I was talking with a checkout woman the other day while I was at the grocery store. One of the things she told me is that she can always spot someone who hasn’t eaten lunch or dinner. I thought she meant that the shopper would have some take out stuff from the deli counter. But no, she said the hungry shoppers always spend more.
Now, I have heard the old adage, “Never shop when you are hungry,” but I didn’t think that it really made much of an impact. My friend at the cash register said that she can tell that there is a dramatic difference. People who normally come in and shop for a half a cart of groceries with basic stuff in it, such as produce, milk, bread, meat and cereal, turn into to “power shoppers” with full carts of all of that plus lots and lots of junk food or easy to eat items. They forget their coupons and load up on convenience foods.
The psychology is very interesting.
So I tried an experiment over two shopping trips. On the first, we shopped at night, after dinner. We pretty much stuck to our list, with the exception of purchasing some items that we found in the clearance section (baby food and pasta), and two bunches of bananas that were a good price.
The next trip, two weeks later, we headed out hungry. It was serendipity. The kids were fed, but my husband didn’t want to take the time to eat. Sure enough, as we were shopping, I found all sorts of interesting things in the shopping cart, from prepackaged cakes to instant hot cereals that were not on the list. These things were grabbed off of the shelves as we passed through the aisles.
Now of course, this was a limited experiment, but it was enough to convince me that the old adage might be true. So, if you find yourself unable to grab something to eat before shopping, head over to the bakery counter and grab a free cookie or buy a roll to have before you do your shopping. It just might reduce your grocery bill.
Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, technology in the Computing Blog, and creating a home in the Home Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
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