diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 390d86c7a..4b4bde6ad 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -25,6 +25,8 @@ Improvements:
    ([#634](https://github.com/Shopify/sarama/pull/634)).
  - Pre-allocate decoding errors, greatly reducing heap usage and GC time against
    misbehaving brokers ([#690](https://github.com/Shopify/sarama/pull/690)).
+ - Re-use consumer expiry timers, removing one allocation per consumed message
+   ([#707](https://github.com/Shopify/sarama/pull/707)).
 
 Bug Fixes:
  - Actually default the client ID to "sarama" like we say we do
diff --git a/consumer.go b/consumer.go
index c001794e1..c70b528f0 100644
--- a/consumer.go
+++ b/consumer.go
@@ -413,15 +413,18 @@ func (child *partitionConsumer) HighWaterMarkOffset() int64 {
 
 func (child *partitionConsumer) responseFeeder() {
 	var msgs []*ConsumerMessage
+	expiryTimer := time.NewTimer(child.conf.Consumer.MaxProcessingTime)
 
 feederLoop:
 	for response := range child.feeder {
 		msgs, child.responseResult = child.parseResponse(response)
 
 		for i, msg := range msgs {
+			expiryTimer.Reset(child.conf.Consumer.MaxProcessingTime)
+
 			select {
 			case child.messages <- msg:
-			case <-time.After(child.conf.Consumer.MaxProcessingTime):
+			case <-expiryTimer.C:
 				child.responseResult = errTimedOut
 				child.broker.acks.Done()
 				for _, msg = range msgs[i:] {