5 Money Saving Tips for Christmas

Gretchen’s Note: Today I’m welcoming Samantha Geary, a UK blogger who is giving us some tips to save money on Christmas.  If you are interested in submitting a guest post like Sam did, use the form here

At the time of writing Christmas day is just… 37 days, 14 hours, 6 minutes and 20 seconds away.

Now when you look at it like that, it’s not far away at all is it? Some of us will no doubt have the gifts all sorted – the pair of comfy socks for grandma, the bottle of whiskey for dad and the stuffed toy for the little one are all but wrapped and ready to be farmed out. But when it comes to the festive period it’s not just the gifts that need to be thought about.

If you have the pleasure of entertaining the family, then you need to think about food, drink, recipes and all manner of time consuming and money draining activities.

But don’t get me wrong, Christmas is a great time, but there surely has to be a few ways that you can skirt around a few of those pricey recipes or DIY your decorations?

Keep Vouchers

On the run up to Christmas all the major supermarkets and department stores release vouchers and start offers, so make sure you keep an eye on these and you never know what you could save.

Collecting Nectar and Tesco Club Card points over the year, not only provides you with offers on what you buy most, but you can also can save you an absolute bundle on that big Christmas shop.

Switch Bank Accounts & Check any Potential Windfalls

Switching bank accounts over the festive period is an excellent and seldom used option. When you transfer your current account or credit account you can activate all kinds of perks. Money off purchases, cash back on household bills and even free gifts! So it’s certainly worth shopping around to see if you can save a little bit of cash, by literally doing nothing.

Similarly if you have had a loan in the last ten years or so, are you entitled to a PPI refund? It’s certainly an out of the box idea, but who knows what will come of it?

Ditch the Christmas Cards

A book of twelve, first-class stamps will set you back a whopping £7.56, so imagine you had 36 Christmas cards to send, you’re spending £22.68 just on stamps, let alone the cost of the cards themselves and this could go on and on…so you get the picture. Sure, they’re nice and traditional but when you really think about it, would you really want to spend £22.68 plus on something people will just throw away?

Probably not, right?

There is an alternative though – most of us utilise things like social media and online platforms, so why not have a digital Christmas card made up and send it via social media or email?

It’s not traditional, but it’s the twenty-first century.

Bulk Buy on Things You Know You’ll Need

The one thing that you know you’ll need plenty of is: booze. Beers, wines, champagne and spirits are all likely to be consumed at a fair rate of knots at this time of year and it can quickly mount up in terms of costing.

So buy in bulk, wines, champagnes and beers are especially good for this. They’ll be plenty of offers on bulk buying in the supermarkets, but typically your best bet is company warehouses and specialist alcohol stockists.

Should you have any leftover, then these bottles can be good for gifts for people throughout the year.

Drop Down a League

Yes, we all like the Premier League, but sometimes the lower leagues can provide just as much entertainment. And that is just the same with supermarkets. We all like Sainsbury’s, Waitrose and the big guns but we can get just as much value for money from the Aldi’s, Lidl and Asda’s of the world.

Who doesn’t love a good football/supermarket metaphor?

Have a Happy Christmas!

Sam is a keen UK blogger who is passionate about sharing her suggestions and tips with a wider audience online and enjoys writing articles that reach out to the readers.

*This post may contain affiliate links.  See my disclosure for more information.

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