Why Does Eating Healthy Cost So Much?
- Jodi Trierweiler
- Apr 2, 2015
- 7 min read
I remember when I first started to really take my health seriously. I had just been diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome and knew that if I wanted to have a baby that I was going to have to make some serious changes. Over the coarse of about five years, I had been slowly trying to improve my health and my eating habits but it wasn't until the idea of never being able to have children that I really was determined to change it all. I read as much information as I could, carefully made my meal plan for the week and tried to make an appropriate budget for my groceries as I set off to the health foods store.
As soon as I walked in to my local food co-op I felt good, not only was I wanting to change, I was actively pursuing the means to actually change. However, about halfway through my grocery trip, my excitment started to turn into panic. I had only purchased half of my groceries and I had already exceeded my grocery budget. What was I going to do? Should I just stop right here and check out? Should I put stuff back? I already made my meal plan for the week, what if I accidentally put back something I need? I abruptly finished my shopping trip, trying to only get what I thought I needed and walked out to my car with my groceries. Quickly, my panic and disappointment turned into anger. It started to dawn on me "This isn't fair!! You mean to tell me that if I want to live on McDonald's, corndogs and canned ravioli than that's affordable, but if I wan't to live a healthy life and eat real food to give me a better quality of life, I have to pay twice as much?" I was angry, but my anger got me to thinking. It unraveled a web of lies and deception.
It began to dawn on me that there was a profound link between obesity and poverty. People who make less money can't afford to eat whole organic foods, so they drive on down to Wal-Mart where they can get an entire meal filled with junk for $3.00. Once, this set into my brain, I became even angrier, like I was living in some sort of cyclical trap. There has to be a way to make this work, I refuse to except that I can't afford to take care of myself and my husband, there has to be a way.
Well, it took a little over a year but I perfected a pretty reasonable way to eat healthy without going bankrupt. Now, our grocery bill is probably a little higher than some people's but as my favorite vegan chef, Christina Pirello says, "You either pay with your dollars now or you pay with your health later."
Weekly Grocery Budget: $130.00 - This includes not only food but everything else too. It includes toiletries like shampoo, razors, face wash, toothpaste and toilet paper but also includes cleaning supplies like dish soap, laundry soap, paper towel and garbage bags. This $130.00 is everything we need for one week to feed a family of two, this does not include anything for our pets as they have their own budget. This also does not include most of my suppliments, if I have the money I can buy some of them with my grocery budget but usually it comes out of seperate money.
Breaking it down by the numbers. I don't think that there is too much of a dollar difference for groceries between famalies of two or three. A family of four or five can eat well on a weekly budget of $150.00 - $170.00 while a family of six or seven can eat well on a weekly budget of $180.00 - $200.00. How is this possible you might ask? Well, it may take a shift in how you shop but it is a shift that is well worth it.
$130.00 per week gets our family 6 breakfasts, 7 lunches, 6 dinners and a moderate amount of snacks, as well as our weekly toilitries and cleaning supplies. I make one night mandetory leftover night and I do take leftovers for some of my lunches, but it honestly just depends on the week and the meals that I have planned. I also always go out for Sunday breakfast, so that's why there are only 6 bbreakfasts instead of 7.
Where to start. My helpful tips to you that work for me:
2. Prioritize. Have a list ready to go of what foods you have to buy organic and which foods you can buy conventional if you have too.
3. Shop around. Ethically, I try to buy as much of my food as I can from either local food co-ops or the farms themselves because I want to support my local economy. Sometimes I have to adjust my ethically views to what fits in my pocket book. I look through all of the flyers, factor in coupons and search online for good deals. I also plan a large part of my meal planning for the week around what is on sale and what I have coupons for.
4. Buy from those bulk bins. If you can find a grocery store that sells food from bulk bins than please take advantage of it! Everytime you buy a canister of black pepper or a box of rice, not only are you paying for that product, you are paying for the packaging too. By bringing your own containers in the grocery store and shopping from the bulk bins can save you a lot of money in the long run. Not to mention, you never know what you will find, at our co-op we have beans, rice, lentils, granola, candy, tea, herbs and more!
5. Buy in bulk. Buying in bulk is a huge factor in being able to shop within a reasonable budget, however it will require a shift in how you shop. The two biggest financial benefits of shopping at co-ops are that members usually recieve some sort of discount when they buy in bulk and when items go on sale, they aren't small discounts like a quarter or fifty cents, they are usually by $1.00, $2.00 or more! An example I like to use is with the breakfast cereal Q'ia. Qi'a is a super yummy, super healthy breakfast cereal. Unfortunately, it costs about $10.00 a bag which is a little too expensive for my blood. Well, one day I saw that it went on sale at my local co-op for about $6.50 a bag, so I decided to order a case. When I factored in the case discount plus the sale price, I actually saved over $3.50 per bag plus I now had a whole case of cereal in my pantry. Even if something is not on sale but you use it frequently, than buy a case, you are still saving. What really helped me was when I first started shopping this way, I actually saved up about $300 initially and over a month bought several items in bulk to have a stocked up pantry. This allowed me to create a sort of snowball effect in terms of buying in bulk. I always have certain staples like grains, beans, canned tomatoes and flours in my cupboard that I usually bought in bulk. This makes it easier on my wallet when it comes to week to week shopping since I know I can plan meals that incorporate these items. I usually reserve approximately 10-15% of my grocery budget for bulk purchases and if I don't find any good sales that week, it goes back into my savings in case I find too many good deals the following week.
6. Shopping in Season and shop local. If you want a strawberry in January, you better be prepared to pay for it. Buying local produce that is in season is always cheaper because it didn't have to travel halfway across the country to get to you. Plus, if you are lucky enough to have a city that hosts farner's markets in the summer, not only is it often times cheaper to buy your food from them, but it gives you an excellent chance to talk to your local farmers and growers. You can ask them all the tough questions about where your food is coming from and they usually give you the honest answers.
7. The more you make, the more you save.
The more time you have to make your food and snacks from scratch, the more money you will save. When you buy power bars, kale chips, frozen pizza, soup, etc., part of the expense is that you are paying someone to make these foods for you. A lot of times you would be surprised to learn that many of thes foods are pretty easy to make, plus you don't have to worry about hidden ingredients when you are the one making the food.
8. Grow a garden and learn how to can.
If you grow your own food from seed, it can save you lots of money. If you learn how to can your produce it can save you even more. Gardening and canning are not for everyone and that's fine but if you decide it's something you would like to try, it is definately worth the effort plus organic tomato seeds cost a lot less than an organic tomato.
Hopefully, this gives you some help and hope that it is possible to eat healthy without going broke. It's unfortunate that we have to pay so much to take care of ourselves and our famalies.
It really bums me out that we live in a world that supports business' who are essentially poisoning their consumers, while companies that are trying to provide their consumers with quality ingredients are being charged insane amounts to be organic and non gmo. One final thought I would like you to keep in mind is to ask yourself "Why is organic, all natural food so much more expensive?" Well, it's not the stores that sell it and it's not that the companies just really want to turn a profit, it's all about business insentives. Don't you ever wonder why companies like monsanto are able to hide their GMO's and toxic chemicals into our food and it's acceptable? You eat the posionous food, get sick, go into debt spending all this money on prescription drugs and never seem to get better. Control the food supply and you control the world, right?