The Great Grocery Debate

In the past few months I've become a lean, mean, grocery shopping, money saving, coupon clipping machine! It's become a new obsession to find the best deal in town on just about anything! 

And there's more to it than just the shopping trip! I used to go to the grocery store (Wal-Mart) on Saturday mornings, along with every other crazy person in town. I bolted thru that store and huffed at every person who got in my way. Mike told me that I needed to go to the bike section, buy a horn and put it on my cart. It would put me in the worst mood, and it really damaged my thinking. I was struck by something that our new pastor said earlier this year. When his family was moving from Michigan to Indiana, his wife said that her goal was to get through the moving process without sinning.... thus began my quest to hit the grocery store each week without sinning.

First I decided to try another store, and see if it would help my mood. And boy did it work. So here is my comparison of 3 major markets in our area, with the pros and cons:

Wal-Mart

Pros:

  1 mile away from home

  I know the aisles like the back of my hand

  I can get groceries AND home care AND personal care items AND clothing in the same store

  Open 24 hours

  Relatively clean shopping carts

  Very good prices

Cons:

  Every crazy person in town decides to show up when I'm there

  Very few decent product specials

  Warehouse feel

  Lackluster produce

Meijer

Pros:

  Clean atmosphere, don't feel like I'm in a warehouse

  1 mile away from home

  Good selection of hard-to-find foods (International)

  Beautiful produce, lots of variety

  GREAT specials

  Good coupons at the register

  Nice big shopping carts with a cup holder and a little tray for my calculator

  I can get food, clothing, and personal care items in the same store. And this is higher quality      than Wal-Mart!

Cons:

  Prices may be a tad higher than other stores

Kroger (I went for the first time tonight!)

Pros:

  Savings with the Kroger Plus Card

  The most gigantic shopping cart I've ever seen in my life

  GREAT specials

  3 miles away from home

  Decent prices

  Dollar sales

Cons:

  Kind of icky-feeling inside the store

  Not the best produce selection, but it had what I needed for the most part and what they had    was gorgeous

So there you have it, folks. I haven't quite made a decision on which one I will go to each week, maybe it will be a different one every time! Probably will depend on what kind of specials they have and also my selection of coupons!

Since we got married and I had to start cooking for someone else besides just me, I got into meal planning and it's been the best habit! Every Thursday or Friday afternoon I come up with a menu for every night of the following week, make the grocery list, and go for it! It's extremely helpful when we come home from work and know exactly what's for dinner!

Anyway, Mike just turned on Ironman so I'd better go. Great movie.