How to Build an Annual Plan
According to Capital One Shopping Research, the average Walmart shopper makes 67 trips to Walmart per year and spends around $54 each time, for a total of $3,618 per year.
While that might not seem like a lot, if you make $50,000 a year, that’s 7% of your hard-earned salary being spent at just one store. Multiply that by all the stores you frequent often, and you can easily see where all your money is going.
Stores are designed to get you to spend as much money as possible. They pay smart people bucks to reverse engineer human psychology to make it irresistible to buy things you don’t need.
You might think you have enough willpower to stick to a list — and maybe you do. It’s unlikely, though. If you struggle sticking to a list or staying under budget it’s because you’re playing a losing game shopping at stores that want every last penny in your wallet.
That’s why you need an annual plan.
An annual plan is a way of mapping out how you’ll spend your time and your money a year in advance. Instead of quickly running into the store every time you need to pick something up, you create a surplus in your home and shop from that instead.
An annual plan is taking your existing process for managing your household but scaling it across the entire year. Think of it as a 52-week schedule that determines how you’re going to run your household over the course of a year. This includes the regular chores that need done, the meals you plan to make, the state of your pantry, and how you plan to resource it all.
Rather than being frustrated that dishes have been left in the sink or angry at yourself for going over your grocery budget yet again, an annual plan gives you the flexibility to dial up or down your spending and time allocation as the year progresses.
By creating an annual plan and getting everything mapped out, you can eliminate decision fatigue, overspending, and sources of conflict in your home. You can read more about the logic behind using an annual plan here.
How to Use an Annual Plan to Run an Effective Household
According to The Motley Fool, the average consumer visits Target 43 times per year, spending around $50 per visit. That might not seem like a lot but that totals up to a whopping $2,150 per year. If you’re earning $50,000 a year, that’s about 4% of your salary spent at one store.
Use a simple spreadsheet to begin building your annual plan.
To get started, use a spreadsheet to plan everything for the year. Create a list of things you’ll need for your pantry, personal products you anticipate buying, tools you’ll need, and recurring chores around the home.
Here’s my pantry list:
Based on my eating habits, I know how much each ingredient in my core pantry needs. I’ll still need to go to the store—or farmer’s market—periodically for fresh produce, but with this pantry, I’ll always have something I can cook for dinner.
Your annual plan can also help you plan out meals. I use themes and look for recurring patterns to build my yearly meal plan.
I keep track of things I like, adding them to the next month. The more things I like — and regularly eat — the less planning I need to do in the future.
Mapping everything out all at once puts you in control of how much you spend and how much time you spend on tasks and chores around the home.
Download an annual plan template for yourself.
I took my annual plan and created a template you can download for yourself. Watch this tutorial on how to use it:
Think of this as a worksheet you can use to map out your own needs. Download a copy and tailor it at your leisure.
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