Grocery Shopping: Buying Paper Goods and storing them.

We store our paper goods in a few places, and I think of paper goods, perhaps differently then you do.

Paper plates:  I seriously just buy them at Costco.  Sometimes if I see a decent deal on other plates I will grab a different size (I buy the smaller dinner plates at Costco).  I think these are SO important to keep on hand, you never know when you will need some.  What’s a good price?  I don’t know.  I saw hefty plates/bowls — 50 for 1.50 yesterday and I bought.  Take that for what it’s worth.  I store a few paper plates in the laundry area, and the rest on top of our fridge in the garage.

Plastic ware.  I have to say I’m SO darn happy with how my plastic ware storage worked out.  I bought this bin from Amazon to put next to my washing machine (and I LOVE them — I put two by the washing machine, and I have one in my closet — they work GREAT, I also store my extra big soap containers behind it and it does roll out nicely for when I need to get at those).  I was wanting to put things I frequently get at in there, and look how great my silverware boxes fit in there.  I’m hoping you get a gist of how excited I was.  I just cut off the top and they all fit in there so nicely.  Now when I open that drawer, I can just grab what I need, or quickly dump in the extras we had when I opened a new box for a party.  Exctied.  Seriously.  BUT for buying plastic silverware, I have no idea.  It really depends on the quality you need.  For my kids lunches I buy the cheapest stuff for usually under a dollar, but if I’m having a party I often go for better stuff so the fork won’t break with your steak.

Baggies et al.  For a family that brings their lunch from home almost daily, baggies are a must.  I am a big fan of plastic containers, especially for sandwhichs and the like — but sometimes you just need a baggie.  I bought a ton of sandwich bags at Albertson’s, their generic brand and I didn’t really love them.  I think I’m just going to wait until Costco has their coupon and stock up on the ziploc kind.  Maybe I’m a bag snob.  We do store a lot of frozen meats in freezer bags, and I do like to make sure those are high quality so we’re not killing our meat.  I tend to think under 2 bucks for the regular size is pretty good.  In my mind I try to go for about 10 cents/bag of a good quality freezer bag.  I’m not really sure if that’s great, or if Costco coupons make that better, but that’s what I do.  I think I’ll just buy foil and that type of thing at Costco from now on.  The store brands just aren’t as good as reynolds, but I have learned my lesson there. {I have them stored on the top shelf of my laundry area, and then I have a drawer in my kitchen that holds one of each item}

Paper Towels.  Now, I have learned a LOT from Slick Deals about paper towels and toilet paper and how they devide it out per sheet to figure out what a good price is.  The main problem is that I like the select-a-size paper towels as we have small kids and use them frequently.  SO, I hope to get them under 1 dollar for the double (or bigger) rolls.  I don’t often calculate it down to a per sheet basis, but I also only buy Viva, Bounty or Brawny because poor quality paper towels drive me INSANE.  It’s just not worth being insane for the few cents I’ll save.  I also really try to use rags when possible instead of paper towels.  I put all our old nasty rags in an ikea baggie holder in the pantry so it’s easy for kids to grab one when they need it {or me, I probably spill as much as they do}.  I store paper towels in my garage on top of our extra fridge, and I have one pack in our laundry room.  I try to keep one roll more accessible on top of the washing machine as I always need them when I’m in a bind and can’t crawl on top of a chair to grab them.

Toilet Paper.  Man, oh man do I hate cheap toilet paper.  Am I right ladies?  I think of 3 ply as a luxury, and when it’s available in bulk I stock up.  I have found quilted northern at America’s Discount Foods for a good price, and also at Amazon (through slickdeals, they often post toilet paper as a good deal on Amazon, and I love getting it sent to my door!).  My mental math on toilet paper is similar to paper towels.  I have calculated down to the sheet, but now I pretty well go by a double roll for less than 50 cents.  Costco makes it extra confusing as their packs are GIANT… so I just try to figure it out as best I can.  But i do like 3 ply better then Costco.  I try to put about 10 rolls in each bathroom, and the rest goes at the bottom of my linen closet.  I’d love to figure out a good way to store extra rolls accessible in the bathroom.  I’ve seen a couple of cute ways on pinterest, but I’m open to more!

Again, I have no idea if this is helpful, but I know that figuring out target prices was one of the hardest things when I was starting to play the grocery game.  So, hopefully someone finds this helpful.