Free stuff. You need it, you want it and it's easy to come by.
Studentbeans.com - This should be the first place you go. Vouchers, samples and deals on meals and movies make this a great place to start getting your free stuff from. You can also get free weekend gym memberships on occasions if you're curious about certain places.
Writing/E-mailing companies - If you buy a pack of doritios every now and again or a bag of M&M's, a bottle of Robinsons juice etc, keep the wrapping/label. I bought a bottle of Robinsons Fruit & Barely which had 'bits' floating around in it. Now, I'm the type of person that cannot drink any form of liquid if there are bits floating around. I e-mailed robinsons, told them what was wrong with my product, gave them the product information (on the label) and they sent me 3 £1 vouchers for Fruit & Barely. Now, Tesco's will do a £1 deal on 1 litre bottles of this stuff, so that 1 bottle I threw away turned into 3 free ones.
This will work with other places too. If you have a genuine complaint, keep the wrapping/label, e-mail or write to the company directly and they should refund you with another product or a fair bit more.
Money saving. Essential and vital to a student.
Seriously, just because you got your student loan and grant, don't think you can go crazy. It may work for your first year but of you go into your overdraft and don't pay it back by working during the summer (Like so many students do) then second year will be a struggle. Be cheap. That should be your motto. Buy Tesco value. See that Helmans Mayo? Tesco do it cheaper. See that can of Red Bull? Tesco do it cheaper. This will apply in most places (ASDA, Lidls, Aldi's etc)
I shit you not, the amount you can save by NOT buying brand stuff is amazing and most of the time the taste isn't all that different.
The market is your friend - Go to your local with a bunch of house/flat mates and buy a shit load of meat. Now freeze it all. Normally you can pick up 10 steaks for £5 near the end of the day when they need to sell their stock. Buy lots of chicken breast aswell. It's healthy and will fill you up. Get some rice with that and you'll feel like you've eaten a 5 course meal.
Make stuff in batches - I bought 1kg of mince meat from a wholesalers for £4.50, cooked it all up, chucked in 2 jars of bolognese sauce and got 5 meals out of it. 5 meals for £5.50. Just freeze up all of it and microblast it when you're hungry. That stuff will taste just as good from frozen.
Cook for everyone - If you live with other people, you should all come to an agreement that you'll take turns cooking dinner every night. It may not be feasible for everyone in your house/flat depending on if they finish late with lectures or have an evening job, but if there's enough of you, you may only have to cook dinner once a week. Thats 6 free meals, and it works out for everyone. Just think if you make up a big batch of Spag Bol for £5, you could thin that out with enough spaghetti to feed 7 or 8 people. That's £5 you've spent to have dinner every night of the week. Sound's pretty good right?
very helpful bro thanks for the post, show some love when you get a chance
ReplyDeletegood info man. appreciate it
ReplyDeleteThis is great stuff. I'm starting my second year tomorrow... Cheap is the way to go.
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great info.
ReplyDeleteGreat tips. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteUseful tips. thank you for them!
ReplyDeleteThank you for these tips !!
ReplyDeleteThat's good advice! I'll try to do this and save a lot of cash! Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDelete