Let’s Go Winco Shopping
by Katy on March 4, 2025 · 49 comments
I finally reached the point where I was out of/almost out of enough items that it was worth braving the grocery store. I’m trying my hardest to avoid corporate America during my continued economic boycott, which directs me to shop at Winco Foods. Not my closest grocery store by any means, but employee owned and mostly cheap.
I went with a grocery list and my only impulse purchases were the $1.28 artichokes and the Pringles, which were $1.98 per case on the clearance shelf. (Versus $17.99 at Safeway!) I’ve set them in the basement and will bring them out for picnics, road trips and such.
I wasn’t sure if I needed a full ten pounds of potatoes, but at $3.48/10-pound bag, it was a no brainer.
Of course I hit the bulk bins for a couple items!
Eggs were tricky, as Winco prices your first 18-count carton of eggs lower than subsequent eggs. I bought an 18-pack and two dozen as it’s really an issue of buy-them-while-you-can. (The smaller cartons were priced low for your first two.) I made a cake last night and used up our last three eggs.
In the end I spent $79.59, which is more than I’d normally spend, but the eggs, chicken and yogurt were budget busters. The chicken and yogurt are for my husband’s work lunches, which he’s quick to point out are cheaper than getting takeout, like many of his coworkers.
How do these prices compare to where you live?
Katy Wolk-Stanley
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”
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{ 49 comments… read them below or add one }
This post made me curious if there were any employee-owned grocery stores in my area, and there are! They’re about 20 minutes away, so I’ll go check them out at some point. Thanks for the inspiration. Their sale prices seem really good, so I’m looking forward to it.
I bought those same potatoes at WinCo this week. 10 lbs is a bit much for us so I thought I could make some steak fries for the freezer. Just peel, slice to size, blanch for 3 minutes. Cool quickly, dry them and freeze for future dinners. You want to dry the, before freezing so they don’t become a giant clump.
Thank you for the instructions on how to make steak fries for freezing for future meals. That is really helpful. We can barely make it through a 5 pounder of potatoes before they start going bad. I’m going to try this steak fry freezer prep soon.
I seem to be the only person I know who keeps potatoes in the fridge. And they last weeks (3+, easily). I remove all packaging and keep them in the fruit and veg drawer at the bottom of the fridge, with a towel under them. I buy 2.5kg bags (just over 5lbs), and I take my time eating my way through them.
I do this too. Our house is too warm to store potatoes and we don’t eat them that fast, so they go in the vegetable drawer in the fridge.
Growing up, my mom always stored them on the cellar stairs. Directly on the left when you opened the door, as I remember. I do the same and they keep a long time, usually about a month. It only works if you have a cellar! I know many don’t.
It would be no savings for me to bring home a case of Pringles because I would just plow through them. If I buy chips, I buy one small bag, as in single serving size, for each of us. I admire your restraint, but I finally realized I must practice restraint at the grocery store, since it apparently evaporates as soon as I walk in our front door.
I’m the same – chips are my kryptonite. If I know they’re in the house I can’t stop myself.
That’s why I immediately put them in the basement!
Out of sight, out of mind!
Kind of.
@Lindsey, you are so on my page about where restraint must be practiced! Chips or chocolate – I simply can’t eat just one! my munchie supply is sadly depleted these days, and I have taken to eating sliced up apples in desperation. Who knows, it might be carrot sticks and slices of pepper! the urge to munch is awful, but knowing myself and how temptations must not enter the house is helping with my slow weight loss…
Pringles are deadly – they just move from container to mouth in a never ending conveyer belt, no action required by my brain….
I had a stomachache last night from too many wasabi peas. As for chips, I just don’t buy them. They’re bad for me and I basically just inhale them. (As if wasabi peas are any better…)
I worked in the food industry as a lawyer and once met a guy called (you couldn’t make this up) Thornton Mustard.
https://www.foodmanufacture.co.uk/Article/2004/12/14/Senses-as-keen-as-Mustard/
He led the development of the Pringles flavours and said that the key was to develop a taste which explodes on the tongue, then disappears. So…you reach for another and another and…Basically, training-in addictive behaviours.
The genius of that idea is impressive but also chilling: we are manipulated by businesses even to overeat bloody Pringles! Another great reason to cook at home. Deny them the opportunity to manipulate.
Thornton also confirmed what I (a devout full-sugar Coca-Cola drinker) had often said: there are dozens of taste variants (he had developed many of them), for each product dependent on regional/country-specific taste preferences. By “product”, I mean lots of different Diet Cokes, Caffeine-free etc.)
I used to travel to the US annually on holiday and always bitched that the Coke wasn’t as “good”. Part of that was the use of glucose fructose syrup (I think that they have changed back to sugar now), but it wasn’t just that.
Same with the chips! singe serve bag, or i hide them in pantry if I buy a bigger bag!
Wow, that is one AMAZING Pringles deal, Katy!
There aren’t a lot of food store choices close to where I live. Still, I’m avoiding shopping at most of the major grocery store chains, and limiting my shopping to Costco, Aldi (both of which still support DEI) and a very small local grocery chain that’s known for its philanthropy and what it does for the community. That store’s a little higher priced than the national chain I used to shop at, but it’s worth it to me.
I bought eggs at Costco this past Thursday – $8.49 for two dozen cage free organic eggs. Not a bad price, especially since at Aldi they were $5.99 for one dozen (non-organic).
As far as potatoes, I’m not sure what the prices are around here because I haven’t bought any potatoes since the small local grocery chain I mentioned above had 5 pound bags of potatoes for 79 cents per bag a few months ago. And I bought a number of bags. Since we probably wouldn’t eat all those potatoes before they got squishy and weird, I stored some and with the rest I made several large batches of mashed potatoes which I froze in quart zip top bags for future use.
Vermont here. On Friday, I paid $12.99 for an 18-pack of generic large eggs at Shaw’s!! Sugar was $3.99 for one of those 4-lb bags. A bag of ground Green Man Coffee was $5.49 on sale. The cups of Chobani flavored yogurt was $.88 each, if you bought 12 (which I did–husband’s lunches). It is indeed painful.
Organic free range eggs cost $7.99 a dozen at my local supermarket. 5 pounds of organic yellow potatoes cost $7.99 as well. Food is our biggest expense.
I bought an 18 pack of eggs at Market Basket last week for $6.49. Milk is still $2.59 a gallon. I bought 5 lbs. of all purpose potatoes for $2.49. I’m so lucky to have a store in this family owned chain nearby. Their prices are consistently lower than other grocery stores in the area.
Glad to learn Aldi is still doing DEI and therefore OK to shop at! Thank you for letting us know!
I get milk either at Aldi or the “Park Lane” store brand at HEB bc a gallon is $3-ish as opposed to other brands at HEB (they have dozens!) or our drug/general store, where a regular gallon is $5-something and our Mill King organic milk (from an area dairy) is $6.41 a gallon. Many shoppers like the latter due to its being so healthy. It even has foam at the top. But $6.41? OMG!
Last week, someone bought 18 eggs from our store and IIRC, they were $9.99; I think the cartons of a dozen eggs have hit $8 now. So off to Aldi I go! Haven’t bought eggs in a while, though. Toast makes an OK breakfast for me.
Our store’s Blue Bell ice cream (the best on the planet! so fresh that they say “it was grass yesterday”!) is the lowest in town: a half gallon now sells for a penny under six bucks. Most other stores, even Aldi, charge 7-10 dollars for same. But I’m giving it up for Lent, and also bc I’ve been too indulgent and my waistline shows it.
For a long time, I’ve thought HEB is too high on their prices. So before this boycott thing, I’d shop either at Aldi or Walmart.
There’s also a ministry-operated small grocery store in a poorer neighborhood (a “food desert”) that I shop at from time to time in order to support their good works. This is not done to save money, but to help out the inner city mission/cause. (It helps people! Jimmy Carter would’ve loved this place; tRump would hate it!) Bonus: the mission has a greenhouse that grows some hydroponic organic veggies for the store.
https://fortune.com/2025/01/31/aldi-scrubbed-careers-website-of-all-dei-initiatives/
Well, darn. The last I’d read (and watched) online, Aldi was mentioned as one of the companies that kept its DEI practices. I checked this morning and am finding articles about them removing the mention of DEI from their website. Some posts say that Aldi still kept their DEI practices despite no longer mentioning them. Which, if true, I find sad. DEI is something to be proud of, not hidden.
Ah, heck, right now I don’t know how I feel about Aldi. I apologize for posting something that was incorrect but I had seen Aldi on “DEI friendly” lists just one day prior to my post. Thank you Brittany for this additional info.
Oops!
I stand corrected.
Guess I’ll be going to the mission’s grocery. And growing some veggies at home.
Ran a few errands today – gas 2.92/gal; red grapefruit for my husband 2.00 each; free can of spray paint at Ace hardware with a coupon. I have a 12 year old Volvo and wanted to get the salt off it. Most basic car wash was 11.00. I guess it’s been a while as last time I think it was $7.00. Our part of CT is served by Eversource for electricity. Feb. bill was $380.00! We don’t have electric heat. It’s mind boggling.
Katy, your prices are a bit better than mine in SE Tennessee. I’m still doing the multi-store juggling act to get the best prices. Had to hold my nose today and buy a few things at Walmart Market, but it’s only stuff I can’t get elsewhere.
Cage-free eggs were $7.99 a dozen last week. I did not dare look this week.
Eggs are still about $10/dozen here, which is less than a couple weeks ago. Fage yogurt is currently on sale for $7.69/32 ounces, 5% milkfat. (hey, I should get some.) Potatoes seem about $1/lb. Chicken, of which I only buy Bell & Evans or D’Artagnan (texture issues), seems to be about $11 for three boneless breasts, which is down a bit.
Pork roasts are on sale–I should pick one up. My mom made roast pork fairly often, with mashed potatoes and sauerkraut and usually green beans. Sauerkraut with pork gravy says comfort food to me. Barber Foods frozen stuffed chicken breasts are on sale, so I should get some. They’re expensiveish but they’re very easy and my kids like them, so that’s a simple dinner.
Katy,
Prices are higher here in north Florida. Onions are $1.69 a pound at Publix! I’ve started cutting them in half instead of using a whole onion in most recipes. Publix is even higher on produce prices than Whole Foods, so it’s time to shop around more. I’m headed to Aldi tomorrow to pick up some pantry staples. Also, sugar is really expensive, especially brown sugar. We don’t use a lot, so I hesitated to buy it at Costco. But I just bought sugar and King Arthur flour at Costco in bulk. I will figure out how to store it.
My biggest price surprise today was a routine dental cleaning and X-rays that totaled $323. And that was with a senior discount. Yikes!
Gael – Fla Gulf Coast here, and I never buy produce at Publix unless its a good sale! They are SO expensive! I get most of my groceries at Aldi & Trader Joes — only go to Publix for good BOGO’s or loss leaders.
Eggs were 5.62/doz at Aldi this week, and over $7 at Publix – so I didn’t get any.
Hi Cheryl,
We have been using Publix less and less and like you, go straight for the BOGOs. I agree that Publix is crazy expensive now. We always start our shopping at Costco and have a CSA bag for produce. We buy some produce at Whole Foods occasionally when we pick up our CSA bag there, because the price of some produce is good, and they purchase from local farmers we know. I’d love to use Trader Joe’s more, but their parking lot is dangerous! Thanks for the comparison of Publix and Aldi’s. Aldi’s is a long drive, but I’m hoping to go there more often.
I also shopped at Winco today. I had to take my car to the DEQ, so I added a couple stops between my house and the DEQ, so I can feel more efficient.
I’m pretty sure we don’t shop at the same Winco since I never see the fabulous clearance prices you seem to find! There’s a clearance rack, but things are *maybe* 20-30% off, and it’s usually lame items, like “ham glaze”.
OK. I’m lying, one time, there were Halloween costumes for pets, and I spent ten cents on a cowboy costume for my cat. It was well worth the price (and the cat loved it)!
I’m in the Bay Area of California. Looking at your list, the only things I’ve bought recently are rolled oats for .79/lb (10 lb bag for $7.99 at Costco) and diced tomatoes for .99/can at grocery outlet. I buy organic produce so can’t compare easily on those produce prices.
I’ve been shopping at Costco and Sprouts and get my weekly produce box delivered. Occasionally I do need to get something at Safeway but trying to make that the exception.
Lisa, I’ve been trying to figure out a good produce box delivery for 2 people in the East Bay versus the weekly farmer’s market near us. We have lived here 2 years but still trying to find the best sources outside of Grocery Outlet and Trader Joe’s with Safeway and our little neighborhood market for a few things. Oddly, I’ve been able to get some good one off deals on things like sugar and soup at CVS using coupons and sales. Haven’t joined Costco yet but May.
I’ve never tried any other one so can’t compare but we’ve been happy with Farm Fresh to You. You can customize it a bit (within season, I can’t add stone fruit or melons right now, as an example). Also, as an added bonus they do school fundraisers so the school gets money for each box I order.
I also feel like I’m piecing things together for where I shop!
Thanks! I’ll look into them.
Katy-For the oats, do you ever make the Kristen the Frugal Gal’s “No Stir Granola”? I make it every week and my family gobbles it up. I also make Katy’s Tea Towel Dressing every week…but 70 cents a pound for oats is incredible. I seriously would have bought 40 lbs.
Why are eggs so expensive in the USA currently?
We pay around 4€ for 10 farm fresh eggs from our local vendor.
Bird flu spread from wild birds to commercial egg farms. The hens have to be destroyed. So egg farming in the US has taken a huge hit. Plus certain unscrupulous grocery chains hiked the price on a scarce product. So it’s a combination of natural disaster meets corporate greed.
And even if current government attention to the problem is successful, it still takes six months to rebuild the flocks. No instant solutions.
Can’t begin to compare food prices with you folk – although your black beans, Katy, are considerably cheaper than what we pay here (I think it is probably closer to $4/lb as we buy by the 100 grams and I think I remember paying about 70 cents per 100 grams and thinking it was a steal, a few weeks ago.
.
Katy, I wanted to thank you for the hydrangea pruning reminder, yesterday – it got me out in my raincoat and Tilley hat, in a light drizzle – and all of mine are nicely pruned too! I wanted to remind you that if you actually PRUNE as in cut branches way back, to shape or clean up the shrub, you can push the cuttings into a pot of soil and a number of them will sprout. just ensure you have a set of leaf buds above the soil, and at least one leaf node under the soil (you can pull off the buds before you push the stick into the dirt.) Keep the pot watered and the sticks that thrive will have sent out roots. I put about 2 dozen clippings into a largish pot, and will keep it watered. don’t transplant too soon, but do fertilize once you see some solid growth.
Those artichokes look amazing. We got chickens last spring and I am so glad.
I’m Canadian. Our food prices are generally higher than yours. But right now eggs are cheaper here (I can get 30 eggs for about 11$ at Costco right now, which comes to about 7,60$ USD). Curious (might not be the right word, but…) to see how Trump Tariffs will affect our grocery prices…
I’ve been doing grocery store avoidance as well. I have been purchasing things we need to fill in gaps in recipes etc. This weekend I spent about $40 at Aldi and we cooked at home on Sunday and Monday and now have left overs.
My boyfriend however is completely unchecked at the grocery store…I looked over a receipt from Monday when he went to the store by himself to buy mushrooms. He managed to spend $130 including bogo $25.99 EVO….we spend a lot of time together, but have separate households and separate banking etc. I don’t count this as part of my budget but in the future might. It will be interesting.
Eggs are hovering just under $6 a dozen in SWFL.
I bought chicken thighs for the first time ever for half off at Aldi. They were huge. Not my favorite cut, but such a good price.
My goal is to make us eat the food and snacks we have in the house for a while and eat down those items. It doesn’t feel fun, but I hope there are some financial rewards.
I bought milk, half and half and eggs at a local farm. The eggs were cheaper than grocery store eggs and the milk was more expensive but I like supporting this farm and the quality is worth it. I also bought a jar of jam while I was there, which I am going to use to make oatmeal jam bars for a friend’s birthday. If you bring the jam jar back, you get a $1 off your next purchase.
Nice haul! I’m in the Dallas/Fort Worth area of North Texas, I mostly shop at Kroger. Milk is $2.69 per gallon, Fage is $6.49, avocados are pretty cheap in Texas, usually less than a dollar. Potatoes are a comparable price, but the potatoes at my local grocery stores have not been good lately, they’re all spotty and look old.
Forgot to add, eggs are $5.49 a dozen for the large store brand at Kroger. Tom Thumb had some oddball brands they don’t usually carry marked down to $2.50 last week that were close to their sell by date, so I got those instead.
I’ve never even seen a winco. I have noticed Walmart parking lots full and their drive in pick up packed. With grocery and gas prices climbing they are probably going to see record sales with people just trying to feed their families. Protests are really only for those who can afford to do so.
A dozen large free range eggs (not organic) in England are $4.10 from a large supermarket chain. Medium are $3.51.
Luckily I have chickens and am able to provide eggs to family and barter a few.
Even though I am a singleton I buy 10# of potatoes if they are a good price and it seems they run about what Katy spent. I share with family and make/freeze mashed potatoes in my silicone muffin cups. We also use baked potatoes as a “base” for whatever toppings and it makes a meal.
My shopping choices have shrunk because of the politics of some locally owned stores.
I would love to have the option to buy oats in bulk, that is an excellent price.
Milk is about 2.50 per gallon here but I only use it to cook with and make my own yogurt. Milk just kills my stomach.
This time of year I buy a lot of salad stuff, when the garden comes in I eat homegrown greens….hurry summer.
I don’t like chips, so I only buy them for family cook outs/gatherings. But give me sliced veggies and I can really clean up on them LOL I probably would have bought them like Katy and shared with family.
JC
I’m down for no spend March, absolutely! I don’t shop much anyway, but it’s good to be mindful. I have some lofty financial goals this year and would like to cut back my off farm work hours. I’ll do 60 hours this week and 48 the following week. I want this farm loan paid down asap.
It’s cold and very windy today. C’mon spring, I’m so ready 🙂
Our local options are limited to Dolloar general and a small, local chain grocery store (expensive). I’ll use the local.option for quick stops. My stock up options are (longer drive) dented veg store, Aldis, and Walmart. I start with the dented veg store and then round out the trip with Aldis.
I grow our meat, while DH gardens. He’s adding potatoes and carrots this year. The seed tators will come from the local farmers’ coop. We’ll start the cole crops and tomatoes soon . They won’t be set out until at least april 15. We are saving milk jugs to set our plants under. I really wish we could.find a good local dairy. The fruit trees are too small to bear yet. Our son’schore is to feed the hens. They laid 4 eggs today (100%, nice job ladies). We share the excess.