Coupons, coupons, coupons. That is all you ever hear about these days. So I decided to give it a really try. What I hate most about it is, I feel unorganized!
Yesterday before our shopping trip I had a plan!
FIRST, I made a meal plan. You can do this for a week, two or a whole month. I made 18 different meal plans. I cleaned out or pantry to see what we had and planned around that. Let's say we where going to make Tacos. So in the pantry we have a taco kit with the seasons and the shells. So on the meal plan chart. I put Tacos, underneath I put ground beef. Because that is all we would need to make that meal. I continued like that.
After I was done I wrote down on a shopping list what we needed from the meal plan. Then added lunch meat, juice, ETC. Normal everyday things we needed. I did that off of our coupons we clipped. Say we had $1 off V8 Splash. That was the juice we would get.
So on the list I wrote. V8 Splash and next to it I wrote $1 off. I have to add we had coupons for all but the meat and about 5 other items on the list. After I have finished my list I put the coupons we would be using in a separate section of my coupon file.
At the store I tried to stick to the plan but you have to be aware, you may run into a few in store deals you can't pass up.
We came across a deal of by 10 of participating items (football promo) get $5 off at check out. I looked at the list and we where buying 6 of those items anyway. (Gerber puff, and other Gerber grads items) I had coupons for those already. $1.00 2 puffs and $2.00 off the other 4 Gerber items. So I added 4 other items from the list. The cheaper ones there where that would would use. So for buying those other 4 items, I got $8 off the Gerber items with the promo and my coupons.
Anyway, we went to Kroger and the double and triple coupons. Double up to .50 and triple up to .39. Which could make a .50 coupon a 1.00 off coupon. Easily making some items free. We did walk out with a few free items. 2 free Tic Tac (.75 off coupons) 2 free mentos gum (1.00 off coupons) and 2 free Crocker muffin mixes (.50 off coupons doubled).
We knocked about $60.00 off our bill, that is $60 we would have paid last shopping trip!
If you stay organized, it's is a lot easier to do, and I must say... IT'S FUN AND FEELS GOOD!
Give my way a try!
Do you have tips? Let me know!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I would love to get into couponing but the problem I have is my hubby brings up this :
ReplyDeleteThe coupons we get would be for things we normally wouldn't buy... like we'd be buying that item just because we had a coupon. I guess he's feeling like we'd be buying stuff we wouldn't use/or like just to save. So in turn we'd have this item and we'd still go back to buy our more preferred item.
Any suggestions??
Maybe just getting better at couponing would help with that, learning how to find/get coupons for things we'd normally buy.
Good suggestions Eric, organization is my main problem and the reason why I give up.
ReplyDeleteRachael, I feel the same way. What I do is have Ben bring home stacks of coupons in the front of the commissary, does yours have that? When you walk in the front door they have a rack that has stacks of military store coupons. Anyway, I have him bring those home and I go through them and find/clip all the items we want or use. I also do the online coupons and then keep my eyes open in the commissary for coupons attached to items.
Nicole, we do get those and we do use them, there's normally 3 or so in there that we'll use. The commissary back in VA would have different ones, you'd go home with 4 books or so to clip from but here there is only one type. :-/
ReplyDeleteProctor and Gamble had a thing special for military. I got the coupon book the other day and it was things like buy one Gain liquid detergent get one container of lysol wipes FREE, the whole book was loaded with BOGO coupons for things we normally buy!! I'm SO excited to actually use those!!
I wanna be the one handing the cashier 20-30 coupons saving like $100!! :D
I know it's possible, I need to get more into buying the sunday paper and printing coupons at home. I bought a little organizer thing a few months back and *tried* keeping my coupons organized by isle but then by the time I wanted to use a certain coupon it was expired :( failed big time on that one.
Erica, I like the idea with for lists and writing down that you have a coupon for that item, maybe I will try that next time I go shopping :)