Frugal people can sometimes find themselves in a bind when shopping, having to prioritize or give something up to save money. But they’re also often more than happy to leave things off their shopping list because they know their value—here are twelve examples.
1. Pre-Cut Fruits and Veggies
Convenience isn’t always worth the cost for frugal people. Pre-cut produce is a good example; it’s significantly cheaper to take a few minutes and cut things up yourself.
2. Designer Clothing
The high-ticket prices from designer labels don’t sit well with frugal people. They’ll happily ignore a $50 white t-shirt from a designer and stick with their $5 ones.
3. Unitask Kitchen Gadgets
Frugal people know how enticing unitaskers are, primarily since they’re used to cooking. However, they know you get much more mileage from versatile tools that can handle multiple tasks, so they’ll usually pass these gadgets by.
4. Pre-Packaged Meals
Frugal people are no strangers to needing assistance when things get busier. But if they can help it, they’ll never bother with pre-packaged meals and will instead rely on their meal planning to help them through.
5. Bottled Water
Buying a water filter is considerably more economical, and that’s precisely what the frugal person does. Bottled water doesn’t register as something they ever want or need because they have fresh, clean water on demand.
6. Luxury Cosmetics
Like designer clothing, luxury cosmetics aren’t appealing to the frugal. They’re often perfectly content with drugstore brands, especially since they come at a much more manageable price point.
7. Costly Coffee
The daily grind of getting coffee in the morning is simply not for frugal people. They’d much rather brew their own at home, opting for a nice coffee maker and maybe even a grinder to enhance their experience but still spending less than heading to a cafe.
8. Brand Name Food
Generic or store brands are the frugal person’s bread and butter. If there’s a cheaper generic available, that’s always going in the cart over the name-brand option.
9. Whatever’s Not on Sale
Alternatively, some of the more extreme penny pinchers would argue that something isn’t worth buying unless it’s on sale, a deal, or they have a coupon for it. Not every frugal person operates with this mentality, but for others, it’s hardwired into their shopping.
10. Extended Warranties
Extended warranties aren’t something you’d see on a shopping list, but frugal people still don’t bother with them. They’re seldom worth the cost, provided you’re buying a quality product from a reputable retailer and take some time to research different models.
11. The Latest Tech
If their phone works fine, frugal people will run it into the ground before spending top dollar on the newest model. They know that not only will this technology’s price eventually decrease, but they’re already doing just fine without it.
12. Cable Packages
Most people know by now that expensive cable packages aren’t worth the cost. With a wide array of affordable streaming options at our disposal, the money-conscious customer won’t even bother considering cable.