Do you hate trips to the supermarket? I do. I resent time spent wandering up and down aisles when I could rather spend that time on my balcony with a cup of tea.
If you would also rather do something more uplifting than visiting the supermarket, I invite you to enter my life for a moment, while I share some strategies for being more efficient with grocery shopping, as well as contributing to the ‘green’ economy while you do so.
STORE CUPBOARD
It is not only time at the supermarket that is wasted, but also the travel-time to and from the shops. I’ve used two strategies to rescue myself from that wastage. Firstly, I order groceries online, for home delivery. Secondly, I order only twice a month. This means quite a large delivery, but once it is unpacked, I don’t have to think about Tesco (or Sainsburys or Aldi or whatever you will!) for another fortnight.
Another advantage of ordering online is that, given that I place items in the online basket over the space of two weeks as and when I realise I’ll need them in the next order, and given that I edit the basket very thoroughly before I actually place the order, there are no are no impulse items in it. Impulse buying is a big risk with real-time supermarket visits.
You may ask, “What happens if you run out of an ingredient before the fortnight is up?” My answer is, quite simply, “I manage without it. If I don’t have rice, I’ll use pasta instead. If I don’t have pasta, I’ll cook with what I do have in the cupboard!”
There are a few things that I don’t include in the Tesco order, the reason being that I have found greener and more economical alternatives for these. As with the main grocery shop, they all get delivered to the door. Here are my sources:
LAUNDRY DETERGENT, FABRIC CONDITIONER, SURFACE SPRAYS, SANITISING GEL, DISHWASHER TABLETS
These I order from Smol Products. Here is Smol’s sales pitch:
I have a standing order for each product, so that a new pack arrives just before the previous one gets finished. How efficient is that!
TOILET ROLLS, KITCHEN ROLL, TISSUES, RE-USABLE WIPES
From Who Gives A Crap I get bamboo toilet paper, forest-friendly tissues, forest-friendly paper towels, and ‘dream cloths’.
Here’s Who Gives A Crap’s sales pitch:
Not only do I like that the TP is made from bamboo (and that it is 3-ply!), but that half of this company’s profits go to building toilets in the developing world. The TRs come in packs of 48 – which is somewhat of a challenge to storage space. But it does mean you need never run out of TRs again. (I was not one of those who cleared out the TR shelves in the supermarkets during lockdown!)
FRUIT AND VEGETABLES
Oddbox rescues, directly from farmers and wholesalers, fruit and vegetables that would otherwise have gone to waste.
Here is Oddbox’s sales pitch:
A curved cucumber tastes exactly the same as a ramrod-straight one does. You can take my word for it. And I like that the fruit and vegetables aren’t wrapped in plastic, as they are at the supermarket.
I have a box delivered weekly and, for efficiency, I plan meals round what comes in the box – rather than, as in the past, planning shopping around the meals I’d planned.
From an economy point of view, by shopping less frequently, I also shop less impulsively. And by having on-time deliveries of routine supplies (vegetables, toilet rolls, cleaning products and so on), my life runs more efficiently – both time-wise and stress-wise. Time I used to spend at the supermarket, I now spend doing piano practice or walking in the park.
I wish you success in your own endeavours to manage your time more efficiently and hope that the ideas I’ve given regarding managing grocery supplies might go some way to helping you do this. But, if you’re finding that trying to manage your time and your stress levels more efficiently continues to be problematic, then please message me. It may be that a collaborative approach to finding a solution is what you need.
In the meantime, feel free to read more about my approach to counselling, mentoring and life-coaching.
