I’m lucky enough to work from home, so every day when I get hungry I just walk into the kitchen and make myself lunch from whatever we have on hand.  Most of the time, I have a wide selection and can choose something healthy.  For people who work five days out of the home, though, is it better to buy a cheap lunch or pack your own?

While there are quite a few inexpensive options for buying your lunch, it is most likely to be less expensive to bring your own lunch- not to mention healthier.  You could eat at many of the fast food locations, including Subway, McDonalds, Burger King and the local deli for about $6 a day.

If you were to bring your lunch, you could have healthier options, and more variety for $4 or less per day.  For example:

Turkey sandwich on wheat bread, with lettuce and tomato, light mayonaisse, handful of baked potato chips, an apple, and water would cost you approximately:

  • Turkey sandwich on wheat: $1.30
  • lettuce and tomato $0.50
  • light mayonaisse $0.15
  • apple $0.50
  • handful of chips $0.30
  • water (free from tap or water cooler at work)

total of packed lunch: $2.75

When you buy a pound of lunch meat, loaf of bread, head of lettuce and a few tomatoes, you will get several sandwiches from that purchase, which is how you can really help keep your costs down.  In addition, you can buy a bag of apples and a bag of chips to give yourself some “sides” throughout the week, as well.

For variety, you could have peanut butter and jelly, different types of lunch meats, and vary your fruit and vegetable selections.   Try chopping up raw carrots, filling celery with peanut butter or cream cheese, or buying canned fruit varieties.  You could also make healthy salads and bring to work to enjoy for lunch.  The result will be the same- a filling and healthy lunch for under $4 per day.

If you have dinner leftovers and a way to heat up your meals at work (microwave for employee use in the break room, for example) you have even more options for healthy varieties of lunches that save even more money.  If you consistently make just a little more for dinner than what your family eats, you could skip buying anything special for lunch and simply pack up some of the leftovers to enjoy over your lunch hour.