The Financial Benefits of Meal Planning
How Cool Would It Be If You Found A Few Thousand Dollars In Your Lunch Box?
How Cool Would It Be If You Found A Few Thousand Dollars In Your Lunch Box?
I don’t know about you, but I’d be so happy that screaming in excitement would probably be my go to move.
I have been looking for a really easy way to explain some of the benefits that meal planning, and meal prep can bring to anyone. Most people who already meal prep do so because they have a committed goal based in health, fitness, or performance. If you are not in that “world” then the idea of prepping your meals is going to seem more of a hassle than beneficial. The First explanation I found that actually worked was to tie everything directly back to money, specifically saving money and wasteful spending. It’s not because everyone is money obsessed, but the relationship of money in/out is a relationship that everyone has to deal with.
I don’t think I am out of line saying that there are a lot of people dealing with stuff like student loan debt, paying for your growing family expenses, medical bills, cars, small businesses, or even working multiple jobs to pay general living expenses.
In this article I don’t care if you have a fitness goal, or if you have never even thought about fitness. You don’t have to start with meal prep simply to meet a fitness goal.
Start meal prepping to save money…a lot of it, like thousands of dollars a year.
If you are not familiar with meal prep it’s simply defined as “planning the meals you’re going to eat, and then in advance preparing them in bulk.
For a variety of reasons most people who already prep their meals will plan & prep meals for a week at a time.
Since that is common practice and structure I will reference make it the default measurement of time. From this moment it will also be considered common knowledge.
** Eliminate ordering coffees and food for lunches at the local restaurants, cafes, fast food stores and delivery **
I am going to save you a few thousand dollars a year in this first section alone just from Lunch and Coffee.
Have you ever calculated the money you are actually spending when you order in or go grab some food from the corner store?
It’s a Shit ton of money. Yea, I cussed…deal with it.
Lets fist talk about 2 possible conservative real life situations and then get into how much $$ is twirling down the money drain for no good reason.
Scenario #1
2 coffees a day
1 lunch out/ordered every day
Scenario #2
2 coffees a day
1 other beverage a day
2 meals out/ordered a day (lunch and dinner)
Those are pretty realistic scenarios, right?
2 coffees a day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon for a pick me up.Then maybe you pick up juice, or something on the way home from work, before, and after the gym.
Finally, you eat lunch out and order in from one of those meal deliver services at night because you are too tired to cook a full meal when you get home from work, and after work activities. I don’t think those scenarios are that far off what a day might look like for quite a few people.
Let’s take a broad look at what a normal day comes out to(for some) in terms of how much you are spending.
(the numbers expressed below were figured for examples only, and your lunch/coffee purchases might be drastically different above, or below the final totals. Cost per item calculation was taking from my own experience ordering lunch/coffee, and again can vary for you depending where/how you prefer to order.
6 days a week: which equals a typical workweek + 1 weekend day, that also might be a work day for some.)
Scenario #1 = $5,760-$8,064 per year
(2) $3-$4 coffees a everyday is ~$3,456-$4,608 dollars a year
(1) $8–12 Lunch a Day is ~$2,304-$3,456(tip/delivery not included)
Scenario #2 = $13,536-$19,584 per year
(2) $3-$4 coffees a everyday is ~$3,456-$4,608 dollars a year
(1) $3-$4 other beverage a day is ~$864-$1,152 dollars a year
(2) $8–12 Lunch and Dinner a Day is ~$9,216-$13,824(tip/delivery not included)
It’s getting “real” now because, those are for normal boring meals and beverages you have during the workday, and doesn’t include the fun stuff you really want to do. No after work happy hour drinks, the day, or night out on a Saturday wit the friends, your Sunday brunch’s with bottomless mimosas, and a few beers to wash down your bucket of chicken wings.
On top of this money for lunches, and coffee you’re also buying regular groceries for your other meals, snacks, desserts, vitamins, supplements, and drinks to have at home in case you want to eat there sometimes. If you’re in a relationship, married, etc., and both of you order out/in at least one meal a day+2 coffees, you’re spending upwards close to $27K+ per year.
At this point I know what your saying; “I’m not going to save every single dollar when I still have to buy groceries to make my meals”. This is true, you will still be spending money on groceries, but your cost per meal will significantly drop because you won’t be paying for the luxury of having someone cook and serve you. When you really think about it, 9 out of 10 times you are paying for the food to be done for you.
I am not saying you can’t grab lunch on the go, but if you’re someone looking for a few thousand dollars a year to save, invest,or spend then taking control of your your mid day meals is an easy starting point. To recap, we have a few thousands saved already, and I didn’t even get to how to shop and utilize the foods you already buy for the other meals.
Reduce the sticker shock of buying groceries
Have you ever heard the total of your grocery bill and said to yourself “how does that cost this much, this place is ridiculous”, all while the cashier stares at you waiting to use your debit card incorrectly because you have the chip card. It’s kind of funny when you think about it but, there are a lot of people who have no idea why their grocery bill is so high, or even what items they are spending the most on. They can probably tell you how much they pay for rent/mortgage, cars/transportation, and even their Netflix account. But ask them what they spend monthly on the food they eat and you will get some blank stares.
When you strip down meal planning/prep to the basics, it’s really just reverse engineering how you shop for the food you cook. This means before you go shopping, you know what you are going to have for every meal or at least the amount you will need to get through a given time period. It actually works the same way as cooking from a recipe works. You not only have the items you need, but you have a calculated minimum amount of food in order to prepare a certain quantity.
When you start planning your meals for meal prep, this bill shock goes away because for every shopping trip you can approximate your bill based off what you spent last time.
Murder those weekly/bi-weekly sales specials
If you want to lower your cost per meal by a crazy amount then these sales events are going to be your saving bonanza.
You don’t have to be a coupon queen or an extreme saver like those people on TLC’s TV shows either, you can take advantage of all these sales and specials without spending much time at all because you are prepared.
Everyone knows that they are going to NEED to eat food regardless if they meal prep or not. You have your favorite foods, and then just the food you eat more often than not so, you can at least plan on getting those every trip.
If you’re meal planning then you have your list of food and, the quantity you need; taking advantage of sales and reduced price items that go temporarily on sale is now going to be easy.
What you want to do is prioritize finding deals for the items where you usually spend the most amount of money, and eat most often.
IE. If you know you need 6lb of chicken every week for your lunches and it’s “Buy One Get One Free” you can load up this shopping trip for a few weeks worth of chicken and not need to purchase again as frequently.
Which me to my next point.
Make proper use of the freezer
Please use your freezer for more than just ice cream, ice cubes and that random bottle of vodka. If there is one thing I learned from my super saver mother it was, you can literally freeze just about anything. Everything from leftovers, an extra BOGO loaf of bread, fresh veggies, and even one time she froze a carton of milk(seriously). She might have gone over the top with a few items, but the goal was to keep food fresh, and ready to cook for as long as possible after buying it Freezing made that possible 10x over for a lot of items that would normally go bad quickly.
There are a lot of passionate debates choosing organic over non organic, and fresh vs frozen but, it all makes no difference if the food rots, or goes bad before you have made full use of it. If half of your fresh Organic Bananas go bad before you eat them, it really doesn’t matter if it was organic,and fresh when you bought it. What really matters is that you spent money to buy those bananas you eventually threw away. Now you have to buy more to essentially do the same thing when it takes you too long to finish them yet again. For a the next minute forget your stance on fresh vs. frozen because food waste is problem on you and your wallet first. You are probably throwing away or have more food just taking up space in your cabinets than you think, and if you’re not using it/throwing it away then it’s like throwing your money in the trash.
“Bulk Buy” Food with long shelf lives
When you buy things in bulk it means that you have a quantity you can use multiple times.
When you can get more quantity out of a purchase, and it won’t spoil before you eat it, the bulk purchase becomes a very cost effective option. This is especially true if you want higher quality, or specialty items which are usually priced at a premium and sold in smaller quantities. Let’s look at a staple food item that is generally eaten by everyone; White Rice. When dried and packaged well, it is shelf stable for a really long time. This means you can buy quite a a large amount all at once without the fear of your purchase being wasted because of the food rotting. Unless there is a ridiculous sale on rice at the grocers, it’s always going to be more cost effective buying it in large amounts. Just Look at the pricing on amazon or go to the grocery store and compare the quantity and price of the same products side by side.
36 lbs of Lundberg California White Jasmine Rice Organic= $147.08 (~$4/lb)
http://www.amazon.com/Lundberg-California-White-Jasmine-Organic/dp/B00A1CTS82/ref=sr_1_124_s_it?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1461598572&sr=1-124&keywords=rice
10lb Bag of Long Grain white rice= $10.28 (~$1/lb)
http://www.amazon.com/Carolina-Enriched-Extra-Long-Grain/dp/B0005ZUV3Q/ref=sr_1_11_s_it?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1461598267&sr=1-11&keywords=rice&refinements=p_36%3A698504011
14oz. of Uncle bens Boil in a bag Long Grain Rice=$9.71 (~$10/lb)
http://www.amazon.com/Uncle-Bens-Whole-Grain-Boil-/dp/B007WRLQ7K/ref=sr_1_2_s_it?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1461599653&sr=1-2&keywords=Uncle+Ben%27s+Boil+in+Bag+rice
If you know you are going to be cooking and eating the same foods (regardless of how you cook or prepare meals), why not buy it in bulk?
Closing thoughts for your food budget
You’re already cooking at least some of your meals, pilling up leftovers
Why not modify what you have been doing just a little bit and reap the benefits of saving a ton of money?
This is your money, and money that you can use for better things than spending it on a some crappy meals.
Remember, you don’t have to be on a fitness journey to start saving thousands of dollars doing some simple meal prep/planning.
If you read this and say you don’t have time to meal prep, or you need help with it then stay tuned.
Originally published at fitletes.com on May 4, 2016.