The 1st is fruit and veggies ( around 25-30 lbs of food) for $16.50 a week ( plus extras like 5 loaves of bread for $10 or fresh tortillas 3 sizes for $7.00). http://www.bountifulbaskets.org/ They are located in 10 states (like NV to TX). I have been doing this for a little over a year and I have never gone to a grocery store to buy produce ( unless it is a off week like Christmas) after joining this co-op. 2nd is a bulk food box ( meat, lunches, veggies, dessert ) for $34 a box. Its once a month pick up in AZ, CA nad NV only (for now). You can purchase as many as you like, all items are frozen so its perfect to stock up on like 2-3 boxes for the month. This is only the 2nd month for the Vegas area but the other cities have been doing it for a long time. Its all name brand stuff like Chicago Meat Co, Sara Lee and such. Here is the site: http://www.thetreasurebox.org/index.php
I use Bountiful Baskets and it is ALWAYS worth it! When I first started with BB I would go to the grocery store and add up what I would have paid for those very same items and Bountiful Baskets was always cheaper! Usually by about half but sometimes a little less than that, though still a savings! The fruits and veggies are always a high quality too! I always get the cases of mango when offered and freeze them after I slice them for making smoothies.
Since we have been getting mangos for 2 weeks now I just dice them and use them for smoothies too! We volunteer ( my dd's and I ) so we get extra food items and since we are the last stop on the truck route we get lots of extra boxes that were left on the truck. So this week we got 3 mango's, 2 asparagus, 3 coconuts, 3 sugar pears and a lettuce as EXTRAS!! It was a great week to volunteer. I usually give a liitle over 1/2 my extras to a family down the street that is on food stamps..it stretches their food budget a little.
Wow, wish we had stuff like this! Now I have heard that there is Angel Food Ministries around here, but after looking at the list once or twice I decided I would have to buy 2-3 boxes to feed our family for a week and it didn't save us anything compared to my bargin shopping, but that fruits and veggies thing is an awesome deal!
We don't have BB in S. TX, but I am in a produce co-op. Ours was put together by moms trying to save. Someone went to the local produce warehouse (which services grocery stores) and asked how much would have to be spent to buy from them. The answer was $300. That amount was split into $25 each for 12 families every other week. (I share a share with my neighbor, so ours is 12.50 each.) Here's the basics of how it works: The twelve are paired for a once every six weeks shopping date. Each team purchases the produce for everyone on their day to shop. You bring it home, sort it out, and designate a pick up time for the others. We did have to revise the guidelines some recently, as there was one team that always bought things others didn't know how to use. I think anyone should be able to put one together as long as you have a warehouse within a reasonable distance and the people to make the co-op.
I looked into Angelfood too, but also found it too expensive. A friend swore by it to feed her family, but she lived in NY, so I"m sure things were more expensive there than here in small town GA... The co-ops around here are too expensive to save me money-I looked into them. The only one really close by is very expensive, the others are just too far-if I drove weekly to pick up my stuff, it's negate my savings in gas... So-we just plant a garden http://twitpic.com/43s5ds
We used to do Angel Food, too....we stopped because we have an Aldi here - and the Aldi prices were even better - we priced out the box several times. We've been fortunate to have a Produce Junction open really close. SUPER produce, SUPER cheap. You do have to buy in bulk, but we eat enough of fresh stuff, that it's worth it. I think Produce Junctions are only in PA, NJ & DE?? maybe???
I WISH there was an Aldi here! We only have one chain store a Whole Foods (too expensive) and another Whole Foods-type store (too expensive).
I LOVE BB as well. It has got me started on the canning journey. Excited to see what extras are available today. Two weeks ago I got the strawberries, combined it with the mangoes in the basket for awesome strawberry mango jam. I already have requests for more pickles once the pickling cukes are available again.
Thanks for sharing this!! We would have to drive a little ways to pick up, but I would. Our ONE grocery store in town is Crazy high on produce and the quality is aweful! I have a friend who would probably like this as well as several moms in the homeschool group. maybe we could swap out on pick up days to save on gas. I'm going to pass this on!! Thanks again.
I'm with Sonita, we grow a garden.. a HUGE garden and can from it. The only thing we buy to put away for the winter is corn because a local farm has the best corn on earth. We usually put down 300 ears worth and it lasts us all year. We want to put in some fruit trees this year so that soon we can can peaches and apples and what ever else.
