Tag: budget

Save Time and $$: Stop Running Errands (Over and over and over…)

Perhaps you love running errands.  Maybe you love shopping.  I love neither.

I detest errands and shopping.  The expense, hassle and time spent.  But, of course, there are items  – food, clothing, supplies, etc. – that I need for my family, our home and my business.  Errands and shopping are a necessary evil.

I have been pondering how to spend less time, money and hassle on running errands and shopping.  I’ve talked to a lot of people also working on the same challenge, and we’ve learned a lot from each other!

Why Change Your Shopping and Errand Running Ways?  Here are a few examples of why:

  • I want to make more client time available in my schedule which means streamlining some recurring errands and tasks.
  • A friend travels for work, and is looking to streamline the household errands and shopping to spend more time together with family on weekends.
  • A client has chronic health problems that make shopping or running errands difficult, and lugging supplies into the house nearly impossible.

How to Change Your Ways:

  1. Answer the questions:  What tasks / errands do you regularly run?
    Grocery or groceries, cleaners, coffee, bakery, post office, bank, pharmacy?
  2. Pay Attention:  For a week, take note of Where Your time Goes.
    Are you running off to the same place multiple times in a week?  A couple of grocery runs, dropping off cleaning, a handful to trips to the ATM or bank?
  3. Which of those tasks / errands / places could you complete less often?  Just once weekly, or even monthly?
  4. If you HAVE to run errands, bundle what you can.  I bundle the Errands I absolutely have to run onto one morning per week. I don’t need to run them more than once a week.  These may include: the cleaners to drop off and pick up; gas up my van; drop off donations for myself or for clients; or in-person banking if necessary.

More Importantly, what Errands could you eliminate entirely?  This week, I asked my FB community: “What is one regular errand you have been able to outsource or delete?”

 

Groceries / Household Supplies:

  • Scan-n-Go app for Sam’s club has been a major game changer. My husband and kids even come with me now that I don’t have to wait in that line! (KB)
  • Mariano’s click list I order my groceries online call them from the parking lot and they load my groceries in the trunk. They even give me 2 free cookies. (ND)
  • Love Peapod! Use them almost exclusively because I do not like grocery shopping. (KK)
  • InstaCart app (favorite groceries will deliver!) (BK/CK)
  • Amazon Fresh for groceries when I don’t have time to go. (MK, KB)
  • Amazon Prime Pantry for cleaning supplies, toiletries and paper products delivered monthly (NR, DCD, MK, LB)
  • Amazon for lots of little purchases, saving time, gas, and most importantly, aggravation. (LB)
  • Melaleuca.com, my first foray into home delivered household supplies!  (Me!!)

Gifts / Cards:

  • Gift giving. Sending an electronic gift card to out-of-town family saves me 1.) having to go to the store to search for a gift, and 2.) having to wrap and make a trip to the USPS to mail said gift. (JB)
  • Send out cards for sending g thank you cards and such. You can even attach gifts. (MK)

Errands:

  • I reserve my library books online. That way, despite having to go pick it up my reads at the library, they are at least waiting for me at the circulation desk, and I don’t need to search for them in the stacks. I guess true outsourcing for this would be using an e-book for reading on a Kindle or Nook. 
  • Mail-order prescriptions in 3-month supplies. No more long lines at the pharmacy! (MJS)
  • I have Chewy.com deliver my 30 lb bag of dog food every 5 weeks and I get great reminder emails when they are ready to ship the next box. I can move the auto ship out another week if they still have food or ship immediately if they are almost out. No more trips to the pet store to break my back on dog food. (AB)
  • Mobile banking is a big timesaver.  (LB) 
  • Chase quick pay and deposit (BO)
  • Auto pay for bills. (MK)
  • Stitch Fix (Me!!!):  I just received my third monthly Stitch Fix. This is an on-line styling and shopping website that sends me an great outfit every month based on my own preferences.  I can choose to keep as many of the items they send or none at all.  For this self-proclaimed non-shopper, this is GOLD!!
  • Target.com (Me!!) I shop at Target every other week for household items like paper goods, toiletries and cleaning supplies.  Amazon Pantry doesn’t carry a few of the items we regularly buy, so recently, I set up my on-line account at Target.com, paid with my Target Red Card credit card for free shipping, and received my first shipment.  They were delivered to my door.  It was beautiful.

So, in the interest of saving time, money and hassle, what errands are you willing to outsource or delete entirely?!  Let’s Go!

Experimenting with a Spending Diet – Who’s With Me?

I’m tired of spending money.

We’re enjoying Summer, and just got home from a lovely long weekend away.  But travel brings expenses: gas, car snacks, hotel room, restaurant, a few souvenirs. Money just flies out of my wallet – poof!

I read an article about a mom who instituted a Spending Fast.  The deal was, the family bought nothing for a prescribed amount of time, to use up their inventory and save money.  They paid regular monthly bills like utilities, cable and mortgage, but nothing else.

It’s certainly time to slow down our spending.  Yet, we can’t stop spending altogether.  We have high school textbooks to order, and a few other small but necessary expenses.  And with August (the month I refer to as the “Month of Writing Checks”) comes back-to-school expenses like registration, supplies and clothes.

So, I am trying a Spending Diet.

And why do we diet? With food, we decrease overall consumption.  We want to feel healthier. lighter and better overall; and we want to regain control over an area of our lives where we feel a little out of control. So, we will go on a Spending Diet for the next few weeks, for the same reasons!

It may seem counter-intuitive, but I started my spending diet by handing out money.  I paid allowances, and set aside $40 that my business owes a friend.  I can now see more clearly what I need for the next few weeks.

A glance at our checkbook indicates that most of our non-monthly bill expenses are on food, either groceries or at restaurants.  Sooooo…..

  • I planned our menu for the next two weeks incorporating food we already have. Our grocery expenses will be for perishables only, like produce and milk, and I’ll pay for these groceries with already purchased gift cards.
  • I skipped my bi-weekly Target trip for toiletries and household items, and will get creative with what we have in the linen closet (saving approx $100).
  • I also moved my Coscto trip to two weeks from now, skipping this week (saving approx $200).
  • We got take-out for dinner (we do this occasionally on the weekend), but we chose the restaurant based on gift certificates and coupons we had on hand. Dinner plus a few days of leftovers cost less than $6.
  • We celebrated National Ice Cream Month on Sunday, on the last leg of our vacation, but we used gift cards to pay for our treats. Total out of pocket was $7.
  • I collected and reviewed all the other gift cards we have, to determine what we can use over the next few weeks (side note, we purchase gift cards through a tuition reimbursement program at our sons’ high school.)
  • And finally, I packed my lunch for work, and will continue to do so for the next two weeks. It is so easy to fall into the bad habit of grabbing fast food between clients, and I can spend $10 a day on such a habit.
  • There is nothing else that we NEED right now.  My husband and I visited my favorite little boutique in the resort town we went to over the weekend.  Everything there was lovely, but I did not touch a thing.  We have all we need, and most everything we want.  And just a guess, you probably do, too.
  • With more planning, we could cut spending even more, by cutting reducing our monthly bill expenses and eliminating eating out altogether, but we’ll see how we do with these changes to start.

So, how can you pare down your spending this week?