Savy Saturday #2: Date Night (Part 1) - Dinner

Savy Date Night Part #1: Dinner

When it comes to date night in our house, it is important that we enjoy ourselves but also mind our budget.  Keeping date night as cost efficient as possible helps decrease the stress and increase our enjoyment!  Besides, it’s not about fancy restaurants or expensive entertainment.  It’s about quality time to make sure we enjoy the one thing that created our family, each other and our marriage!

Tips for saving money on the meal portion:

E-mail/Text Clubs: Have favorite restaurants? Then make sure you take the time to sign-up for their e-mail or text message clubs.  They will frequently send you coupons and discount codes for % off your next visit or even free food, such as appetizers or desserts.  Additionally, they will keep you up to date on their current specials and events where they will reduce certain menu items during a certain time period. Make sure if they offer it you put in your birthday or anniversary.  Most places send you significant % off coupons or certificates for free food for these occasions! Around our birthdays and anniversary we get all sorts of free dinners/food!  It’s really great!

Time It Right: Instead of going out at night, go out during the day on the weekend.  Lots of restaurants (especially more upscale ones) have greatly reduced $ menus catered to lunch guests.  Perfect portions at perfect prices!  

Go out between meals for a mid-afternoon treat at your favorite dessert/ice cream shop.  Or even go to your favorite place and split an appetizer or favorite dish. 

Online coupons: Search online prior to going for coupons that are printable.  Some restaurants post coupons on various sites for printing. 

Online Discount Sites: I'm sure you have heard of Groupon, LivingSocial, and possibly others.  These are sites that offer for a limited time certificates for restaurants at dramatically reduced rates.  The easiest way to keep up to date on what they offer is to subscribe via e-mail.  They will send you daily or weekly e-mails highlighting what offers they have going for your area.  The most important piece of shopping on these sites is READ THE FINE PRINT.  Some of them are limited to certain days of the week or certain locations. 

Coupon Book: At the beginning of the year, invest in a coupon book from Entertainment.com. These books are great if you live in major metro areas because they have a wealth of coupons off of numerous restaurants, entertainment venues, services, etc. The books usually cost between $25-$35 and it covers the whole year.  You can even sign up for annual subscription where it automatically bills and sends you the new book every year.  

Gift cards:  If you have a membership to a wholesale club (i.e. Costco or Sams), then you may find that your favorite restaurant sells gift cards there at reduced prices.  Most of the time you get $100 worth of gift cards for $75-$80!

Save up those gift cards!  When we get gift cards for holidays or birthdays, we hold onto them and use them for our date nights.  Usually our loved ones ask us what we would like as gifts and we provide them with a list of places we like to dine.  Even if the card is just $25, when paired with a coupon, it can cover the majority of your dinner.  

Points, points, points!: If you use a debit card regularly, make sure you sign up for a points program that is associated with it!  It’s a great way to stack up $ and buy gift cards or even redeem for cash!  Consider it a small “side job” that the bank provides you free of cost.

These are just some of the ways we like to save on our date nights and I can tell you that they all work! 

I would love to hear from you in the comments below on ways you save! 

Next week on Savy Saturdays: Date Night Part 2-Entertainment....