Buying in bulk when it’s too much

Buying in bulk is great if you can consume it all, of course.  But what if you can't?

Quantity discounts, used appropriately, are one of the pillars of frugal living.  Why go to the store for one smallish package of toilet paper when you can hit Costco and be well-stocked for two months?

Buying in bulk makes perfect sense if the items you're buying aren't perishable.  But if the items will spoil, rot, or otherwise go bad, it's not always a great idea to stock up.

Buying in bulk and tossing part of it

I recall an article in Wired magazine — didn't realize it was from 2003! — that discussed among other things the relationship between Walmart and Vlasic, the pickle company.  Walmart sold a gallon of Vlasic pickles then for $2.97.

At the time, this was a lower price than most other grocers charged for a quart.  It was a crazy low price.

One way to look at this gallon of pickles is to say that you break even after eating the first quart of pickles, and then the rest is free.  The problem with this argument is exactly that it places no value at all on the last three quarts of pickles, and this can lead one to be cavalier and wasteful of said pickles.

Finding the sweet spot

Now, I don't consume that many pickles, but of late I have started to eat more broccoli in an effort to eat healthier and feel better.  My wife very kindly got a reasonable sized bag (12 ounces or so) at Walmart.  I suggested next time that she get the bag at Costco because it would be four times as big for only slightly more than what she paid for the 12-ounce bag.

She wasn't too keen on that, because the experience we had had before was that a lot of the three-pound bag of broccoli went bad before we finished it.

The point was not doing better than break-even with the big bag.  The point was not being wasteful.

In the end, she found a workaround.  We could try to freeze part of the bag and eat the rest raw or cooked.  (I ended up eating the entire three-pound bag before it went bad.  And I bet you're thinking: “Glad I wasn't around you during that time!”)

Buying in bulk, with feeling this time

There are a number of ways to buy in bulk without letting some of it go to waste, when the quantity is just a bit too large to consume comfortably:

• Freeze it.  I was the only one of the three of us that really liked to eat broccoli raw.  The rest of it could be cooked (it's a step above thawing out frozen vegetables) or frozen for later.  Here's a quick how-to on freezing fruits and vegetables.  We've already frozen a bunch of the fruit from our garden, and some fresh-picked blueberries (see the next tip).
• Split it.  A friend from church was buying some fresh-picked blueberries for a fundraiser.  She bought a bunch, and split with us.  We, in turn, split with someone else.  Even after the split we still had ten pounds of (really delicious) blueberries, many of which we froze.
• Donate it.  Certainly there's someone (or some organization) around that could use some of your extra, right?
• Share it.  I've been the recipient of many bounties.  People will bring in tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and so forth from their gardens because they have more than they can eat themselves.  Return the favor and bring in some extra to share.
• Compost it.  This is a last resort for fruits and vegetables that have gone bad, but it's better than entering the landfill.  Or offer the food to someone who has livestock, especially chickens.  They'll eat most anything.