Buying organic on a budget

We try to buy mostly organic milk, dry goods, meat, other dairy, etc BUT buying organic produce in Arizona is SO expensive and hard to find. When organic strawberries are $5 a pint (!), I mostly reach for the conventional strawberries for $1 pint.

There is a local, non profit co-op (volunteer run) that has recently added organic produce to their list. For $25, you can get a basket full of organic fruits and veggies. Today was their first pick up day and I was so excited! They have a pickup site right in my neighborhood (a total of 20+ sites in the East Valley).

From what I understand, the co-op has enough participants to have the same buying power as Sprouts, Whole Foods, etc. But, they don't markup the prices like the stores do- they share the wholesale savings with the co-op participants. Can't beat that!

This is what I got this morning for $25:


I figured out that I would have spent the same amount of $ if I bought the same amount of conventional items in a store.

For anyone interested, the website is www.bountifulbaskets.org