Happy Couponing Mama

Monday, April 13, 2009

An Apology and Adventures in Couponing

Heh, it's been 12 days. Sorry, guys! I've had a hard time coming up with new things to post so all I can do is be sporadic. Poop.

Today, I challenged myself to try Walgreens out. I generally stick to one of four places to buy household items: Publix, Kroger, Wal-Mart, and Target. Jamie likes to joke that I'm *always* at Target; not true, not true! I'm there at least once a week, though. I do love Starbucks Iced Lattes! I avoid Wal-Mart if I can since they have a horrible reputation for employee treatment, but they do have some great bargains, I will admit. Kroger and Publix are obvious because they are grocery stores and very close to my house. Wags, though, is not one of my normal stops, but I wanted to give it a shot.

This week, Wags had a deal where you get $6 in Register Rewards (RRs; basically a coupon for that much off your next purchase) WYB six Dove items (hair care, deodorant, soap), which are also 25% off. They also had 100-ct. packs of Splenda 2/$7, Kleenex 89 cents a box, etc. Here is what I got:

1st transaction
2 Dove conditioners @ $3.74 each
2 Dove shampoos @ $3.74 each
2 Dove deodorants @ $3.59 each
1 pack of Scunci hair elastics @ $2
= $24.14
- 7.00 coupons
= $19.07 after 8% tax

I saved a total of $15.39 after coupons and advertised savings. Additionally, I got $6 in RRs for the Dove products and $2 in RRs for the hair elastics. I turned around and used those on my next transaction:

2nd transaction
4 Splenda 100-ct packs @ $3.50 each
3 Kleenex 110-ct. boxes @ $1.29 each
= $17.87
- 7.20 coupons
- 8.00 RRs
= $4.00 after 8% tax

I saved a total of 20.76 after coupons and advertised savings. In total, I spent $23.07 and saved $41.15. I still feel like I could have done better, but holy smokes! I saved almost twice what I actually spent.

I did the same thing at Publix next. The savings weren't quite as good, but Cheerios were a BOGO deal this week and so, after coupons, I got 8 boxes of Cheerios (Multi-Grain, Frosted, & Honey Nut) for $11, which is about $1.38 a box for cereal that is normally upwards of $4. I also got two large bottles of EVOO (32 oz. each) as a BOGO, which made $12 bottles of EVOO only $6. That deal would have been sweeter had I gotten the coupons to go with it, but, alas, they wouldn't print. Publix also had 8-packs of Gatorade for $5 and then a $2 coupon stuck to each pack so I paid $3 for 8 bottles of Gatorade, which is about 38 cents a bottle. I also got two free reuseable bags for buying General Mills products. I love it!

I could go through each ad and tell you what's on sale that seems interesting, but I read so many blogs that have posts like that and I worry that I would just be repeating information that you could easily find yourself.

Want to save money like I just did? Here are my quick tips!

1) Subscribe to the Sunday paper. I pay about $7 a month to get the Sunday paper delivered, which saves me time and money. If I really want more coupons, I'll buy a second one the next day, but generally I get two sets anyway, one from my paper and one from my mother-in-law's paper.
2) Clip coupons. Don't clip every single one; just cut out the ones for things you already use.
3) File the coupons you don't clip for later. I keep each Sunday's inserts in an accordion folder. If I see something on sale that I don't have a coupon for in my binder, I will go back through the inserts to find one that I can use.
4) Organize your coupons. I use a zippered binder with baseball card pages. Each pocket holds a different coupon, folded where I can see the item, the expiration date, and the amount. This saves me so much time! I was using a purse-size accordion folder and I spent more time going through coupons than grocery shopping.
5) Shop where the deals are. If Publix has more items I need on sale than Kroger, I go to Publix. If I need a stash of birthday gifts for kids, I go to Target and stock up when they have toys and other stuff on sale.
6) Supplement Sunday coupon inserts with online coupons. I subscribe to Cellfire, which allow me to load coupons on to my cell phone or my Kroger Plus card. Kroger's website had a page of coupons you can print. Target has a page of grocery coupons you can print. I subscribe to newsletters and other such emails for products I buy a lot so I can get coupons in my email.

That is all for now. I'm taking suggestions for future posts! Happy Couponing!

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Printing Coupons & Publix Deals

In my very long list of links yesterday, I posted three websites that you can go to and find coupons that you print yourself. For me, these are hit-or-miss; since we are a South Beach Diet household, we buy more fresh food and a lot less prepackaged food, especially the convenience foods (like frozen meals, etc.). That is not to say that we don't buy those on occasion, but sites likes Coupons.com are great when you find something you can use. I recently found $1 off any Fiber One granola bars and, since those are presently my favorite snack, I printed as many as I could.

This brings me to my point. If you want to print coupons yourself, you need a laser printer. I haven't really had experience with inkjet printers and printing coupons personally, but I know that the consignment sales prefer that you print your tags with a laser printer rather than an inkjet printer because a laser printer is better at printing barcodes. Scanners read barcodes more easily if they have been printed with a laser printer. Our laser printer is about six years old, but it still works great. It cost us $150 in 2003 and maybe $60-$100 a year in toner catridges and paper, depending on how much we use it. You can get a relatively inexpensive laser printer for $100-$150 now. It is an investment I highly recommend.

Publix has some nice BOGO deals this week. Combine those with coupons and, voila, you have a very happy couponing mama!

BOGO A1 Steak Sauce
Minus $2 coupon here (remember to print two, one for each bottle!)
=$2 or less per bottle (depending on size)!

BOGO Kraft Salad Dressings
Minus $1.50 coupon from Sunday's paper (remember to use two, one for each bottle!)
=less than $2 a bottle!

Visit www.publix.com and click on Services to find a link to their weekly ad and see what deals are brewing in your neck of the woods!

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

The Benefits of Signing Up for Store Emails

Here is one (I hope the link works): http://mic.michaels.com/USAWeekly03-27A.aspx?id=34&referenceNo=01577918061

I have signed up for emails from such retailers as Michael's, BabiesRUs, Ann Taylor Loft, Ann Taylor, New York & Company, White House Black Market, Books-A-Million, Bath and Body Works, and more. Why? For every two or three ads for sales or new products they send out, I get at least one coupon like that 50% off one regular-priced item at Michael's. That's a nice benefit, especially if you shop often at a particular store.

"But, Jennifer, that's a lot of emails," I'm sure you're saying at this point. Yes, it is. On average, I probably about 10 emails a day from different retailers or other savings sites. It builds up fast and sometimes I forget to delete them. To alleviate the pile of emails in my personal email account, I started a second email account just for this stuff. I only check it once or twice a day and, since it is a separate email account from my personal one, I can keep up with my daily correspondence a lot more easily.

If you want to try this, sign up for one or two retailers' emails and see what happens. I guarantee you will be happy when you get that first coupon for the stores that you love.

Monday, March 30, 2009

One Example of How Coupons Rock!

If you are wondering how useful coupons really are, especially when you realize how much time it can take to clip and organize them, I hope this example will help convince you of their usefulness.

Publix is one of the best grocery stores in the area. Their everyday prices can be a little high, but their sales are excellent. They do Buy One Get One Free (BOGO) deals on many items every week. Combine a BOGO with coupons and, all of a sudden, you have saved yourself quite a bit of money. Here is my most recent BOGO deal that left me smiling from ear-to-ear.

I love Campbell's Select Harvest soups, but they are expensive -- $2.39 a can at Publix. This week, they have had the Select Harvest soups as a BOGO deal, meaning that each can is technically $1.19/$1.20 a can. A few Sundays ago, there were Buy 2, Get 50 cents off coupons in the Sunday inserts. I clipped a few plus traded for more. I went into Publix today with SIX 50 cents off 2 cans coupons plus a 75 cents off coupon from Target (Publix takes competitor coupons).

So...I bought 12 cans @ 1.20 a piece = $14.40 (before tax). Double the six 50 cents off 2 coupons, which Publix doubles everything up to 50 cents, and now I have 6 $1 off 2 coupons and that 75 cents off coupon from Target, making my coupon total $6.75.

$14.40 (12 cans of soup @ $1.20 a can)
- 6.75 (coupons)
= 7.65 (final cost for 12 cans)

That makes each can about 64 cents a piece. With the BOGO deal plus the coupons, I saved $1.75 a can or $21! Amazing!

Honestly, I still would have bought the soup even if I had not had the coupons, but saving myself almost $7 with the coupons means that I have $7 in my pocket to get toward other items and I have stocked up until the next sale on these soups.

I hope you can find a deal like this one that excites you as much as this one did me!

Welcome to Happy Couponing Mama!

For now, this blog is going to be just for me and my friends. I'm going to log my savings each week for those who are interested in getting into this couponing thing and are having a hard time getting started or are wondering if it is worth it.

Welcome to my blog! I hope that you all will share your couponing experiences with me as we all learn the best ways to save ourselves some moola!