How To Save Money, and still lose weight
Certainly today we all need to find ways to save money. With things the way they are it seems like there is “More Month than Money” as my dad use to say. What he was saying was, that towards the end of the month the money had already ran out and there was still more of the month left before he received another check. There are certainly financial advisors, which seem to have all the answers! I am not a financial advisor, so the items and or suggestions that we are sharing with you is what we have personally observed. We are the standard small business owners, who struggle with all the same issues as most of the small business owners, and individuals face every day. MORE MONTH THAN MONEY Suggestion 1 : Apply the same technique that we used in the previous section, Think about all the places where you are spending money for the food you eat and the drinks you drink. Keep a written record for one week,( use the one provided in the appendix How To Save Money, and still lose weight ), Record your observations for a typical week . You will probably be as shocked as we were as to how much money we were actually spending on food and drinks. Now it is very obvious that we cannot eliminate these expenses all together, We have to have food and drink to live. My dad used to tell us children that he “once had a Puppy, and he trained the puppy not to eat, and just about the time he had the puppy trained, the puppy died” A bit humorous. But the point is, we cannot eliminate the total cost for food and drink. Our primary purpose was to lose weight, however we also realized that as a result of losing weight we also started to save money on the food we ate, and the drinks that we were drinking. What an added bonus this was. It was as if we were being rewarded for losing weight. Suggestion 2: After you record all the areas where you spend money for food and drinks ( do this for 7 days), Record everything that you spend money on for food and Drinks. You will probably begin to spot a trend after two or three days, and you might have enough data to support a decision , about areas you can eliminate to save you money. An example of this for us: I would stop and buy some donuts, and a large cup of Latté, (about $4.50) on my way to the office. Another morning I would stop and buy a large Breakfast Taco with a large cup of Cappuccino coffee, (about $3.95). If you stop to think about it , this routine was costing me about $20.00 dollars a week, not counting the calories it added to my diet!! Another example : I found out from my actual observations, is that I would drink one or two sodas a day. Sodas can cost as much as $1 from a vending machine, or $0.85 from a convenient store. This added up to about $10 a week. I hope you get the picture. Use the food and drink spending record in the appendix, How To Save Money, and still lose weight to record all of yours and yours family’s expenditures for a week or 3 days to give you a picture of what the cost is for your food and drinks are. The above two examples saved us about $30 a week or $120 a month, for one person. It was twice this amount for my wife and myself. Just this saving alone almost completely paid for our fuel cost for the cars. And if we paid for the fuel using our debit card, and not a credit card then, we did not need to worry about having to come up with more money at the end of the month to send to the credit card company. As an added bonus by reducing this expense, it contributed to our weight loss. The extra calories in the Donuts, Breakfast Tacos, Lattés Cappuccinos, and sodas added up to approximately 1000 to 2000 extra calories a day. We actually saved enough money in a month to make a sizeable contribution to other areas where we are trying to improve our financial situation
WOW what a difference that might make in your life also. Suggestion 3: We ate out for lunch every day and had some sort of fast food for dinner. It was obvious that when we started to Grill, Smoke and Cook all of the meats ahead of time and placed them in individual containers, to take with us for lunch we did not have to spend the money for lunch. We aren’t picky eaters, nor did we have to go to the best restraunts for lunch . But for two people to go out for lunch, we would spend an average of $17 to $21 a day so in the course of 5 working days that came out to approximately $85 to $105 per week for lunch. The cost was approximately $400 A Month, and the calorie intakes for these lunches were astronomical. I would venture to guess about 1800 for the food and another 100 for the sugar drinks. This translates to about 9500 calories a week or 38,000 calories a month. WOW doing some simple math again that was an additional 10 pounds being added to our weight every month, and cost over $400 dollars. BUT WAIT THEIR IS MORE!!!!!!
Suggestion 4: Make a list of only the items you will need to purchase at the Grocery store. A list serves two purposes:
You know I am not telling you anything that you do not already know, YOU will begin to feel real good about yourself. If you follow our suggestions your friends and family will ask you “what are you doing to lose that weight” They will not know about the money you are saving. I cannot encourage you enough to keep going about this routine; the benefits are worth all your efforts. Suggestion 5: Please look around your town, city or neighborhood, for a Fruit and Vegetable Stand. These small business establishments have the best prices and most of the times the freshest fruits and vegetables. We are very lucky to live in the area of United States where we enjoy fresh vegetables and fruits almost all year long. But what we have here in Deep South Texas is available through the rest of the Country, they might just cost a little more. Also look for a FARMERS MARKET in or around your area. They usually flourish during the summer months, more, than in the winter months. However they are wonderful places to purchase their items at a huge savings over the supermarket prices. The quality of their products is superb and, as added bonus, besides saving you money, is the flavor that fresh fruits and vegetables have.
We will discuss this flavor enhancement later (Eating Foods That Taste Good).
Suggestion 6: While you are shopping for the items only on your list, if however you find some of the items are on sale or are specials, then you may want to pick up additional quanties of the item. An example is: at times during the summer, around the 4 of JULY the stores run specials on items associated with outdoor grilling. One of these specials is for Briskets, I like to pick up maybe one or two additional ones, if I have room in the freezer.
Suggestion 7: Do not forget to look for coupons, Coupons can be a source of saving you some money. But remember to use the coupons for only the items on your pre-prepared list. CONCLUSION: The above suggestions can save you money, and if you also have other suggestions please e-mail us at the address found in the contact list. We would be glad to share your savings along to others that is in the same BOAT so to speak as we are in, and JOIN our Group and receive our free newsletter.
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