Keeping Baby Care Costs Down Part 1: The Infant Stages

In the first year of life, a formula fed infant will consume more than 12,500 ounces of formula. At a little over $4 a can, the average parents can expect to invest over $2000 just on formula. Add an estimated $750 for diapers, and another $200-$300 for baby food and other items.

Parents are looking at shelling out $3000 or more just to feed their new addition; not counting clothes and baby furniture or even the necessary toys.

If you don't have that extra three grand lying around, or if you want to keep more of it in the bank, here are some tips to minimize the cost of feeding your baby.

The biggest money saver, if there are no medical reasons to prohibit it, is to breast feed. Formula is the single most expensive part of having a baby, aside from the medical costs.

If breast feeding just doesn't work or isn't possible, you can still save big on formula. Sign up for every manufacturer's website newsletters and mailings. Enfamil, enfamil.com, sends checks and tips. Similac, welcomeaddition.com, sends samples and some coupons. Good Start, verybestbaby.com, sends regular checks -- i.e. $8 off. These add up fast. Have your family memebers sign up as well.

Be a coupon clipper. For example, Similac has been offering $5 off coupons in the Sunday inserts, online, and through some of the drug store chains for their Similac Organic powder. If you clip the coupon, and go to your local Wal-Mart you can save a big chunk of change. Wal-Mart currently sells the powder for $11.48. SEbtract the coupon and you're paying $6.48 to make 95 oz. of formula. If you can't find coupons, check out ebay.com. Many people offer the coupons for shipping plus a pittance for the organic version. The regular Similac coupons tend to go for about 2/3 of the value. I recently picked up $100 worth of organic coupons for a little over $5. Well worth it; I've still saved $95.

Where diapers are concerned, the same strategy applies. Sign up for all of the brands! While the coupons aren't as good as the formula offerings, it still adds up. And if you follow the store ads you can catch brands on sale and then take the coupon off the sale price. Most diaper manufacturers, including Pampers and Huggies, will regularly send you coupons for at least $1.50 off of diapers plus others for wipes and more.

For baby food, check out the big two, Gerber.com and beechnut.com, but don't forget to seek out Earth's Best as well. The big boys will email you coupons to your inbox that you can print. Both sites allow you to print them up to three times. So again, employ relatives to add their names to the newsletters as well. The coupons are worth it. Beechnut currently offers a BOGO (buy one get one) free for any first food; Gerber offers 75 cents off of two. And if your grocery store doubles coupons, then you save even more.

I recently took my printed out coupons from Gerber and with the store doubling the coupons, ended up with over $17 worth of baby food for $6.81.

Save your UPC and proofs of purchase; both Gerber and Beechnut offer mailed coupons in exchange for UPS. Gerber is the better deal on this, 10 UPS for $10 worth of coupons, limited oner per household. For this one, send them to relatives, neighbors and friends. Beechnut is stingier with an offer of 48 UPCs for only $4 worth of coupons, but it still adds up to savings.

Wholesale clubs are worth the cost to join with the savings you can see on baby food, formula and diapers. Although Babies R US comes close, within a few dollars, on the diaper costs and savings. Keep an eye out also on the baby events when Babies R Us and it's sister store, Toys R Us offer a booklet full of coupons from 15 % off diapers to $5 off various toys, to $25 off furniture.

Also sign up for the grocery store baby clubs. Pathmark recently offered a sale on the Similac Organic for 4 cans for $19.99. If you had those $5 coupons, the cans would have been free. While they limited card holders to 4 cans; you can make repeated trips on different days to obtain the most bang for your coupon.

With some smart planning, email listing, and coupon clipping, provided your baby's system can tolerate the formula, the cost of formula alone can be cut back to under $800. Baby food costs can be reduced by almost half, and diapers and other items, by about 20%. Follow these tips and watch that $3000 drop to a little over $1400.

Have any other money saving baby tips? Pass them on to me!