Groceries

Let's hope I didn't lose anyone at the title. On Monday I went to three different grocery stores. I didn't plan to do so (and it certainly wasn't the most fun day of my life) but in the process I started comparing the three stores and (more specifically) their produce prices. This may sound snooze-inducing to some... but who wouldn't like saving money just by going to a different store??? If you don't buy your own groceries then this probably isn't the post for you unless you'd like to consider this post your own dose of melatonin.

Cutting coupons has never been my thing for various reasons. One: I try to buy (and stock up on) things that are on sale. Sale prices are always better than coupon prices. Two: Having too many coupons confuses me. (Yeah, I admitted it). Three: Most coupons are for overly processed food that I shouldn't be putting in my body.

Fresh produce always seems to be the most expensive part of my trips to the store. Produce is more expensive than boxed food... and my grocery lists always seem to be mostly produce. The downfall of trying to take care of this God-given body (bodies if you include David's). In the course of my snoozalicious Monday I decided to compare three grocery stores (mainly the produce prices/freshness) in an epic battle.

The competitors:
Fresh and Easy
Vons (aka Pavilions)
Sprouts

Fresh and Easy
I went to F&E with my list completely prepared to buy everything there like I had my first two years of college. I had heard their produce prices were good plus the name had me sold from the get go. It's fresh AND easy. How could you not try it out? But I was utterly disappointed. For me, the word "fresh" conjures up images of bunches of tomatoes on the stem, crisp apples sitting in heaps, and bunches of bok choy piled up together waiting for a good stir fry. As I walked down the produce aisle I was greeted with some good sights... tomatoes, apples, pineapple, butternut squash all sitting there ready to be scooped up, bagged and taken home to eat. Unfortunately it seemed as though a good majority of F&E's produce had been bagged up, put in a plastic box, or contained in some other way that is just a big waste. They had four apples prepackaged in a plastic bag. There were three Roma tomatoes prepackaged together in a plastic produce. There may be some business sense behind all of this... but why waste the plastic? Also, I noticed a lot of the produce looked a little overripe/no bueno. This is when I decided to go elsewhere for some good freshness.

Sprouts
Let's get one thing straight... "health food" places like this intimidate me. I feel like they are full of trendy health nuts and actual health nuts plus a handful of real people like myself just trying to take steps to achieve a healthy lifestyle. The only reason why I went here is because my Mom told me they had great produce prices. Okay Momma bear, you win. I'll go. As usual, Mom was right. Their produce prices were awesome with an added bonus of almost no prepackaging. Love love love. Price comparison chart to come. Plus, the staff there is very helpful and unpretentious. I'm sensing a winner here but let's give Vons a chance too.

Vons
This store is two minutes away from my house. I can (and often do) walk here. This store is part of my comfort zone. The aisles are familiar, the cashiers are nice, and they sell honeycrisp apples aka the best apples in the world. The store is well set up, has some good meat prices, and a WIDE variety of foods. In fact, there are only a few negatives. One: In the aisles it's all about advertising AND there are so many different selections that trying to do nutrition comparisions between the different brands makes my head hurt. Two: Their produce prices tend to be higher. Let's take a look at the price chart.

This is the real point of this whole post. This is where the dolla dolla bills come in to play.
This... is... SPARTA!!!

Kidding. It's just a chart.
Note: F&E is not included in this. You don't need it or want it.



My list happened to be a lot of stir fry that day but from the other prices I saw Sprouts is still the leader in cheap (and fresh) produce.

Let that be a lesson to me... don't judge a place by the hipsters that shop there.