I personally find McCormick’s spices so overpriced that I laugh at them. Like $4-$5 for a container than I can go to Spice House and buy 4x the amount at the same price at much better quality.
There really ought to be a better word for it, as “buying in bulk,” to me, connotes buying large quantities of something. Anyhow, this is a meaningless side discussion. It’s clear what the OP had in mind when they said “buying in bulk” and it’s not buying how much you want.
Yeah this is how it is around us. Have you ever checked the “Mexican” aisle for spices at your local store,** Whack-a-Mole**?
In addition to these great tips, buy an inexpensive grinder ( I use a repurposed electric coffe grinder), get your spices whole whenever you can, and grind them when needed. Whole spices will stay fresh for years vs. only a couple months for the ground versions. Plus you can toast whole spices in a pan before grinding which makes them tastier when making curries and such.
Saffron is usually sold by the gram and used in amounts less than that. Penzey’s has it for $17.95 a gram, which is quite a bit more than one would usually use in a paella. Typical recipes call for a pinch of saffron threads. If you used an ounce of saffron in a paella for four people it would be inedible and would cost hundreds of dollars. Perhaps you were thinking of Mexican saffron, which is a lot cheaper but isn’t actually saffron (it comes from safflower instead of the saffron crocus).
Penzeys often have spices they give away for free to get you into the store. Many of their spices can be bought by the scoop.
If you’re putting an ounce of saffron in four servings of paella, your family must have really big appetites, or you like your paella extremely spicy. And, if you’re paying $8-10 for an ounce of saffron, you’ve either found the best place to buy spices…or, the worst (perhaps you’re buying red sewing thread instead of threads of saffron?). 
Pretty sure you mean “gram”, but even a gram of saffron threads (2tsp) should yield ~32 servings.
:smack: Ninja’d
You are correct, I was mixing up ounces and grams.
Which, given my history of recreational drug use is unforgivable. 
ETA: I can just imagine buying an 8ball of saffron.
Sometimes a health food store, or a natural foods store, will have a section where you can buy spices by the ounce from containers. I usually buy mundane things like garlic powder, cinnamon, pepper, seasoned salt, etc. from a place like Real Deals or a dollar store - some have more options like bay leaves, rosemary, or whole cloves. I will splurge on a bunch of dried oregano in a cellophane bag, like a bouquet, at a Mediterranean type market, strip the leaves and crumble them, and put in a jar. And finally, near the produce section there’s sometimes a rack holding little plastic baggies of spices, pretty cheap…I can’t see buying a huge bag of spice at the India imports place, I use a 1/4 cup a year and it would just lose all its taste after a while.
OK, so that works out to about 60 cents per serving for saffron, and that’s the most expensive spice out there. I stand by my statement that, even if you overpay for them, spices are pretty cheap.
Saffron keeps extremely well, as long as you store it well. I buy an ounce of best quality Spanish red, and it lasts me for years without suffering much loss in potency. The price is far better than the few threads you get at a supermarket, and the quality is superior. It’s not practical for most people, but I dabble in Indian cooking and I make saffron rice and paella during a typical year.
This. In a similar vein, I shudder when I shell out $15 for a pint jug of maple syrup but since I use maybe 6 tablespoons per stack of pancakes, it works out less than the eggs I used. The fake stuff isn’t worth my time.
Lakeview (think Wrigley Field area).
Err…
bulk
bəlk/
noun
noun: bulk
1.
the mass or magnitude of something large.
"the sheer bulk of the bags"
synonyms: size, volume, dimensions, proportions, mass, scale, magnitude, immensity, vastness
"the sheer bulk of the bags"
a large mass or shape, for example of a building or a heavy body.
"he moved quickly in spite of his bulk"
large in quantity or amount.
verb
verb: bulk; 3rd person present: bulks; gerund or present participle: bulking; past tense: bulked; past participle: bulked
1.
be or seem to be of great size or importance.
"territorial questions bulked large in diplomatic relations"
2.
treat (a product) so that its quantity appears greater than it in fact is.
"traders were bulking up their flour with chalk"You might think of it this way: the store has bought in bulk so that you can buy in portions. I shop for nuts, cereal, grains, spices, and trail mix in the area where the store offers the items it has purchased in bulk. I put the goods in bags and take them home to my own containers. Because the STORE has bought in bulk, I save on the cost of individual packaging.
At Central Market, HEB, or Whole Foods, I use their plastic bags. At my local food cooperative, I bring in jars or bottles and have them tared at the service counter before filling.
At work, I keep a shaker of saltless food seasoning I got at Dollar Tree. I used it to make Chex Mix last week and got lots of compliments on it
While spices might be cheap per serving, having to purchase a year’s worth of servings at a time can hit hard. Not to mention, it’s not a great thing to use year old spices.
One word: Costco
They sell jugs of high quality grade A amber for about $10/liter.
Bulk refers to how it’s shipped to the store, not how much you need to buy. “bulk bins” at grocery stores allow you to buy as much or as little as you want.
I find decent spices at the Dollar Store.
Ditto. Their dried basil tends to be old, but you can see through the container if it’s yellowy or not. I buy all other basics there.
For fancy cooking I prefer Penzey spices. And for dried basil, which I use by the crap-ton, I recently got a pound from nutsonline that I am really happy with. That oughta last me at least six months. LOL!
Rural King has four or five shelves of generic spices. Each is around $1.00.