One savvy Sainsbury's shopper has slashed her weekly food run from £49 down to £3.50, using one simple trick.
Leia Winch had racked up thousands of pounds in debt, and had to take action to save money, reports the Mirror. The woman had £8,000 worth of debt, and has shared her tips to reducing grocery bills to those struggling with the cost of living crisis.
Leia's first piece of advice was something people might find obvious, which is looking for reduced items in stores that are signposted with yellow stickers. However, the savvy shopper also used another simple trick to save on her shopping.
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Leia utilised her local supermarket loyalty scheme to collect points - she then changed these points into vouchers and different coupons to use on her weekly shop.
Leia said: "I managed to get the weekly shop from Sainsbury's for just £3.58 reduced from £48.58, as I used some of the points I’d saved up and converted them to vouchers, and got a lot of reduced foods including meats, ready meals, and vegetables.”
The woman also changes her weekly shopping location to see if she can nab better deals. Leia recently managed to save a ton in the conventionally more expensive supermarket Co-op, getting her £22.40 shop for just £4.28.
Another one of her tricks is to use cashback sites, as these offers usually give you some money back when you are shopping.
However, you do need to spend money first in order to be reimbursed on these websites. Leia’s final money-making tip is to take part in online surveys.
Surveys do vary, but typically take between five to 10 minutes to complete. They pay out between 25p - 40p, although you can sometimes get more.
Leia added: “With the cashback apps and survey sites, I tend to get a lot of free items, like four bottles of shampoo from Boots, or big bags of dog food, which I gave to friends and family.
“I’ve also managed to get four free jars of coffee, which actually costs £5.50 per tin in store.”
Leia also uses these simple tricks to enjoy other aspects of life, despite her debt. Deals include two-for-one cinema ticket offers, and takeaway deals.
With the money she has saved, Leia now hopes to buy the flat she currently rents with her partner.
She added: “I’m aiming to be mortgage-free by retirement age, as well as having a hefty sum of more savings to be comfortable for retirement, as I don’t think a state pension will cover it anymore."
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