Well, our food budget is soaring out of control since starting the GAPS diet. Especially in the introductory phases when you are limited to meat and veggies and are feeling ravenously hungry all the time due to carb cravings, you can go through organic groceries (and money) like crazy! I realized this month, as I overspent my budget by over a hundred dollars, that we couldn't keep this up.
So I went searching for another way. I looked at all the CSA's in my area, but most of them are just as expensive as the grocery stores, or even more. And you don't get to pick and choose what you get, which is no good on a restricted diet. The farmer's market in my area is exorbitant - they should be charged with extortion, seriously. And most of the farmers there aren't even organic. There has GOT to be another way to get discount produce, I thought. I mean, where do the grocery stores get it from? They must charge us 200% more than they pay for their produce, so where do they get it?
After a number of hours spent online, I finally found what I believe to be a viable option. I located a wholesale produce supplier in our area that sells to cash customers on the side. Jackpot! Not all wholesale produce warehouses stock organic produce, so you have to find one that does and that will sell to private customers. Our wholesaler happens to carry a large stock of organic produce items at about 50% less cost than in the local grocery store. Most items on the organic list cost $1.00-1.50/lb compared to $1.99-2.99/lb in the store.
BUT - you have to buy a truckload to get it! Not literally, thankfully. But most items do come in large quantities. 100 apples, 60 avocados, 8 pounds of strawberries, 10/4lb bags of navel oranges, 25lb of red beets, 20lb of broccoli crowns, 25lb of carrots, 30ct of celery, 1lb of mint leaves, 24ct lettuce heads, 5lb of mushrooms, 40lb onions, 4lb spinach, 35lb butternut squash, 15lb tomatoes, 10/5lb bags of potatoes, etc, etc.
Now in my mind I was picturing myself with a 60oz. glass of fresh juice the size of my head three times a day, and I was drooling. But, in reality, there is no way I could go through all that produce in time without it going bad, or even have the room to store it - unless I wanted to eat only beets for two weeks straight, then only avocados for the next two weeks, etc... Umm, no. So I set my energy to figuring out how to get my hands on all this yummy cheap produce - realistically. The answer: form a private mini "co-op." Get a few GAPS or paleo friends together, put together a list of what we want to split every couple weeks, pick it up and split it! Simple, right?
Yes, not too complicated, but it does take some time and thought to organize it. It will save me some of my grocery shopping, which saves some time. But it takes quite a bit of time to obtain the weekly price list, disperse it to friends, get the friends to give you their list of desired food, figure out what we can agree to split that week or two, and then compile the list, place the order, pick it up, transport it, split it into shares for each family, have them pick it up from you, receive their reimbursements, etc.
What the heck! Eating is my part-time job right now, I figure. And, if time is money, think of all the money I'm saving by spending an extra bit of time on this. Decreasing my produce budget by 50%! That's worth about $150 per month in my house right now. So if I spend about 3 extra hours on produce shopping every 2 weeks, about 6 hours per month, then I'm basically being paid $25/hr for my effort. Not bad, I say! If you have a large family, you will be saving even more. If your budget is twice ours for a family of 4-5, then you will be saving $50/hr for your time.
So let's talk logistics.
I've done it for a number of months now. I created a Google Group forum where my wholesale produce "co-op" communicates with each other about what we want to get and split. I posted the organic produce stock list online and I update it before each order so that my friends can look over it. I created an online spreadsheet where I keep track of what each person owes me for their portion of the order. I give my friends a deadline for their order, pick it up once per month, divvy it up, and they pick it up and pay me. We share gas costs for pick up based on what percentage of the order was ours (If I bought 60% of the order, then I pay 60% of the gas). I have been spending about $200-250 on produce once a month with this "co-op." Not bad. I try to keep our produce budget under $300 per month.
When I bring the food home once a month, I dedicate my afternoon to processing it. I max out our fridge, and then start cleaning, chopping, and freezing whatever will not fit. I make home-made applesauce or pearsauce and freeze it. I freeze ripe bananas for baking (or banana "ice cream"!) and pineapple spears for juicing. By the time I'm done, both our freezer and fridge are pretty stuffed. But I have been able to do this with just an average-size fridge.
We have certainly been able to eat a lot more veggies in general this way; and a LOT more avocados than we would have been been able to by shopping at Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and Costco. I still get occasional items from other stores if I want to use something that I don't want to buy in bulk.
The herd mentality works well for buying other bulk food items as well. Try it with organic raw almonds (Living Nutz); herbs, tea, and spices (Mountain Rose Herbs and Amazon); totally raw honey and bee pollen (Walt's Swarmbustin' Honey); and fermented cod liver oil (Green Pasture).
No comments:
Post a Comment