Coupons are cool!
My husband recently became a motivated coupon clipper. I think what inspired him was an article he read on MSN.com on how much money some people save on groceries. The biggest tip that we have learned in these short few days as coupon clippers is: buy an item on sale with a coupon. It’s as simple as that.
Since many coupons can be found on line, it makes it easy for us to access and print coupons. This comes in handy since we don’t receive the paper any more and usually forget to pick up a Sunday edition. Two sites my husband has found are: AFullCup.com, an easy to use site where you can browse by category and print coupons directly, and MySavings.com. Both of these sites require registration, but it’s painless enough. This is just a new way, for us anyway, to save money on our favorite items. Here are a few items we recently saved money on using coupons:
- World’s Best Cat Litter: The store in my neighborhood rarely puts this corn-based cat litter on sale. But, I lucked out yesterday; the store had it priced at $1.00 off. And, with my $3.00 coupon from MySavings.com, I walked out of the store saving $4.00!
- Green Giant frozen veggies: Purchasing two boxes on sale for $4.00 for two, plus our $.75 coupon, we saved $1.75!
- Raisin Bran cereal: Again, this was already on sale at a local grocery store, plus I had a $1.00 off coupon from MySavings.com. I saved a total of $3.50 off my two boxes.
- RoC Nightcream: As I age, those fine lines are becoming deeper valleys! To ward off age a wee bit, I use RoC Night Cream, it really works. However, it’s not cheap; a small tube usually costs about $20.00. Thank goodness I found a $3.00 off coupon. Now I just have to find it on sale, a more difficult task.
Another option for searching for coupons is through eBay.com. I’ve used this in the past to find rental car coupons, but people also sell grocery coupons. Being a 3-cat owner, I go through a bag of Iams cat food every two weeks. I just found $60.00 worth of Iams coupons for $10.00. Again, since this is a staple item in our house, the point of sale makes sense. Our goal is to reduce the cost of our basic necessities so that we can put more of our hard-earned money into savings.
Being new to coupons, do you have any suggestions for clipping coupons? Are there some terrific and easy to use sites you can add? How much money do you save on groceries by using coupons? I’m curious to know!
I used to try to use coupons, but found that most coupons are for things I wouldn’t buy anyway. Shopping for staples at Costco using my business Costco Amex True Earnings rewards card saves us money consistently, and we don’t have to deal with all those coupons!
Here’s a better idea that works for me – only buy what’s on sale at the grocery store. If it’s not on sale (meaning you need to know what the everyday and a good price is) then it doesn’t go in the cart. Stock your pantry/basement when things are deeply discounted – buy a years worth of TP if they’re basically giving it away. And don’t think you’re above eating or using generic and store brands. Most times, the white label goods are made on the same production lines as the brand names. It’s the same stuff without the fancy label and higher price tag.