I’ve come to the end of my obsessive math experiment of Coupons vs. Frugal Shopping. Finally in November frugality had a win. I had planned on making a big stockpile trip to Aldi, but the month got away from me, so I used just about everything from my stockpile. When I totaled it all up. I was $30.00 less per week than in August. I also had 9 fewer shopping trips.

Since I wasn’t able to shop out of town I utilized my local discount shops. That has helped the grocery budget a lot.  A few of my favorites are Dollar General for milk, laundry supplies, and paper products. I’ve found bulk-buy paper towels, and toilet paper that are always at a great price. Family Dollar is the best place locally to stock up on tissues, trash bags,  and they always have great deals on cleaning products too.

I have tried my best to keep my trips very limited at Wal-Mart, this one is tough. They are the lowest locally when it comes to groceries, but the over-abundance of Christmas crowds has me making fewer outings out there. I try to avoid Wal-Mart on the weekends altogether, and I like to go when the oldest kids are at school.

I’m happy that my experiment has come to an end, it was fun, but my head hurts from the obsessive tracking. I’m going to take December off, and try to keep up with the frugal shopping, and making as much as possible from scratch.