What Does the Weekly Shop Really Cost? Here's How to Find Out

"How much goes on groceries each month?" Most people can only give a rough guess, and that guess is often well below the real figure. It's not dishonesty. It's how shopping happens: the big shop on Saturday, a quick stop for milk and bread in between, something for dinner on the way home, drinks for guests at the weekend.

With food prices noticeably higher than a few years ago, it's especially worth taking a closer look.

Why "groceries" is too broad a category

In most budget books, the supermarket goes into one category: groceries. But a typical shop at SPAR, BILLA, HOFER or LIDL (the big supermarket and discount chains in Austria and Germany) contains far more than food:

• Toiletries and household basics (toothpaste, shower gel, laundry detergent)
• Drinks, including alcohol
• Household supplies (kitchen roll, bin bags, batteries)
• Pet supplies
• Special offers from the non-food aisle

If all of that ends up under "groceries", the food looks more expensive than it is, and it's easy to miss that it isn't the food driving up the total at all, but everything around it.

Step 1: Record every shop for a month, line by line

To find out, the line items on the receipt have to be known. Typing out a 30-item shop by hand isn't realistic. This is where a receipt scanner helps, one that reads not just the total but every single line item and sorts them into categories.

In Money Koi, this happens right on the phone: take a photo of the receipt, the app reads the line items, checks them against the total and books each item into one of the book's categories. It learns from corrections and booking history, and no cloud service is involved in reading the receipt. The shop then isn't a single booking of "Groceries €87.40", but what it really was: say €58 on food, €14 on toiletries and €15 on drinks.

Important: record the small shops in between too. They're exactly what's missing from the estimate.

Step 2: Review after a month

After four weeks, there are real numbers. Worth looking at:

• How much per week and per person? This makes the figure comparable, even if the household changes.
• How many shops per week? Every extra trip to the supermarket is a chance for impulse buys.
• Which categories are the biggest? Drinks, sweets and snacks, ready meals and meat are common surprises.
• How much goes to each shop? Sometimes it turns out that the "quick shop" at the pricier store round the corner adds up to more than the big weekly shop at the discounter.

In Money Koi, Analytics (in Pro) shows, among other things, the top merchants, where the money goes by category and how that changes from month to month.

Step 3: Target the right spots instead of cutting across the board

"Spend less" isn't a plan. With real numbers, though, the effort can go where it actually pays off, and nobody has to eat worse for it.

Shop with a list. The classic, because it works: shopping with a plan means fewer impulse buys. A shopping list on the phone that the whole household can use also prevents buying things twice.

Shop less often. One big, planned shop a week plus at most one small top-up is usually cheaper than going every day.

Try store brands. For many basics, such as pasta, rice, flour, dairy and tinned goods, the difference from branded products is small in taste and big in price.

Use offers wisely. Supermarket discount stickers and multi-buy deals are worth it for things that are needed anyway and can be stored. For everything else, they're just a reason to buy more than planned.

Plan for leftovers. A regular "leftovers day" each week cuts down on food waste, which is money that would otherwise literally go in the bin.

Look at drinks and toiletries separately. If these are big items, it pays to buy them deliberately: toiletries when the drugstore has offers, drinks in larger packs.

Step 4: Set a realistic budget

Only now, with a month of real data, does it make sense to set a budget. Take the actual figure and knock off a small, realistic amount, around ten percent. A budget that holds does more than one that fails every week.

In Money Koi, a budget for the category does exactly this, and during the month it's always visible how much is left.

The bottom line

Most people underestimate what they spend at the supermarket, and almost nobody knows exactly what on. Recording every shop line by line for a month gives a clear picture and makes it possible to save where it counts: with a shopping list, fewer trips, store brands and a realistic budget. All without giving up good food.

Money Koi reads receipts line by line, right on the phone, without a cloud service reading them, and with Pro adds shopping lists that can be booked as an expense once the shop is done. The budget book and the scanner are free for Android on Google Play and need no account. iOS is planned for the end of 2026.