An Easy Way to Cut Your Food Bill by at Least 30%

Let's face it, eating a healthy diet with lots and lots of fruits and vegetables DOES cost more money than living on rice, beans and potatoes. And with the higher cost of organic food, and the huge quantities of fruits and vegetables that are necessary to eat in order to be well nourished on a raw food diet, it's no wonder that many people find this diet a little expensive.

However, when we keep things in perspective, eating a raw food diet ends up being no more expensive than eating a "good" diet that features eating out, drinking good wine and buying delicacies and special ingredients. However, eating raw is generally not a cheap diet unless you live in a tropical country where lots of fruits and vegetables are available at very low cost.

The good news is that you can dramatically cut down on your food bills by following the simple tips I'm going to share in this article.

How to Get Organic Food for Less

We all know that eating more organic food is one of the best things we can do to limit our exposure to pesticides and help the environment. However, due to the cost of organic fruits and vegetables, many people cannot afford to eat organic.

But what if I told you that you can get organic food at the *same* price that your health food store gets it at, or less!

The secret to spending less on food and at the same time have access to higher-quality food is to buy in larger quantities and cut the middleman.

By doing this you will save *at least* 30% on your food bill, if not more.

*Buy Boxes*

When you eat a mostly or completely raw food diet, you can no longer buy foods the way most people do, which is to go to a store and buy a few apples or bananas at a time. You have to stop doing that and buy food by the case.

First of all, you won't waste any food since you WILL go through a case of food. Raw-food families will tell you they easily go through cases of food in no time, and even single people like me go through cases of food easily.

Second, it's a lot cheaper to buy by the case. When I buy organic bananas by the case, I get the *same* price for these bananas that the health food stores get, which is the lowest price possible. So instead of paying $1.30 a pound for organic bananas, I pay around 65 cents a pound.

Everything is cheaper by the box, and another advantage is that you'll have plenty of food. One of the main reasons why people fail on a raw food diet is that they don't have *enough* food. They live on a starvation diet, or worse, they run out of food completely and end up eating junk!

Find a Distributor

In order to buy food by the case, you will have to find a distributor or a food co-op. Distributors or food co-ops will be different in each city, but generally, the process is the same.

You will likely have to drive to a larger town in order to get food directly from distributors, but as I have found, by buying larger quantities you won't be wasting time going back and forth to the store several times a week.

I live in a small town and about once a week or less, I drive to the city in order to renew my supply of food.

Organic Food Distributors

The first type of distributor that you should look at are organic food distributors. Basically, those are the companies that health food stores deal with in order to get their food.

For example, in the Montreal area (and Quebec in general), the main distributor for organic food is called Distribue-Vie or SunOpta. In other cities, there are other distributors, but the idea is the same.

You can set up an account directly with them and cut the middleman. For example, when I was ordering with Distribue-Vie, they were sending me a price list once a week by e-mail. I would reply with my order, they would prepare it for me, and I'd go pick it up. I was able to order a case at a time or even half a case.

The good thing about this is that if you order in larger quantities, for a minimum of a few hundred dollars generally, they will deliver the order for you. If you can't meet the minimum to get free delivery, all you have to do is pool with other folks who want organic foods, and ideally those who'll eat them in large quantities.

To find the organic food distributors in your area either look in the Yellow Pages and/or ask the people who work at health food stores who their distributor is. Tell them you want to start a co-op. Then contact the distributors and ask them what you need to do to set up an account with them.

Produce Stores

In most cities, you'll have to “supplement” your organic food supply with some commercial fruits and vegetables, since there isn't a big enough variety of fruits sometimes.

The way to get great food at low cost is to go to certain produce stores. These stores are generally next to each other in an area where there's a Farmers Market. They sell to restaurants and individuals, and can sell you cases at a time at a good price.

For example, in Montreal, near the big market called Jean-Talon, there are several such produce stores. I used to go all the time to a place called Leopoldo, where an Italian guy knows me.

The advantage of dealing with these merchants is that they'll eventually get to know you and give you better deals on food, since you become a “great customer.” They'll also let you know what their best stuff is each week.

Discovering Shangri-La

For many years, I dealt only with the resources I mentioned above. I would go to the organic food distributors, buy all my boxes of fruits and vegetables, then go to the market and buy more boxes of non-organic produce, and finally stop at the health food store to buy the few vegetables I couldn't buy elsewhere in large enough quantities.

That was until I discovered another kind of distributor.

With the popularity of organic food, distributors of conventionally-grown foods now carry organic fruits and vegetables too. These distributors typically sell both organic and non-organic foods to produce stores. Supermarkets generally have their own distribution system.

This for me was the missing “link” - the place where many produce stores get their own food!

In Montreal there's an area called the “Marché Central” - central market - which is not the Farmers Market, but a place where tons of distributors are located.

What I found out is that I could just walk into one of those distributors (I go to Gaetan Bono), and buy all the food I wanted without ever setting up an account with them!

The place is like a huge fridge, and there are cases and cases of fruits and vegetables. They have mostly commercially-grown food, but also organic.

The prices are lower than organic food distributors and lower than produce stores that sell by the case. For example, cases of organic bananas are $25 to $26, while the organic food store sells them at $29 to $30.

When I discovered this, it was like Shangri-La for a raw-food enthusiast!

To locate these distributors in your area, the process is the same: ask around, or look in the Yellow Pages.

By following the simple tips I have outlined in this article, you'll be able to easily cut down your food bill by at least 30% while gaining access to better, fresher and more nutritious organic foods.

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