Tips for Saving Money at Whole Foods
About a month or so ago, I received an email from Whole Foods asking me about partnering together to create a one-week meal plan for me and Ryan that included two meals each day for the two of us for $125. (Full disclosure: I was provided a $125 gift card.) Since getting a little creative in the kitchen is one of my favorite things, I was more than game and immediately started brainstorming ideas for a healthy and delicious meal plan.
The first step in my meal plan journey involved attending a value tour at my local Whole Foods led by Jennifer, the regional marketing specialist at Whole Foods in Charlotte. Jennifer and I walked around the store and chatted for about an hour while she pointed out lots of money-saving tips and tricks.
Some key takeaways:
- Check the bimonthly Whole Deal brochure which features more than $45 of savings per issue on average (you can also find these coupons at www.wholefoodsmarket.com/coupons) and check out weekly sales fliers, One Day Sales and sale items throughout the store.
- Sign up for your local store’s newsletter and follow them on Facebook and Twitter to receive bonus coupons, budget-friendly recipes, and notices of sales and more.
- Shop seasonally.
- Cut costs, literally. If you need only half a cabbage, sandwich, chunk of cheese, fish fillet, loaf of fresh bread, etc., simply ask a team member to help you get (and pay for) only the amount you need.
- Utilize the bulk bins to buy as much or as little as you need.
- Check out the 365 Everyday Value line for hundreds of affordable organics, including peanut butter, organic frozen veggies, pasta, sauce, canned tomatoes, soups and more.
- Consider purchasing Value Packs to help you get fish and meat at a better price, and allow you to use only what you need.
- Look for budget-friendly pricing on lesser-known cuts such as boneless sirloin, flat iron steak or skirt steak.
- Receive discounted pricing on most items when you buy a full case.
- Make the most of your leftovers with the Whole Foods Market recipes app, which allows you to save recipes, create meal plans and shopping lists, view sales items at your local store and more.
When it was time for me to create my two-meals-a-day meal plan, I opted for breakfast and dinner since breakfast is my favorite meal of the day and dinner is often the meal that requires the most planning in our house. When I set out to do shopping for our meals, there were a few hiccups in my plan. My father-in-law was in town, so our dinners needed to be able to feed three people and I knew we’d likely be going out to dinner once or twice. Whole Foods wanted the meal plan to include two meals each day, but food I bought did cover breakfast, lunch and dinner for me and breakfast and dinner for Ryan. (Ryan actually did bring his lunch to work using food from our grocery haul a couple of times, but he also ate at his workplace cafeteria or out with coworkers during the week as well, so I’m not counting his lunchtime meals.)
And a few important notes: We went out to dinner twice during the week because we wanted to take my father-in-law out to some of our favorite local hotspots, so we did not consume two of the planned dinners on the “correct” days (Tuesday and Friday) but we ate the “dinners” for lunch for two of the days during the week. I hope this makes sense! The meal plan is just a guideline for our breakfasts and dinners, but I wanted to be sure to actually make and eat everything, too, which we did!
As I shopped for our food, I did a lot of price comparisons (buying in bulk ended up being the cheapest every time!) and clipped coupons to save money, like I usually do each week.
I was truly surprised when I went through the checkout line and only spent $69.76! I ended up going through the line again and picking up more food to use to get closer to the $125 total.
Our total for the week ended up being $115.20, but it did not include the jar of peanut butter I also used in the meal plan that we already had at home. (I figured being $10 under budget made up for the peanut butter since that would be an easy purchase within the budget.)
Here is what our one-week meal plan looked like:
- Breakfast: Tortilla topped with banana, peanut butter and cinnamon
- Dinner: Fish tacos with (frozen) mahi mahi, black beans, chopped romaine lettuce and pico de gallo
- Breakfast: Overnight oats made with oatmeal, Greek yogurt, honey and raw almonds
- Dinner: Turkey and ham rollups with romaine, tomatoes and pumpkin seeds, served with apple slices
- Breakfast: Cottage cheese topped with a sliced apple, cinnamon, almonds and pumpkin seeds
- Dinner: 365 Everyday Value whole wheat linguine with steamed spinach and 365 Everyday Value marinara, served with roasted broccoli
- Breakfast: Two waffles topped with a dippy egg and tomato slices, served with a plum on the side
- Dinner: Chopped salad with romaine, ham, tomatoes, black beans, edamame, wheat berries and pumpkin seeds
- Breakfast: Two waffles served with a cup of Greek yogurt
- Dinner: Baked chicken breasts with sweet potatoes and roasted Brussels sprouts
- Breakfast: Three-minute egg white oatmeal, topped with chopped almonds
- Dinner: Crockpot lentil wheat berry soup <—We loved this soup!!!
Crockpot Lentil Wheat Berry Soup
Serves 6
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups dry lentils
- 3/4 wheat berries
- 6 cups reduced sodium chicken or vegetable broth
- 1 sweet onion, roughly chopped
- 2 cups chopped carrots
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 1/2 – 1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper (depending on taste)
- 1/2 – 1 1/2 teaspoons salt (depending on taste)
Directions
- Combine all ingredients and cook on low for 8 hours. Serve and enjoy!
- Breakfast: Strawberry, mango and spinach smoothie
- Dinner: Leftover lentil and wheat berry soup
Giveaway
Now Whole Foods Market wants to give you guys a chance to shop at their store and create some healthy budget-friendly recipes.
FIVE readers will win a $25 gift card to Whole Foods!
To enter this giveaway, simply leave a comment on this post, telling me about some of your favorite Whole Foods finds!
I will randomly select five winners on Friday.
Good luck!
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The fresh guacamole is my all-time favorite Whole Foods product! Yum!
That soup sounds fantastic! One of my fav WF finds is the tofu salad on their cold bar. So yummy!
I LOVE their fresh ground honey roasted peanut butter and the Vanilla Flax milk + protein by GoodKarma! They are a great place to shop
Whole foods always has at least one outstanding sale on meat each week. I stock up, freeze it in portions, sometimes with seasonings or marinade and it’s ready to go! Since meat is expensive I think it has the potential to be the biggest money saver!
The HOT BAR , SALAD BAR and make your own nut butter:)
I love all of the bulk bins!
Whole Foods has a great selection of organic vitamins and supplements – love the new KIND Organics vitamin line they are carrying.
Honestly, I’m pretty intimidated by Whole Foods because I feel like everything is so over priced. Thanks for the great post. A gift card would certainly give me the incentive I need to try them out.
I am amazed that you were able to get all that food for that price at Whole Foods! I usually only go there as a treat when I have extra money in the budget for groceries! Everything sounded and looked delicious, especially that lentil soup! Awesome, Julie! 🙂
I love the dried roasted edamame!
I love Whole Foods fresh market area! I love to pick up a little grilled chicken and seaweed salad when I’m on the go!
Pretty colorful tasty fresh produce. Fresh ground almond butter. The organic meats. Organix Dog Food for my pooch. The sushi bar or salad bar when I don’t have time to make lunch at home. And those gorgeous flowers when you first walk in. Safe to say I love everything in the store!!!! Can I live there please?
see now i have to go to whole foods today…..hands down best pb
Non-GMO Hummus by Cedar’s , their housemade guacamole and 365 Almond butter. All are great for you and are at great prices!
I love the roasted plantains with red onions from the salad bar!
I love all the locally grown produce and the bulk bins! And I love your blogs! So inspirational to my food shopping plan each week!
I love the bulk bins for things like chia seeds or gf flours!
I’ve actually never shopped at a Whole Foods! The closest one in an hour away in Jax. However, we go up to Jax a lot on the weekends and I’m making a point to stop in next time and check it out!!
I love the expansive produce section at Whole Foods. I usually try to pick up something new to me to try and discover new fruits and veggies.
The hot bar and the sandwiches. Heavenly.
One of my favorite Whole Food purchases is called Farmers Cheese. It’s the best!!!
I love this meal plan – thanks for sharing!
I have a hard time resisting the made in store guacamole! Two of my favorite other products are the Runa Teas, a great alternative to coffee and Way Better Snacks Sweet Chilli Tortilla Chips (delicious with some of that fresh guacamole). I could list about 20 other go to items. But I agree with you, using the Whole Deal coupons (right now there are coupons for both Runa and Way Better Snacks!) and shopping bulk and sales have helped me to save money, but still get great food!
To be honest, my favorite part about WF is the hot foods and salad bar. When I traveled through the US on a road trip a few years ago, I used the prepped bars as a place to get a variety of healthy food instead of dining out in a restaurant or fast food!
The truffles. They are soooo rich and yummo! I love everything from 365 Organics, too!!!
I love the variety you can find at whole foods. Any flavor or particular product is most likely to be carried at whole foods. such a win!
I love the whole foods brand for their quality and savings. I’ve found the peanut butter and maple syrup to be of the highest quality and my first choice when buying those items. A real savings!
I love Whole Foods’ robusto cheese! Since it’s exclusive, I tend to get a huge amount of it every time, it’s great for snacking! Thanks for the giveaway
I love their peanut butter that you can grind there in store!
I love wholefoods salad bar; i also love the fact that if you dont need the entire product of something you can ask them to cut it down to how much you need.
I love their salad/hot bar in the store! I often meet my husband for lunch there.
This meal plan looks great! I’m surprised it was so affordable. The fresh ground nut butters at WF are my absolute favorites!
I love all the vegan items they offer.
I love their produce selection! I’m always able to find different types of squash, like delicata and sweet dumpling!
This is a GREAT post and so helpful. I really love Whole Foods and am a big believer that you can shop sensibly and save money there, chiefly w/ their store brand, which I think is SO high quality. I especially love their frozen haricots verts and 365 brand smooth peanut butter!
I still pinch myself that a Whole Foods opened up near me. I’ve always been into healthy foods, but it took me by surprise just how much I have learned (and am still learning) about different products, cheeses, sustainability, humane breeding, etc! Most of all, I love finding bargains! For instance, I love Bob’s Red Mill products, and ordering them online the shipping is expensive – WFM has most all of them, and they’ll get something if you want it! My heart literally skips a beat when I see there is going to be a flash sale !! Most all the organic produce can’t be beat in quality or price in the regular grocery stores! I love raw cashews and have googled and amazon’ed repeatedly to find a better deal, and WFM is the best – and also no hard shell surprises to break a tooth on if you’re getting dates or walnuts, etc., the quality is the best! Today is the start of the new sales for the week, and I can hardly wait to look online for what it on sale this week – yippee!!!
I love their fresh seafood! Always looks & tastes like it’s right off the boat!
So many great Whole Foods finds. Uncooked pizza dough…365 Basil Pesto…yum!
I love their meal deals, such a great way to enjoy a meal quick, easy and affordable. I also love their garlicky kale on the salad bar.
Bulk bins are my best friend at Whole Foods. They are typically cheaper than even my regular grocery store (which is impressive since WF is organic {the stuff I purchase} and the local grocer is definitely not). I also am obsessed with their salad bar (lets be honest, who isn’t?) but my favorite finds are in the protein/snack bar section. As a student, bars are so easy and versatile and I can honestly find some great and cheaper finds at WF than other places.
The array of fresh produce!
Their salad bar is the BEST! I could eat it everyday!
It’s a toss-up between the WF bulk bins.. and the always AMAZING hot bar. Sometimes I will go to WF as a lunch or dinner destination because of the hot bar!
I love the curry cashews and the superfood salad.
365 Everyday Creamy Peanut Butter! (and i DO eat it everyday)
best value for peanut butter anywhere. And it’s simple. 2 ingredients: Peanuts & Salt.
Love the hot bar and the wide variety of fresh produce!
I love the prices on Ezekiel Bread at Whole Foods, much cheaper than the regular grocer.
I love all their dairy free products and organic selections!
The Whole Foods 365 brand coconut milk is the best I’ve ever found. I use it from coffee creamer to making my own Thai curry sauce. It’s the one of the big reasons I walk further to shop at Whole Foods instead of the supermarket down my block.
My favorite is the huge variety of marinated chicken breasts. Especially on my way home from work, it’s great to just stop by and grab the marinated chicken and a fresh veggie to steam for a healthy combo!
The honey roasted peanut Butter is divine! I also love the already prepared family dinner, they make great meals plus left overs!