet paper.

Clare splits her shopping day into four destinations, spending $80 at Aldi, $10 at Woolworths, $80 at her local butcher and $30 at her local farmer’s market.

First she goes to Aldi where she spends, on average, $80.

‘I get my staples like dried foods and canned foods,’ she said.

She goes to Woolworths to ‘pick up anything I couldn’t find in Aldi’.

She then heads to the butcher, where she favours the cheap cuts and usually cooks them slowly to make them tender.

‘I spend $80 at the butcher for the whole fortnight. Everything we get there goes straight to the freezer and I defrost it as I need it.’

Her last $30 is spent at the farmer’s market where she buys all of her fruit and vegetables.

‘I am pretty lucky to have such an affordable market near home,’ she said.

Clare told Daily Mail Australia the family ‘doesn’t miss out on anything’.

‘We love what we eat – if it didn’t work for us we wouldn’t keep doing it.’

WHERE DOES SHE SHOP?

Clare puts one day aside for shopping each fortnight – Thursday because that is the day following pay day.

Groceries

She goes to the Supermarkets first and usually spends $80 between Aldi and Woolworths. This includes shampoo, conditioner and detergents.

Meat

Then she goes to the butcher where she spends, on average, another $80.

She buys budget cuts of meat to make her money go further.

Fruit and Vegetables

Seasonal produce is purchased from the local farmer’s market. Clare spends $30 here and gets a fortnight’s worth of farm fresh good.

She has chickens for eggs as well as a small vegetable garden at home.

She doesn’t waste anything and if she can’t eat it she gives it to her five chickens who produce upwards of six eggs every day.

Clare shares more on her blog – The Life of Clare

How much does your family spend a week on groceries?

Share your comments below.

Image via Facebook

We may get commissions for purchases made using links in this post. Learn more.
  • Great budgeting she has going. Sadly there is no market anywhere near me and the fruit and veg shops while decent enough, isn’t that much cheaper that I go out of my way to shop there as opposed to coles.woolies/aldi.

    Reply

  • Great budgeting and she saves so much by having her own garden and chooks.

    Reply

  • What a lot of people gon’t realise that basic food for a person with celiac is very expensive. The average load of bread for a celiac is about 2/3 size of an average size loaf of bread and nearly double the price too. Flour to make their food from scratch is close to double the price too. No foods containing wheat, barley, rye or oats are safe, nor is food safe if it has come into contact with other food containing it or processed on machinery used for other food. Even a lot of mayonaisse and sauces have grain in them – vinegar that contains barley. Aldi have their own brands. What most people don’t realise is that their goods are manufactured by bid name companies and packed with Aldi brand labels. The same refers to Coles, Woolworths, Foodland, Black & Gold, IGA etc and other retail labelled goods. You can save a lot of money buying those brands.

    Reply

  • Great budgeting – I didn’t realise chickens could produce more than one egg each per day – wow

    Reply

  • This is very doable, especially if going to the market. I go to the market just before they close and can get a box of veggies for $5. Eating plenty of legumes also helps and we don’t buy meat.

    Reply

  • I roughly spend around $100 – but we no longer scrimp and save like we did when the children were at home. And we do grow a lot of our own vegies.

    Reply

  • Unfortunately we only have the one shop so we spend up to $200 a week. Very rarely am I able to go under this. There are three in our household and all adults. Good for her if she is able to do that for her family

    Reply

  • Whatever works for you and your family I guess.

    Reply

  • You can save money shopping but it has to be a way of life. I shop according to the specials. You have to flexible in the kitchen.

    Reply

  • It would be interesting to see a sample menu of meals.

    Reply

  • I only shop fortnightly now and since tax time I have restocked my freezers but during the rest of the year I bulk buy where I can. For the really broke times I do my groceries with a list and pen and record every single price as I go around the supermarket, I find I put a lot more back n the shelf and really buy the necessities only this way! On a regular week though I also start at Aldi then move off to the larger supermarkets for the things Aldi doesn’t have (or if I prefer a particular brand).

    Reply

  • Wow would love to be able to do this. I spend roughly $150 a week on 4 adults, 1 child and a baby.

    Reply

  • We are a family of 5. 2 adults, two teen boys, and an 8yr old and I spend $400 a week, 1 of my sons is a celiac.

    Reply

  • I have happily fed my family of 4 on $100 a week for 2 years now. We too are lucky to have markets close-ish to home and we eat very fresh, with very little in the way of packaged foods and junk. It is very do-able with a bit of organisation and effort!

    Reply

  • wow good work. in my house theres my 3 children, my husband, his father, and myself, between us we eat about $40 of meat nearly everyday then $15 on veggies. thats $55 a day just on food, not including toiletries, cleaning products, and cupboard staples like salt, flour, sugar, coffee, etc. i am broke afterdoing shopping.

    Reply

Post a comment
Add a photo
Your MoM account


Lost your password?

Enter your email and a password below to post your comment and join MoM:

You May Like

Loading…

Looks like this may be blocked by your browser or content filtering.

↥ Back to top

Thanks For Your Star Rating!

Would you like to add a written rating or just a star rating?

Write A Rating Just A Star Rating
Join