I know that
many of us are having a tough time making ends meet and thought that I could hopefully help others learn how to stretch their own
grocery budgets through the use of coupons.
Before I get
into how it all actually works, let me tell you real quick about why I had
gotten into it myself. One day I had caught an episode of a show called extreme
couponing. I watched in amazement as people rolled out buggies full of hundreds
of dollars’ worth of nearly free stuff. They had $600-800 dollars of food and
maybe paid $30 bucks for it! In some cases, they would not pay anything, and in
fact the stores paid them to take the stuff. I thought that would be
really cool if I could figure out how to do that.
The first
thing I soon learned was that this type of thing is not quite possible, at least not in my state. That is not to
say that you can’t walk out with a great deal, you absolutely can. Just don’t
expect it to all be completely free. Another important thing to tell you up
front, is that it takes time and work. When I was at my peak of couponing, I was
clipping, ordering, and printing out coupons on nearly a daily basis. I got really
into it. As silly as it sounds now, I was obsessed for a little bit and was determined
to get as much as I could for as cheap as possible. I feel like I should throw
in a little disclaimer here: now that I cook more from scratch I don’t buy the
same types of foods that I did before. With that being said I am a realist and
know that you are here because you want to know how to make this work for
you, so let’s get started.
There is a
lot of information you need to know before it’s time to grab your coupons and
go. The first thing you need to know is your local grocery stores coupon
policies. I say stores, because each one has a different policy. For instance,
we have a homeland store about 15 miles away they double one like coupon only.
But if I drive about 25 miles to another of these stores locations, (at last I
knew) they were doubling 3 like coupons. If you’re new to this your probably
wondering what this means. Let’s say I have a coupon that is .50 off of a box
of cereal. The first store will let me use that coupon, but they will also
double it making it a total of $1 off of that box of cereal. Now if I were to
happen to have 3 of these particular coupons, I could wait and go to the second
store instead and by 3 boxes of the cereal (because I have 3 of the coupons)
and they will double all three of them.
If you go to
a store like Walmart, they do not double coupons, but they are the only store
here that gives cash back. So if you make a purchase there and your coupon is
for more than the price of the product, they will give YOU money! So let’s put
this into an example that makes sense to you..
Let’s pretend I have a coupon
that is $4.00 of shaving razors. If I find those razors for $2.99 and give them
my coupon, whatever the difference is they will give me back. So, they
basically pay me .70 or whatever the amount to walk out of the store. But you
always need to read the fine print on coupons, because the store does too. They
hate giving cash back. If that coupon
says something like limit 4, or no more than 4 like coupons, that means you
must have a coupon for each item but they will only let you purchase 4 of the
same items. I have made that mistake and believe me they will catch it. If the
coupon doesn’t limit the number of items, then you can buy as many as you’d
like. I once went the Walmart with 25 coupons for $1 off of single bar of Dove
bar soap, guess what, the soap was only .97 to begin with so I only paid a
portion of the tax which was about $2.00 or so. That was well over a year ago,
and I still have some of that bar soap.
As I
mentioned get to know your stores policies, this is the first step. This allows
you to know how many of each coupon you need to acquire to use. The next step I
would say that you need to do is look on sites that do coupon matchups. These
sites do all the "leg work" so to speak, they have already figured out what’s
on sale at the stores and have found coupons to help you save even more money. I
use consumerqueen.com for this.
Once you
become familiar with how the matchup works, it’s time to start gathering
coupons. There are many ways to do this. You can begin by buying Sunday papers,
if you plan to shop at a store that doubles more than one coupon, let’s say
they double 3 like coupons like my store then I would need to buy three papers. A
huge thing to remember is that if you get the Sunday paper to save coupons,
save them until they expire. Your store might not have a particular item on
sale this week, but next week they might.
You can also order coupons or coupon inserts from
eBay or coupon service websites like thecouponclippers.com.
The last method is to print them out. You can go to sites like afullcup.com and they will let you
print out most coupons only once or twice from the same computer.
Stores also
sometimes have store coupons that they offer. You can use their coupon and also
a manufacturer’s coupon on one product, this is called stacking. Again, it is
important to first read your stores coupon policy because some won’t allow printed
coupons or they might limit the amount of home printed coupons that they
accept.
If you’re
going to coupon, definitely look for the stores that double your coupons. That
way you can save the most money!
It’s also
helpful to get organized. Many couponers get a binder and baseball card sleeves
and make sections or print off a template that already has sections for coupon
binders. This does entail a bit more work because you are clipping every single
coupon and categorizing them. If you’re interested in getting a free template,
I found mine at thekrazycouponlady.com.
Some people may just leave all coupons together and only clip them as they need
them. Find a way that works best for you.
So let me
recap real quick incase I’ve overloaded you.
1. Look up and print off each store’s
coupon policy.
2. Find a website that does coupon
matchups in your area.
3. Begin gathering your coupons; I’d do
this for a couple weeks.
4. Organize your coupons.
5. Prepare for your trip. Print out the
matchup and gather the corresponding coupons.
6. It’s a good idea to take along the
stores policy, just in case there is a question about something.
7. Don’t buy junk you don’t need.
8. But wait, what to do with expired
coupons….?
You’ll
noticed I mentioned don’t buy junk you don’t need. There are a lot of people
that think they have to use every single coupon they have. If you don’t use a
product, unless it’s free, don’t buy it. You’re trying to save money, not waste
it. Now if the product would be free, I would get it to either pass along to
someone who would use it or I would keep the item if it has a preparedness
purpose such as medical supplies or dry goods.
It takes a
few couponing trips to really get a handle on how the process works. I know
that sounds silly, but it’s true. When you get up to the counter and you’ve
gotten a few hundred dollars’ worth of stuff, if you have not properly planned
the trip, you’re going to either being paying too much or be embarrassed by
having to put stuff back. I’ve been in both of those situations, and it’s not a
fun position to be in.
I know this
all may sound like a lot of work, and honestly it is …at first. Once you get
the hang of it, it does get easier. Just remember to pay attention to sizes and
quantities and that they match the coupon.
Also don’t
throw those expired coupons away, donate them. Many people might not realize
that coupons can be used on military bases for up to 6 months after they’ve
expired. So donate them to military families to help pass along the savings. You
can go to supportourtroops.org
to get information about their "Troopon Program" or you can also adopt a specific
military family to send them too each month. Just look online for couponstotroops.com
they can help you find a family to help out, simply by sending them your
expired coupons.
You might be
wondering how much you can realistically save from couponing. I would save
anywhere between 60-85% of your grocery bill. That is extra money in your
pocket that you can put towards whatever else you need too.
If you’d like to
see one of my big hauls (as their called), I got $264.10 in groceries for only
$78.01, which saved me about 70% which was $186.09. Here’s the link: Sharon’s
Haul.
I hope this article helps but if you find yourself now utterly confused, Leave me a comment and I will help you out!
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