This post may earn affiliate income from links and/or review products to help support this site from the companies .
Scoring 30 bags of chips for $10 is not the best deal if you are not going to be able to eat them before they go stale. By doing this, you may actually end up wasting money and spending more than you would have if you just bought what you needed. Here is a list of the 10 best and worst products to stockpile.
Best:
- Toothpaste – long shelf life and takes up little space
- Hand Soap – You can almost always find these cheap or free. You will always need soap and since there is no expiration and little space this make the perfect stock up item.
- Laundry soap – This is a score if you can find them on a hot buy. I go though about 1 bottle a week with my family of 9, so as long as you have a little space this can be a huge money saver.
- Shavers – It wasn’t until I started couponing till I felt the luxury of using a “nice” shaver. This will always be something I will stock up on if their are great deals. They save you a bunch and they are very compact….great for storage.
- Shampoo – If you like a certain brand and are a little picky about hair care, then shampoo is something you should stock up on when there is a hot deal.
- Sugar – If you are like me, sugar gets used a lot in our house…I love to bake and the last thing I need is to run out of sugar in the middle of a recipe. As long as you have a cool/dry location, then this would be a great saver for you.
- Canned food– You can’t go wrong with canned food……as long as you know you are going to eat it. I have gotten many things on great deals just because they were free but we never ate them. Wasted space = Wasted money.
- Coffee/tea – These can stay fresh for a couple of years as long as they remain unopened
- Diapers – These are great to stock up on as long as you have space and you think ahead to the sizes you will be needing.
- Tampons/pads – every time my stock pile runs out of these….I have total sticker shock. They keep getting more and more expensive all the time…. if you can find them for under $2 a box, I would consider that stock up worthy.
Worst:
- Toilet paper – you would think this is the best thing to stock up on but if you have very limited space, this can seem very invasive. Your square footage is more valuable than maybe the hundred dollars you saved.
- Mayo– after a about 6 months mayo can become rancid and have and off taste, so maybe 1 or 2 jars in the pantry depending on your usage.
- Chips – These tend to get stale within a weeks, even if unopened
- Dressing – Salad dressing gets rancid and can separate after about 6 months
- Nuts – Unless you are able to freeze your stock, nuts can get bugs in as little as 4 months
- Candy – candy can very to temperature, and also get bugs after a few short months
- Soda – after about 3 months, unopened bottles can loose their carbonation and become flat
- Pregnancy tests– If you find a nice stash of clearance tests…. resist the erg. These have pretty strict expiration dates leading to false readings.
- Medicine – unless you take a product on a daily basis, most medicine has a 1-2 year expiration. After that date your medicine can loose effectiveness or even is some situations make them stronger.
- Cereal – unless you have a huge family like me and you can go through a box a day you may want to reconsider, cereal boxes are not all that small don’t fit in a lot of cabinets, leading to you having to put it in the garage or basement. This is the perfect food to invite bugs and rodents.
