7 Ways to Save on Lunch Costs
1. Drink water
This is the easiest way to save on lunch costs. A soda will cost you anywhere from $0.60 to $1.50. If you don’t buy that soda you will save anywhere from $149-$370/year (assuming you work a 5-day workweek).
2. Skip the Chips
Again chips not only cost money, they cost your waistline. J.D. has an interesting post at Get Rich Slowly about the cost of being fat.
3. Buy pre-made
Burritos, SmartOnes, Michelina’s, Lean Cuisine, etc. All of these are cheaper than eating out. Trader Joe’s also has some amazing pre-made meals (like their rice bowls) that will cost you a little less than $3.00/meal. Sometimes you can get the TV dinners on sale for only $1.00. (But, remember to make smart choices here; don’t buy fatty, high cholesterol items that will drain your energy).
4. Prepare Ahead of Time
Make a bunch of lunches ahead of time. If I know I will have a busy week I often make my whole week’s worth of lunches on Sunday night and freeze it all. Peanut Butter and Jelly, Bean and Cheese Burritos, even Spaghetti—they all freeze well.
5. Leftovers
Make a little bit more of your dinner and put it in Tupperware.
6. Buy in bulk
I’m not saying you have to get a Sam’s Club or Costco membership, but if something you take for lunch goes on sale, buy a few more boxes.
7. Think outside the container
Instead of buying individual yogurt or cottage cheese cartons, buy a large container and partition it out into small Tupperware. You won’t believe how much money this can save (and it’s much better for the environment).
My version of a cheap lunch is:
a) bring a recycled bottle of spring water (filled with chilled, filtered tap water) to work
b) for lunch take a couple of slices of bread to work and eat them with a can of low salt baked beans (high fibre, high protein, low fat - yum).
Total cost for lunch - around 85c a day.
If you have simple tastes and a high boredom threshold like me, then you can eat this for lunch every weekday. You get enough opportunity for variety with your dinners.
[...] Elizabeth presents some practical ways to cut food costs 7 Ways to Save on Lunch Costs posted at Money for the Rest of Us. Personally, I do not fully agree with the “buy pre-made” advice on the list, and have tried #4 unsuccessfully a couple of times. But, it might work for some of you. [...]
Another thing that saves on lunch costs, but does require payment up-front, is to buy a reuseable “lunchbox”. In the past, I was not a huge fan of them because I thought they looked dorky and what not, but Built NY has a “lunch tote” (http://www.builtny.com/index.php?pageID=1569) which is a great size, and it is made of Neoprene, which is wetsuit material, which is obviously a great insulator. I’m a college student and I have 8am classes, so it’s great so know that my dairy products will stay cool until I eat them at lunchtime if I have them refrigerated the night before.
It’s much better than using those old brown paper bags that you keep having to buy every week and also, like tip #7, more environmentally-friendly.