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Priority Grocery List System

jehnaz says:
I have created a hard list called "Shopping" in this I have every food item that I have bought or need to buy. Basically, this is my master list for shopping and includes everything related to food.

All my food items in this list are sorted by having two digit number in front of it. For example, 04 Apples. Each number represents a category so in this case 04 would be my "04 Produce" category. I have created a separate item in the list called "99 Categories" and have added a note to this item with a list of all my categories (so I don't forget!). And numbering the item "99" ensures this is at the bottom of the list as I don't refer to it frequently.

Now I use RTM priorities as follows: "Priority 1 = To Buy" and "Priority 2 = Not needed." That's it! So every time my shopping day comes I look at priority 2 items and tick the ones I need and make them Priority 1. This sorts my list and I have all the Priority 1 items (the ones I need to buy) at the top.

Once I have finished shopping I go into all the completed items and make them all incomplete and change the priority back to priority 2. And next week I start again by selecting the priority 2 items and making them priority 1 for those I need to buy.

Now, the reason I have priority 2 is because some items are weekly regulars and need to bought each week. For those with a small list can probably do without the priority 2 and just use priority 1 to mark as "To Buy". But I have a mega large shopping list and so it makes life easier for me to keep some regular items marked as priority 2 so I don't waste time going through all of the list.

And the items with no priority are at the bottom and are those that don't need to be bought very often, maybe once every 1-2 months.

In the supermarket, I only look at one list and that is the "Shopping" list and I only focus on the priority 1 items and check them off as I zoom across the aisles in the store.

Hope you like my Grocery system and I have tried to keep it as simple as possible and avoided creating multiple smart lists as I find I don't want to clutter my Remember The Milk interface.

Lastly, sometimes a particular food item runs out during the week and in this case all I do is just go into my "Shopping" list and look for the item and mark it as priority 1. So when my shopping day comes some items are already marked and I just need to do a little more work to mark the rest.

Thanks for reading :)
Posted at 3:01pm on June 21, 2013
julie.ricketts says:
Very clever!

If I could get the rest of my family on to RTM, they could add things to the list online instead of the white board on the fridge. ;-)

Posted 10 years ago
xtoq says:
Great tips! You can also use the "after" attribute to avoid having to uncomplete the shopping list. It will automatically make a new task for you when you're done with the current one.

I have a detailed explanation here if you're interested:
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/tips/12995/
Posted 10 years ago
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