How much can I really save with deal-based planning?

Realistically 20 to 35 percent per weekly grocery shop. A household that previously spent €100 per week lands at €65–€80 with consistent deal planning. Over a year that's €1,000 to €1,800 in reduced grocery costs.

Do I have to shop at several supermarkets every week?

No. Shopping at a single supermarket already saves 15–20% with this method. Combining two close-by stores (e.g. Aldi and Rewe) saves another 10–15%, but costs more time.

What if the deals don't match any obvious recipe?

Focus on 4–5 base ingredients per week (e.g. potatoes, chicken, peppers, yogurt, rice). If you can't build a dish from those directly, use a recipe search engine like Allrecipes or let Flyva do the matching automatically.

Does this work with special diets?

Yes. Vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, low-carb — the order stays the same: deals first, recipes second. You just filter the deals for ingredients that fit your diet and build the plan on those.

How often should I update the deal plan?

Once a week. Most supermarkets rotate weekly promotions on Monday. Planning Sunday evening or Monday morning gives you the longest window to use the current offers.

Plan a Weekly Grocery Shop Around Sales: Save 20-35%

If you really want to save on groceries, you have to reverse the usual approach. Instead of choosing a recipe first and buying ingredients at full price, plan your recipes based on sales. This simple lifestyle change cuts monthly grocery costs by 20 to 35 percent — realistic numbers, not marketing claims.

This guide walks through the method in detail: how to read offers, how to turn them into meals, what mistakes to avoid, and how to do the whole planning in 20 to 30 minutes per week.

The paradigm shift in the supermarket

Most of us know the feeling: you're craving a specific dish, head to the supermarket, and realize at checkout that the ingredients were extremely expensive. The better way: look at what's discounted first, then decide what to cook.

Creating recipes based on sales means staying flexible. If bell peppers are expensive this week but zucchini is on sale, you're having zucchini stir-fry. A single swap like this saves €2–€4 per shop. Over a year, that adds up to real money.

According to Eurostat, EU food prices rose more than 25% between 2021 and 2024. Shoppers without a strategy pay the full inflation premium. Deal-based planning offsets most of it.

The method in 5 steps

Step 1: Read the offers

The weekly flyers are online:

Or bundled on portals like Marktguru and Kaufda.

Step 2: Categorize ingredients

Group the interesting offers into four buckets:

Starches: potatoes, rice, pasta, couscous, bread
Proteins: chicken, ground beef, fish, eggs, yogurt, cheese, legumes, tofu
Vegetables: peppers, zucchini, tomatoes, spinach, carrots, broccoli
Extras: cream, crème fraîche, spices, herbs, canned goods

Step 3: Assign meals

For each dish, pick one starch, one protein, one or two vegetables, one extra. You get a complete meal automatically.

Example for a week with potatoes, chicken, peppers, yogurt, and tomatoes on sale:

Day	Meal
Mon	Chicken-pepper skillet with potatoes
Tue	Baked potatoes with herb yogurt
Wed	Potato soup (uses leftovers)
Thu	Tomato-chicken casserole
Fri	Pepper frittata (uses leftover eggs)

Step 4: Build the shopping list

Collect the ingredients of every planned meal, strike duplicates and subtract what is already in the cupboard. Then sort the list by store section, not by meal.

The reason is practical: a list sorted by meal sends you across the shop five times. A list sorted by section you walk once. That saves time and cuts the passes along the shelves where impulse buys happen.

Working order: produce, dry goods, tins, chilled, meat, frozen, drinks.

Step 5: Shop and stick to the list

Hardest step. According to the Food Marketing Institute, around 60% of all purchase decisions are made in-store. A solid list cuts impulse buys dramatically.

The challenge: running out of recipe ideas

The biggest catch with this strategy is often your own creativity. You see eggplants and ground beef on sale but can't immediately think of a dish. Searching recipes takes time, and the recipes you find often need other expensive ingredients.

Two paths from here:

Classic: recipe search engines

Platforms like Allrecipes and BBC Good Food support ingredient-based search. Type "eggplant, ground beef" and get matching recipes.

Downside: you have to check each recipe individually for budget-fit.

Modern: Flyva

Flyva automates the whole process:

Reads the current deals: Flyva reads the current offers of up to three supermarket chains you pick (including Aldi, Rewe, Kaufland, Edeka and Lidl).
Recipes from its collection: Picks recipes based on sales from its recipe collection, favouring dishes whose main ingredients are on offer. No manual brainstorming.
Shopping list from the plan: Turns the plan into a shopping list, and you choose which dishes go on it.

Benefits of this strategy

Consistently picking recipes based on sales pays off on several fronts:

Large cost savings: You buy almost exclusively discounted or seasonally cheap goods.
More variety: Weekly offer rotation means automatic variety. You don't fall into the same default dishes.
Less food waste: Planned shopping means less ends up in the trash. The UN Environment Programme's Food Waste Index estimates 132 kg of food is wasted per person per year globally.
Less stress: With Flyva, the daily "what should I cook?" question disappears.

A real-life example

Open Flyva on Monday morning. The app shows: this week, tomatoes, mozzarella, and fresh basil are heavily discounted, plus chicken breast and potatoes. One click and Flyva puts together your week from its recipe collection. Five of the dinners:

Monday: Caprese salad with tomatoes and mozzarella
Tuesday: Tomato-mozzarella pasta
Wednesday: Chicken with baked potatoes and herbs
Thursday: Stuffed chicken breast with mozzarella and tomatoes
Friday: Potato gratin with mozzarella

Five dishes, estimated cost for 2 people: €22–€28 for the full week. No brainstorming, no individual recipe hunts, everything aligned with the deals.

Quantity guides per person per week

These figures are why planned lists come out shorter and cheaper than estimated ones. They assume one adult with five cooked dinners a week.

Category	Per person / week
Protein (meat, fish, tofu)	500–700 g
Eggs	3–4
Pasta, rice, couscous	400–500 g
Potatoes	1–1.5 kg
Fresh vegetables	1.5–2 kg
Fruit	1–1.5 kg
Milk and yoghurt	1–1.5 l
Cheese	150–200 g
Bread	500–750 g

Once these are internalised you buy noticeably less without anything running short. The classic over-buy happens with vegetables and fruit, because both spoil quickly and visually look like less than they are.

Worked example: 4 people, under 100 euros

Starting point: mince, chicken thighs and courgette are discounted; pasta and rice are in the pantry.

Day	Meal	Main ingredient
Monday	Pasta with mince sauce	mince, pasta
Tuesday	Chicken thighs with roast potatoes	chicken, potatoes
Wednesday	Courgette bake with leftover mince	mince, courgette
Thursday	Chicken and rice skillet with vegetables	chicken, rice
Friday	Lentil dish from the pantry	lentils
Saturday	Combine leftovers	–
Sunday	free	–

Three staples, five meals, every ingredient used at least twice. A four-person household following this pattern usually lands between 85 and 100 euros a week. Without a plan the same need runs 130 to 160 euros.

For fuller family plans see weekly meal plan for a family of four.

The pantry as a buffer

A pantry is not prepping, it is the precondition for the two leftover days. Buy these ahead on offer rather than weekly:

Pasta, rice, flour, passata, oil, onions, garlic, lentils, stock, spices.

With those in place, any spontaneous meal is covered without a top-up shop. That top-up shop is the most expensive operation of the week, precisely because it happens hungry and unplanned.

Common mistakes and how to avoid them

Mistake 1: "Only buy discounted items"

Even discounted items can be unnecessary. Stocking 5 kg of flour on sale when you rarely bake is waste, not saving. Only buy discounted items you'll actually use.

Mistake 2: "Always go to the cheapest supermarket"

Driving between Aldi, Lidl, Rewe, Edeka, and Kaufland burns the savings via fuel and time. Usually one main store plus possibly one second is enough.

Mistake 3: "Note deals for later"

Most offers last only one week. Saving them "for later" loses access. Better: plan and cook now.

Combines well with other strategies

Recipe-to-sale planning stacks nicely with:

Meal prep: See meal prep for beginners
Freezer prep: See freezer meal prep
Family and student planning: See cheap family meals and student meal plan
Discounter guides: Aldi recipes of the week, Lidl weekly plan, Aldi & Rewe guide

Bottom line

Say goodbye to rigid meal plans. Once you plan recipes based on sales, the amount of money left over at the end of the month is surprising. Simple method, measurable results. Manually in 20–30 minutes per week, or automatically with Flyva — both work.