Grocery Shopping in an Era of Insanity — How Are *Your* Grocery Prices?
by Katy on February 1, 2025 · 32 comments
Today was the last day to redeem a $10-off-$50 Winco Foods coupon and there was no way in hell I was going to let it go to waste. (This unicorn of a coupon came randomly in the mail — rare, special and unlikely to ever be seen again.) My day was busy with preparing for a houseguest and attending to various family member issues, but again . . . using this coupon stayed at the top of my to-do list!
For those not in the Pacific Northwest, Winco is an employee owned no-frills grocery store with an extensive bulk food section and except for loss leaders, knocks the socks off their corporate grocery rivals. Even Aldi, in my opinion.
I didn’t choose my groceries based on looming tariffs, instead I stuck to my list and added a few extra items based on sale prices and whimsy. Were the Andes mints a necessity? No, but my sister is flying into town tonight and I go over the top as a hostess, which includes a daily mint on the pillow.
Here’s everything laid out, minus a case of canned cat food which I bought to ensure that I’d be spending the requisite fifty bucks, but also because the Winco website had a $3-off ecoupon. (Turns out I didn’t need to buy the cat food to hit $50, but I’m still happy to have it on hand.) I bought an extra bag of tater tots, as they were on sale and I cook them in the waffle iron to add to burritos, which I highly recommend.
Hello, kitty!
My total was just (ha!) $73.83, which still feels expensive, although I did buy a few pricier items like the chicken thighs and two boxes of Tetley tea.
This blog post is far from a “Wow, look at the amazing deals I got at the grocery store!” and more of a “Hey, these are the food prices in Portland, Oregon.” I’m curious how food prices are in your region, especially if you live outside the United States.
Please share your thoughts on grocery prices in the comments section below.
P.S. Winco doesn’t accept credit cards and I couldn’t for the life of me remember my PIN, so I wrote an ye ole timey paper check to pay for my groceries!
Katy Wolk-Stanley
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”
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{ 32 comments… read them below or add one }
These prices are similar to our large regional grocery store HEB in Texas. I live outside of Austin and looking over the receipt the prices are similar! Which makes me feel a little better since Winco is no frills and HEB can actually be over the top if you buy tons of prepared foods etc.
HEB used to be my favorite store, but IMO their prices have gone up too much. I get most of my items from Aldi. I also buy loss leaders from the drug store where I work, since their Blue Bell Ice Cream is the lowest price in town; however, just yesterday, the price of a half-gallon went up by a dime and the price of a dozen Blue Bell “Dixie cups” went up by over a dollar. But a case of off-brand bottled water went down by 40 cents a couple of months ago, so it’s now $2.29 for 24 bottles. (I usually use tap water, but once a year the city pumps huge amounts of chlorine into the water so it reeks of bleach, and for that month I rely on sources other than my faucet. ) We’ve gotten in some cases (boxes) of 24 cans of Dr Pepper products for $9.97, so I got those. (Much cheaper than the teacher’s lounge vending machines, where it’s a dollar for one can!) I also bought a big 20 ounce (1 pound 4 ounces) box of “Mom’s Best Cereals” brand “Honey Nut Toasty O’s” cereal from the health food section for $5.55, less than I’d pay for Cheerios Honey Oats. Tastes the same. Yesterday, I went to a couple of outlet stores (Ollie’s, and Big Lots, which is closing) and got some food items there. Including $3.79 for a 16.7 oz. box of pumpkin spice flavored Kellogg’s Special K at Ollie’s. (I didn’t see any of Aldi’s pumpkin spice cereal this fall, and missed it!) One of my favorite Aldi buys lately is their calzones for $2 and change; I can heat these up in the microwave for 1 min. and have a very filling lunch. I also shop Walmart for groceries, and I think their “Sinfully Sweet” tomatoes are almost as delicious as homegrown ones. So that’s where I buy tomatoes when the growing season is over. But my money goes a lot farther at most other stores than HEB, so I find myself going to HEB less and less.
The prices you paid at Winco are comparable to the prices at my small-town Walmart, which is north of me. If I drive south to the college-town Walmart, prices are marked up 8%-10% higher than what you paid. I haven’t been shopping at Aldi in a hot minute- I often take advantage of shopping online with Walmart and picking up my groceries. I spend a lot less if I don’t have an opportunity to walk around the store and impulse buy. I make a meal plan and stick to it as close as I can. For two, we spend about $75 on groceries every week. When I lived alone, I spent about $40 on groceries every week.
Prices in Ireland are also still high in comparison to pre-pandemic prices. It’s hard to compare as it’s not like for like but here are the items from my last receipt from Lidl:
Conference pears 1kg. 1.49 Euro (on special offer, normally 2.59 Euro)
Organic chickpeas tin 0.75 Euro
Black beans tin 0.85 Euro
Irish Vintage cheddar (250 g) 2.29 Euro
carved topside beef 2.69 Euro
mini chicken fillets 1.99 Euro
Gouda, 12 slices 2.85 Euro
Emmental, 12 slices 2.85 Euro
Roasted hazelnuts 3.49 Euro
Lidl own brand toothpaste 1.59 Euro
White bagels 5 pack 1.45 Euro
Bananas (6 pack) 1.79 Euro
Greek style yogurt 1.69 Euro
bag of organic spinach 1.59 Euro
bag of baby leaf salad 1.49 Euro
Mixed peppers (3) 1.89 Euro
Italian blend ground coffee 227g. 1.99 Euro
Whole milk (1 litre) 1.15 Euro
Basmati rice 1kg 1.49 Euro
strawberries 250g 2.69 Euro
6 free range eggs 1.95 Euro
Thanks. Given that Euros and dollars are almost even right now, it’s easy to see you’re doing pretty well with those prices.
Thanks, Rose. When I read GK’s list, I was unsure how the Euro compared to the US dollar, but was too lazy to look it up. heh.
Here are current prices at my local supermarket:
Eggs $11.39 doz
Gal milk $5.49
Chuck stew meat $6.99 lb
Rub eye roast $21.99 lb
Rotel $3.79 each
Progresso soups $4.79 each
Stouffer’s French bread pizza, frozen, usually $5.49, special $3.99
Groceries are cheaper if I drive about 40 minutes, but given gas is currently
$5.22 gallon here, I don’t know how much savings there is. I sometimes Instacart that store, but then prices are higher and you have to tip etc.
That is insane for a dozen eggs. What state are you in? I keep hearing high prices but my family in CT, MD and MA have eggs about the same as me.
Marybeth, the Hamptons. Enough said. My son paid 17 and change for 1.5 dozen this week and they’re almost all gone. I really like and eat a lot of eggs.
Lis, we don’t really have branded milk here. Some kind of state law. Milk is milk, and I always buy whole milk.
OMG! I buy milk from Aldi or Walmart or get the Park Lane (lowest priced off brand) from HEB, so it’s always about $2 and change for a gallon jug. Our drug store sells organic milk for $6.61 a gallon and plain old ordinary milk for about what you pay, so I don’t buy it there; a lot of HEB milk brands are also in the neighborhood of 4 or 5 bucks. Always look at the price of each brand bc they vary a lot, even at Walmart. But I get the lowest-priced (non-artificial growth hormone) milk I can find — why pay more for a fancy name brand?
Holy cats, Rose! I don’t want to make you jealous, but my local Kroger has a sale price of $3.99/18-pack of eggs this week. Heck YEAH I got some. And gas is $2.17/gallon right now. Of course, Ohio doesn’t have gorgeous beaches right outside one’s doorstep, so there’s that. 🙂
Here’s how you get around “no credit cards” at WinCo. Buy a gift card online using a credit card and keep reloading it. If you don’t want to wait for a gift card to arrive in the mail, purchase one for a small amount at the store and reload it online using your credit card. I’ve been using the same gift card for at least two years!
Across the board, Katy’s WinCo prices are somewhat lower than mine here in Central NY (considering only my usual grocery stores–Wegmans, Price Chopper, occasionally Tops when I take NDN shopping, and occasionally Aldi). But here are a few of my pro tips:
(1) Meat: I’m still getting a screaming deal on beef from my friends who raise the steers. And apart from the rare grocery store special (I’m thinking that the days of chicken drumsticks for 99 cents/lb. may be coming to an end, given bird flu), I buy meat Reduced for Quick Sale whenever I can find it. Thank goodness for an upright freezer.
(2) And I make full use of my discount stores: Ollie’s and the discount grocery outlet I shop at whenever I can get to that part of town. (As a single person, I’ve found that warehouse clubs no longer work for me. Our one and only Costco here, for example, is at the other end of the county, and I no longer need to buy most things in warehouse-club-size bundles anyway. On the rare occasions when I do need something from Costco, I put in a request with neighbors who do have a membership.)
(3) And as no one here needs to be told, I try not to buy anything I don’t really need. Since most of my grocery runs these days also involve shopping for NDN, this forces me to keep my own list to the essentials.
I wonder how much Ollies varies across the country. The one I visited had canned goods, candy, and shampoo prices comparable to generics or sales at my supermarket, 40 miles away. I had not been there before, so had no coupons or membership. The overflowing atmosphere did not entice me to stay, with most of it being “stuff” rather than food. It’s been a few years; if I am near, I may look again.
Our grocery prices are high. Even though it us usually just the two of us I do some shopping around. I use Aldi for a lot of our produce, I shop Giant for sale items/loss leaders (which there seem to be a lot less of these days). I buy some items at Costco, I go there about once a month. I occasionally go to Grocery Outlet and Sam’s Club. Other than Costco all those stores are within 1-1/2 miles of our home and I try to combine errands.
I don’t think prices are going to come down, there are too many factors that are adding to inflation.
I went shopping at our WinCo yesterday (in Bellingham, WA). Interesting to see the price differences on some of the items shared on our list:
Milk: $3.19
Juanita’s chips: $2.98 (same)
WinCo diced tomatoes: $0.98
Avocado, medium: $0.78
Popeye’s spinach: $2.99
Cosmic crisp apples: $0.98 (same)
Apparently we pay more for milk and spinach, but save on avocados and canned tomatoes!
I received one of those unicorn coupons in the mail a few years ago. There’s been no sighting since then. (I want one!!)
I’m in Portland, so you know how much my groceries cost. I’m having good luck with clearance items at Freddie’s. For example, yesterday I bought four cooked chicken leg quarters for $2.50, and this will be part of “soft taco night” and “burrito bar night” and the bones will become stock for soup. If I see marked down ground beef, I get it and put it in the freezer. I’m also having good luck with “scratch and dent” produce and almost never pay full price for mushrooms, peppers, or mandarin oranges. The peppers freeze well. I try to find clearance milk for my homemade yogurt. I went to a health food store and bought a good yogurt culture, so I use the previous batch to make a new batch, and this is saving me lots of money (and I’m not cluttering the landfill with little plastic containers).
I continue to get eggs at Trader Joe’s, but yesterday, my Trader Joe’s was completely wiped out of eggs. There was a sad, empty cooler.
I find that processed foods seem to have gone up in price the most, so I’m buying fewer of them, and this is probably a good thing for my health!
Another observation about the cost of groceries in Portland:
I recently went to a Winco on the far east side of town and they had a big accordion gate pulled across the exit to the self check area. When you show your receipt, and employee will pull the gate aside so you can exit. I think people might be getting desperate enough to steal the groceries?
I’m in England – London. I’ve just done some online comparisons. We’re more expensive on some, cheaper on others. The biggest difference was cat food – way cheaper here. 40 tins for £12.50. Allowing for Katy’s box being 36 tins and the conversion of £:$, ours was $8.70 for 36. Wowser.
Li: I had a similar experience a few weeks ago. One of our national supermarket chains, Sainsbury’s, where I live doesn’t do any checking but I went to Birmingham (UK’s second city). They had closed gates and were checking receipts very carefully before releasing the gates. Desperately sad.
dunno if you saw this but interesting. The Guardian has covered it a lot.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/jan/30/some-steal-to-order-on-the-frontline-of-uk-shoplifting-epidemic
I must say, though, there’s been a lot of boo hooing here in the US about baby formula being shoplifted, and when I explain that in certain segments of society, baby formula is a form of currency, people look at me like I’m Trump. (BTW Tide detergent is another kind of scrip often shoplifted.) I mean, I am sure there are some Jean Valjeans out there stealing bread for starving children, but stealing £77 of vapes is not exactly the same thing.
Eggs in the regular grocery store are $6.99, at the city drugstore they are $10.99. I got the max of 2 cartons at Aldis for $3.99 each. I keep giving my hens pep talks but still no winter eggs yet.
I stopped at Aldi on the way home from work yesterday. I only needed a few things. Overall, Aldi is the cheapest store near me. I shop at Stop & Shop and Shoprite too because loss leaders and coupons make some of their items cheaper. I don’t care about brand names. I always look for the discount stickers at Aldi. Yesterday there were $2 off stickers on Artisan flatbreads which made them less than $2 a pack. They are great for quick pizzas. I grabbed 3 packs, 1 for now, 1 for the freezer and 1 for my son. Large packs of chicken legs had 50% off stickers. I got 3. It came to 49¢ a pound. I threw 2 packs in the crockpot overnight.The other one went into the chest freezer. I am going to make Matzo ball soup with some. Some got put in the freezer for easy tacos, and some will be made into dog food.
Eggs were $3.99 a dozen at Aldi. I got 2 dozen last week when they were $3.29 so I am good. Bananas were 42¢a pound. OJ was $2.65. Mayo was $3.09. Vegan cheese was $2.99 for 12 oz.
I try to only buy groceries when they are on sale. I have a good size pantry and an extra chest freezer. It helps to keep our budget lower. I do buy for our kids when things are on sale.
I also had a $3 store coupon for pet food today. Love those.
Your prices are very similar to mine in SE Tennessee. Your tea is a screaming deal: I have been buying it for more than that at the Ollie’s Outlet clearance store.
Today I managed to stack some coupons with sales and spent $86 on people food and $51 on pet food.
I shopped Aldi
Baby Carrots 1.29
3 pack Multi color peppers 2.39
Hummus mini cups 4.29 (the 10 oz tub is cheaper but I was being frivolous)
32 oz Greek plain yogurt 3.75( I’m trying this to compare to Fage and I like it as much)
I wanted an orange but at Aldi’s you have to buy a bag of oranges so I’ll get an orange another place another time. And I forgot to get bananas.
The other day I shopped at a little store in Arkansas that always has good deals
2 lbs deli spicy pineapple ham 3.94
2 lb Granny Smith apples 1.47
Large bag tortilla chips 1.77
Southwest salad mix kit 1.57
10 oz grape tomatoes 99 cents
Last night at dinner with peeps I had a large plate of beans and rice, there were chips and salsa at the table. Looking at this I realize my preferred eating is pretty cheap. Im not trying to be frugal right now but I also can’t pass up a good deal (nature/nurture?)I love beans. Fish sticks and chicken nuggets are my fancy foods.
We just moved back from West Africa. If I bought from the local market and boutiques, I could keep our food bills pretty low. If I shopped at the grocery stores with imported goods it was expensive.
Now back in the US, I’m spending about $700 on food groceries (not Tp or Toiletries) and $100 on eating out a month. We’re a family of 4, 2 of which are teens.
This seems high to me, but I’m not sure where to cut, especially because I want to eat healthy.
I shop at our local store, especially getting sale items, a bargain discount store with excellent prices and occasionally at Wal-Mart.
I do most of our food from scratch and am growing some herbs. Hoping to have more gardening in the future.
This post is timely for me. Yesterday, 1/31/25, on my day off I went to three different stores and observed butter and egg prices and shared them elsewhere online. I live in SWFL.
1lb Store Brand Butter and Land O Lakes
Aldi
Store Brand $3.79
Land O Lakes N/A
Target
Store Brand $3.99
Land O Lakes $5.79
Walmart
Store Brand $3.96
Land O Lakes $5.28
12 Count Eggs
Target 34.9 cents an egg
Walmart 37.3 cents an egg
Aldi 38.9 cents an egg
To offset the rising cost of groceries I try to buy things on clearance, sale, bogo, promotion, and with coupons. I also use Shopkick, ibotta, and Fetch to get some money back for my groceries. It’s a lot of work, and I still spend a lot of money. I have a hollow legged teen. He eats about three times what I eat. I also have a significant other who does not live with me, but is over a lot. I would describe him as a good eater…
Grocery shopping is challenging right now if you have any type of budget, but I persist.
I can’t really compare prices because we almost exclusively buy organic produce and hormone-free chicken/meat/eggs. We also have to work around severe food allergies and those products are much more expensive. I’m willing to spend more on groceries, though, because we spend so little in other areas. I also dropped some money on two large cases of rice pasta. In this case, it was pre-tariff stockpiling. The ONLY pasta one of my kids can safely eat is made in Canada. It’s definitely more expensive than being able to buy loss-leader wheat pasta, but that’s life with food allergies. I have almost enough for a year in the pantry now. I’m actually less concerned about a price hike on this product than I am that, after getting hit by the tariff, the company will decide it’s not worth it to export to the US. #fourlettercursesgrumblegrumble
If there are other folks here who buy organic, I’d be interested to see how much they’re spending.
I used a $5 off $25 Dollar General to buy 30
Lbs of Purina Dog food for $22.75 regular price and $11.75 for 9 lives cat food for 13 lbs. I live in a food desert again, so the nearest grocery store ( Walmart) is 20 miles away. DG comes in handy since up the street from my house. Their diced Del Monte tomatoes are $1 a can this week, looks like same size you have.
12 lbs cat food
Del Monte canned diced classic tomatoes were $1 a can for 14.5 ounces. Clover Valley, the in house DG brand the same size, were the same price also. I think the Del Monte were actually on a special.
You can also get canned polar tuna at DG at $1 a can for 5 oz. 16 oz Clover Valley pasta is $1 a box. I think both these prices are regular prices.