The Estevan Salvation Army is offering some helpful tips for shoppers with grocery prices remaining high across Saskatchewan and Canada.

Community Ministries Director Ronza Reynard says there a number of things you can do to make your grocery shopping more efficient.

"I would say for people to sit down and try to meal plan," said Reynard. "I feel if we have a list of exactly what we need, we can then also apply that to the flyers. So check your flyers when they come in, see what grocery stores have what on sale this week and how you can combine that with your meal plan."

"And I think that will help cut down on some costs, because then we're not buying things that we're not needing this week or within the next week or two."

Reynard said online shopping could be a good option for some people as well.

"If you're like me, sometimes I go down those aisles that I shouldn't be going down," she said. "You can go online to the grocery stores and pick out what you want and then go there and they'll have it already packed for you. Again, that also makes you only buy what you need, because you're not browsing the store."

"You'll start to see the difference," she continued. "I've spoken to somebody and they said in one month it's amazing how much they can save by doing it online."

Reynard is also practicing what she's preaching. Her and her team are out grocery shopping every week. She said people will start to reap the rewards of better grocery shopping if they put more work into it, just like anything else in life.

"It takes a little bit of work...maybe you need to do meal prep. I find a lot of people do meal prep on Sunday and it gets them going for the rest of the week," she said. "I think it's just that we need to put more work into going grocery shopping. It's not just going to the grocery store and getting our stuff. I think we actually need to sit down and put a little more time and effort into deciding what we want to get at the grocery store."

Another way to offset the high food costs is to take advantage of community events, Reynard said.

"When Warm Welcome Kitchen gets up and running, go have a meal with people. Sit down, have conversations. That saves you a meal or two that week...take your family to it. We have a senior's lunch," she said. "So keep an eye out for some of these things that the community is offering people. Go and socialize with people and have that meal...it can save a couple of dollars as well."