First of all, let's look at home food costs for the United States.
Click on: www.cnpp.usda.gov/USDAFoodPlansCostofFood.htm
Then, click on Official USDA Food Plans: Cost of Food at Home at Four Levels, U.S. Average.
Always bring a calculator.
Use it to calculate price per unit. For example, price per ounce, price per pound, price per individual piece, or price per serving. This will be particularly helpful when you are looking at similar items of different sizes or to compare different brands which are packaged slightly differently.
Only buy things off your shopping list
Resist impulse buys. It's a good idea to have a master shopping list of things you regularly buy. You can create it on your computer so that it's easy to modify. Print it up and hang on your refrigerator. When you run out of something, circle it on the list. This will help prevent problems with forgetting to buy certain things and will decrease those extra trips to the supermarket.
Always buy the item with minimal packaging.
You pay a lot extra for the individual packaging! Compare a large box of raisins to a bag of lunch sized raisin boxes. It's much more economical to buy the large box and separate it into smaller amounts yourself if you're packing it for lunch or travel. Additionally, you will produce much less garbage if you don't buy individually packaged items.
Cook from Scratch.
Cooking things yourself is almost always going to be a fraction of the price you would pay for prepackaged food. The only probable exception to this rule would be if you bought something on sale and used double coupons.
Decrease the amount of meat, poultry, and fish you buy.
Buy less meat. Designate a certain number of vegetarian meals and use meat as an ingredient instead of a main course.
Buy seaonal produce only.
Off season produce is much more expensive! It has to travel long distances and doesn't taste nearly as good as in-season produce. Another thought to ponder: do strawberries, grapes, and peaches taste nearly as good if you get to eat them 12 months a year?
Browse the "day-old" baked goods.
Compare the price to the fresh baked goods.
Make your own beverages.
Make homemade iced tea and lemonade instead of buying soda and juice. This will result in significant savings!
Look in the meat case
for meat, poultry, and fish that is nearing its "sell-by" date. This is usually marked down significantly. Buy several and freeze it for future use.
Cheap chicken.
Go shoppping in the late evening. Stop in the deli section and see if they still have any rotisserie chickens. If there is a lot leftover, the manager might be willing to sell them to you for a deep discount. Buy 3-4 chickens. When you get them home, remove all the meat and freeze in small portions. Use the meat for soups, sandwiches, salads, sauces, etc. You can also use the bones to make your own chicken stock!
A word about "loss leaders"
"Loss leaders" refer to the sale items advertised in the newspaper and mail flyers. Loss leaders can offer you significant savings so take advantage of them! Beward that the grocers offer these deals in the hopes that you will then buy the rest of your shopping list from them. This will wind up costing you more money than you intended to spend when you entered the store. See extreme comparison shopping below.
Couponing
I met a woman in Crest Foods about a year and a half ago. She was shopping for a family of 14 and spends only $800/month on groceries. Of course, she was very busy with her coupons. Coupons are valuable only if you use them for items you need or reasonable substitutes for these item. They will not help if you end up using them for extra items that you really weren't intending to buy. That being said, couponing is a great idea if you have lots of time, but little money.
Homeland has double coupons everyday
Here are two good websites about couponing:
www.mommysavers.com
http://grocerycouponguide.com
Extreme comparison shopping
This method is less time consuming than couponing. It takes a large initial time investment, but once you have collected your data, it's pretty efficient. Obtain a small notebook you can carry in your purse or pocket. Make columns on each page for the different supermarkets you patronize. For each item that you regularly buy, write down the cost at each supermarket. Mosts costs are fairly stable except for items like produce or milk which can fluctuate. You will be surprised by the price difference for various items! You will end up saving money by doing your shopping at several different stores. Also, don't forget to take advantage of the loss leaders!
A word of warning...try to be discreet as your collecting your data. Some folks have been asked to leave by the store managers who thought they were working for the other supermarkets in order to compare prices.