Wise Buying- Everything you need to know

Many people consider themselves to be wise shoppers, but they usually only focus on one part of wise buying. How can you tell if you are a wise buyer?

Wise buying is taking into account 3 main principles. The cost per unit, the cost to use/ store, and if the cost is in your budget. When you only focus on one principle you may not end up making a wise buying decision.

Wise Buying: Cost Per Unit

Cost per unit is when you break down the total cost of an item by smaller increments like the number of items, ounces, liters, pounds, etc.

So for instance, if you are buying a pack of diapers you want to look at how much each individual diaper is going to cost. If you are buying produce, you will usually look at the cost per ounce or pound.

Why do you care what the cost per unit is when buying? In the past, it was generally cheaper to buy in bulk and therefore saving on the cost per unit. Stores generally offer a small, medium, and large size of items.

Most people assume the largest size is always the cheapest per unit, but stores have become savvy to this practice. In a lot of cases buying the middle size product is usually cheaper.

Real Life Example of Wise Buying #1 – Instant Mashed Potatoes

4 sizes to choose from:

26.7 oz box for $2.68 (10.1 cents per oz)

15.3 oz box for $1.24 (8.3 cents per oz)

9 oz box for $1.00 (11.1 cents per oz)

4 oz pack of garlic flavored for $0.84 (21 cents per oz)

Based on these 4 choices, it is actually the middle size box of instant mashed potatoes that is cheaper per ounce. Now if I needed to buy more than 15.3 oz, it would actually be cheaper for me to buy 2 boxes of the 15.3oz size than it would be to buy the 26.7oz box. ($1.24 x 2 =$2.48 for 30.6 oz vs $2.68 for 26.7 oz)

Wise Buying: Cost to Use & Store

With everything you buy whether it is groceries, cars, clothing, toys, etc there is a cost associated to use the product and to store the product.

We will stick to our grocery theme for a minute and look at the cost to use mashed potatoes. What if your family doesn’t like plain mashed potatoes? Maybe they really like garlic mash potatoes, and they like to eat them a lot.

The store offers a pack of garlic mashed potatoes in a 4 oz size for only 84 cents! That has to be a great deal compared to the 15.3 oz box of plain mashed potatoes right?

Um, nope. I would have to buy 4 packs of the 4 oz mashed potatoes to get 16 oz and then it will cost me $3.36.

Now what we can do, is buy a bottle of garlic powder and add that garlic seasoning to my mashed potatoes myself!

Let’s compare this side by side:

1 box of 15.3 oz mash potatoes ($1.24) + 1 bottle of garlic powder ($0.98)	Total Cost: $2.22	Savings of $1.14
4 packs of 4 oz packs garlic mash potatoes ($0.84 for each pack)	Total Cost: $3.36	costs 34% more

As you can see in this chart, buying the plain mash potatoes and adding your own garlic flavoring is definitely cheaper. Plus, you now have garlic powder that can be used for other dishes and meals.

Both of these mashed potato options are relatively easy to store at home in your cabinet or pantry, so the cost to store doesn’t really come into play unless you are doubtful that you will eat the entire amount of mashed potatoes before they go bad. An opened box of instant mashed potatoes will typically last about 6-12 months.

Other examples of cost to use & store would be replacement batteries for toys, cost of dry cleaning for clothes, and the cost for routine maintenance like oil changes and tires for cars.

Wise Buying: Is the cost in your budget?

Sometimes you find a super awesome deal on something in a super large size but is that really a good deal and buying wisely?

In our article about Saving Money on Spices, we found that it was so much cheaper per ounce to buy Pink Himalayan in a 5lb bag on Amazon. Now a 5lb bag of salt is pretty big and not only will it take up a lot of room in your pantry to store it, but it will also cost you $13.05 upfront to purchase it. (Assuming that you don’t have to pay additional costs for shipping)

We will assume that you will use about a 1/4 of a pound a salt per year while cooking and eating, so this 5 lb bag will serve your family for the next 20 years. In order to get the most bang for your buck on pink Himalayan salt you will have to have a dedicated storage location in your pantry for 20 years and hope that you store it in a way that doesn’t get moisture. Salt doesn’t expire but it can be ruined by moisture.

Now back to that upfront cost of $13.05. If you are working on a grocery budget of $100 a week, do you really want to spend 13% of your budget this week on salt? Yes, the salt will last forever but you also still need to buy food to eat this week.

So, while the super large bag of salt is cheaper per ounce, it is going to take up a lot of space and it has a large upfront cost. If we are trying to be Wise Buyers, you would probably be better off buying a much smaller container like the 5oz size of pink Himalayan salt for $1.25 at the Dollar Tree.

Now salt is one of the only foods that doesn’t actually expire because it is a mineral. What if you wanted to buy something that does have an expiration date like shredded sharp cheddar cheese?

Wise Buying Real Life Example #2: Sharp Shredded Cheese

Here is an 8oz bag of Sharp shredded cheese for $2.42 and a 80oz bag for $12.77. Now the label is a little confusing because it is giving you a price per pound and a price per ounce.

You can compare these two by either comparing by price per pound or by price per ounce. I personally think it is easier to do it by ounces.

So the 80oz bag of cheese is 15.9 cents per ounce ($12.77 divided by 80oz) compared to 30.3 center per ounce in the 8 oz bag.

This means the 80 oz bag is going to be way cheaper per ounce than the little 8oz bag.

On average, an opened bag of shredded cheese is good for about 5-7 days in the refrigerator, but you can also freeze shredded cheese!

If you look at how much your family can reasonably eat shredded cheese in a week, how much room you have available to store cheese in your freezer, and if your budget can afford paying $12.77 on cheese…. then buying the bigger size may just be a very wise buying decision!

On the other side, if your family does not use shredded sharp cheese very often, you don’t have a big space in your freezer to store it, and your grocery budget can’t really afford almost $13 in cheese this week, then the smaller bag will be the wise buy for you.

Benefits of Wise Buying

I am a huge fan of stocking up on staple foods that I know my family is going to eat, I just want to do it the wisest way possible.

When you take into account the price per unit, the cost to use/store, and if the cost is in your budget, you can stock up on so many pantry & freezer staples and have lots of room in your grocery budget to buy your weekly essentials.

Don’t be fooled by only looking at the cost per unit. That definitely will save you money when your looking at an item that can be fully consumed in the next few months, but if you have to buy the item in bulk that will last years, it will probably not be worth it.

One of the best tips that I have for wise buying and for stocking up on your family’s most used foods, is to break up your grocery budget into 2 smaller categories.

Our family budgets $250 a month for groceries for 2 adults and 2 toddlers. I like to aim for $40 a week for essentials like bread, milk, and fresh fruit. That totals to about $160 a month. I then use the other $90 for the whole month just to be used for stocking up my pantry and freezer.

This may seem like a super tiny budget, but it is very realistic for my family, because we shop our pantry and freezer before we shop at the grocery store. I am only buying at the store what is needed to fill my needs for the next week. This may include things like creamer for my coffee, a green bell pepper to complete a recipe, a container of blueberries for the kids’ meals, etc.

Meal Planning is essential for bringing your monthly food costs down! If you combine meal planning, with shopping sales and wise buying, you can cut your food spending down by so much.

According to this article, the average cost of groceries per month for a family of 4 in the United States would be about $938 in 2021. I spend about 26% of that and my family is well fed and not just eating cheap junk.

We all know the prices of food has been going up very quickly in 2022, so by using the principles of wise buying right now, you can really get more food for your money.

With more thought up front, you can tackle your grocery budget and any other spending you do, just by applying the principles of wise buying. This means really considering other factors than just price.

Wise buying can also mean doing some easy home repairs. Check out “DIY: How to Fix a Wobbly Toilet for Super Cheap!” and “Do It Yourself Stuffed Animal Repair” to get some ideas on you can maintain your items for longer and fix them for cheap!