September is National Preparedness Month. With winter on the horizon and the status of the economy uncertain, it's a good idea to plan ahead. Creating a surplus of essential supplies is an important way to prepare for the unexpected. Having food and other needed items available can help ease you through any number of undesirable circumstances to include natural disasters, severe weather events, power outages, supply chain issues, or personal tragedies such as the loss of a job or an unexpected illness or injury. 

Building a surplus doesn't have to cost a lot of money. With careful planning and an organized approach, it's possible to stick to a budget while stocking up on needed items. The following tips have worked well for my family, and I hope you will find them useful as well. 

Building a surplus starts with picking a time frame. At the minimum, it's important to have a 72-hour supply of food, water, medication, and other essentials in the event of a natural disaster, power outage, or severe weather event. Beyond that, I recommend starting small and building. over time 

Once you have a 72-hour reserve of necessities, focus on building a two-week supply. From there you might strive for one month, then three-months, then six-months or more. Your ultimate end goal will depend on your personal budget, needs, desires and available space. Whatever your end goal, having one in mind when you start will help provide a framework for an organized approach to building your surplus. 

To determine how much of a specific item you need in order to have a 1-month, 3-month, or 6-month supply, write the date on items when you open them. Use this information to figure out how long the item lasts in your household and then to estimate how many you will need to achieve your goal supply.

Another important step in building a surplus is organizing your existing supply. Take some time to look through your pantry and other food storage spaces. Identify what you have on hand. Get rid of anything that is outdated or that you know you won't use and organize what's left. 

When organizing non-perishable food items, I recommend storing like items together so that it is easy to see how many of the same type of item you have on hand. Store the oldest items (those that will expire first) at the front to be used first and avoid unnecessary waste. 

You will be amazed how quickly, easily, and painlessly (budgetarily speaking) you can build a surplus by buying two replacement items for every one item you use. Use up a bottle of ketchup, buy two. Use up a bottle of shampoo, buy two. Use up a can of tuna, buy two. You get the idea. My husband and I began implementing this practice as newlywed college students, and we were impressed and pleased at how easy (and affordable) it was to stock our cupboards using this simple method. 

This may seem like a no-brainer, but it takes effort and planning to get the best prices for the items you need. It means looking at weekly fliers (either on paper or electronically) and planning accordingly. 

You can decrease the amount you spend on building a surplus significantly by waiting for items to go on sale and stocking up on the brands and products you use when the price is right. 

You probably know that certain items are on sale at certain times of the year. What you may not be aware of is the specifics of the annual cycle with regard to which items are on sale each month of the year. Knowing this can help you to plan ahead and stock up on specific items when they are at their lowest price of the year. 

These days saving on groceries and other essentials is easier than ever with the myriad of savings apps and rebate programs available. By spending a few minutes before and after you shop to see what special deals are available and then to scan your receipts can increase your savings significantly with coupons and rebates. 

Often the larger the quantity, the lower the cost per unit. Admittedly, this is not always the case, but it is certainly the case much of the time and sometimes the savings are significant. Now that we are empty-nesters I sometimes choose to buy the smaller version of a product because the larger version won't get used before it spoils, but I've also discovered that in many cases larger quantities can be divided into smaller portions, thus preserving both the savings and the food item. Vacuum sealers are a great way to divide and preserve larger portions. 

Each month we take any leftover money in our food budget and roll it over into another budget category that we call Grocery Surplus. We then use this money to add to our surplus of food and other essential items. This is also where my grocery rebate money is stashed. After saving in this manner for a few months, I recently had enough money set aside to buy a supply of freeze-dried foods for long-term storage. On another occasion, I spent my savings on 5-gallon water storage containers. Other times I've used the money to stock my freezer.

It is not necessary or desirable to store a surplus of every item on your shopping list. With regard to food, I recommend that you begin by building a surplus of staple items that form the basis for much of your family's diet - things like flour, rice, oats, salt, sugar, vegetables and fruits (canned, frozen, or freeze-dried), meats (canned, frozen, or freeze-dried), etc. Next, focus on items your family uses regularly and/or in large quantities. 

Even if you have no interest in establishing long-term food storage, I recommend having at least one #10 can of powdered milk and powdered eggs because these will allow you to do a lot more with the food you have on hand in a situation where stores are closed, or perishable foods are difficult to obtain. I have tried a variety of freeze-dried foods, and the one thing I do not recommend is freeze-dried shredded cheese. It just doesn't reconstitute in a palatable fashion (in my opinion). 

Building a surplus of groceries and other essential items brings peace of mind both in emergencies and on a daily basis. Apply these tips to gradually and affordably increase your stockpile. ​

Welcome to part 2 of my series on how to save money on groceries and other essentials. In this post the focus will be on digital savings. 

I'm not even going to pretend like I know every single app or extension available for saving digitally. Instead, I'm just going to share some apps and extensions that have worked well for me as well as some suggestions for how to use these tools in tandem to increase savings. 

Most grocery and pharmacy chains have a savings app. Some are definitely better than others (Kroger, Target, Walgreens), but each offers ways to save money on groceries and other essentials. To utilize the savings available on a store's app, you will have to have an account. When you sign up for an account, you will be issued a shopper's card, and it is generally through scanning your shopper's card that you are able to access available savings. 

My favorite local grocery store is a Kroger affiliate, and I LOVE their app. I'll share my favorite features, many of which are common across the best grocery store apps. If you have not done so, I encourage you to explore your store's app for these (and possibly other) features. 

Store App features to look for: 

• Digital coupons - Scroll through the coupon section of the app (usually listed under "savings") and "clip" the coupons of your choice.  This will download them to your shopper's card. Scan your shopper's card at checkout, and savings are automatically deducted on any items for which you have downloaded a coupon. It's that simple. NOTE: Some stores have a limit on the number of digital coupons you can redeem at one time (Kroger and its affiliates do not). 
• Weekly digital deals - These are special savings offered for a 7-day period that are only available by downloading the digital deal. To take advantage of the savings, "clip" the coupon for the deal in the savings section of the app exactly as you would any other type of coupon. Weekly digital deals are a Kroger thing, but the concept (and the actual deals) apply to all Kroger affiliates (of which there are at least 19 supermarket chains nationwide). 
• Cash back - This is a relatively new feature that I'm really excited about. The store offers cash back on certain items. Simply purchase qualifying items and see your cash back total increase. Transfer your rewards to your shopper's card by selecting "cash out" and they will automatically be applied toward your next purchase. I currently have $15.25 in cash back rewards on my shopper's card, and I have done absolutely nothing except shop my grocery list as usual. I only discovered my cash back total in researching this post, so it definitely doesn't take any extra effort to earn these rewards aside from signing up for an account. 
• Fuel Points - Many grocery store chains offer fuel points which can be applied either at the store's gas station or an affiliate. Our local store has a gas station, so that is where we purchase 99% of the fuel for our vehicles. Simply having a shopper's card automatically saves us three cents per gallon of gas at the store's station, but that is just the beginning of the available fuel savings. Every $100 spent in the store gives us 10 cents off per gallon of gas. The maximum amount of fuel points rewards that can be applied at one time is 1,000 points which translates to $1.00 off on up to 35 gallons of gas. I regularly have between 30 cents and $1 off per gallon based on my current fuel point level. The result is huge savings on gas! What's more, I can use my fuel points at any Kroger affiliate gas station across the country.

Receipt scanning apps seem almost too good to be true. You use your phone's camera to snap a photo of your receipt and upload it to the app, and in return you get a reward in the form of a rebate or gift card. You may be wondering how these companies can afford to pay you for simply sharing your receipt with them. The answer is that they get paid for the information they collect. They're essentially conducting market research, and companies are interested in the demographic information and other pertinent data they randomly collect. Be assured that they are not collecting or sharing private information; they are tracking shopping trends.  ​

Online extensions are buttons you add to your browser's taskbar. 

While any one of these digital savings tools will help you save money on groceries and other essentials, combining them can yield even more impressive results. My top three tips for maximizing savings are as follows: 

• Maximize offers: You might think that the more you buy, the more you are spending. While that is technically true, it is also true that the more items you buy at the sale price, the more you save. Better to buy five tubes of toothpaste this week when they are on sale for 99 cents (with a limit of 5 per customer) and store them for future use than to pay $3+ per tube as needed. If you see an amazing deal, stock up on the sale item. 
• Stack coupons: Stacking coupons means using two coupons for the same item. The way to do this is to combine a store coupon with a manufacturer's coupon. Store coupons are issued by a specific store and can only be redeemed at the store issuing the coupon. Manufacturer's coupons can be redeemed at any store that accepts coupons. 
• Combine offers: This is my favorite (and most effective) way to save. Going back to my toothpaste example, Crest toothpaste was on sale at my local grocery store this past week for 99 cents. At the same time Ibotta was offering a 50-cent rebate on Crest toothpaste. By combining the two, I was able to get my toothpaste for 49 cents a tube. Last week I actually made money on Trident gum by combining offers. The gum was on sale for $1.29 per pack. Ibotta was offering a $1 rebate on two. This alone would have given me two packs of gum for $1.58, but because it was my sixth rebate that week, I earned a $3 bonus, so I actually made $1.42 on the gum! 

Maximizing your savings on groceries and other essentials using digital tools takes a bit of organization, but it is well worth the effort. I personally love finding new, effective ways to save money, and I get a real sense of satisfaction from getting a good deal. I hope you find these suggestions useful, and I invite you to share your favorite ways to save in the comments section below.