Coupon Help

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Hey all, I have been trying to use coupons for the past month. I've also kept track of spending and used a price book. I really need help figuring out how to use coupons because I can't seem to save money using them.

I am sending out a call to those super frugal people who are able to use coupons. I am hoping that you will take the time to write in detail what you bought for $60 that was worth $120 and you save $60 using coupons/store sales.

I have posted on another website and my blog about coupon shopping. And there are always people who say it can be done. Or they say they are saving their families a ton. BUT no one ever posts what they actually buy for say $60 and shows me how to shop and eat using coupons.

So I was hoping that people who use coupons a lot, especially the grocery game, will share their shopping lists and prices with me so I can attempt to buy the same things. If not I"ll finally learn once and for all that coupons are not for me.

We don't eat a lot of processed food, frozen food, or premade stuff. We also don't have a ton of space to stockpile like 30 boxes of something. And where we live coupons aren't doubled.

But I'm hoping that people here can help me learn what they buy to feed their families for cheap using coupons. I've been doing the grocery game and coupon mom and been unable to find coupons I use.

[nanamom]

I am so glad you posted this and I can't wait to see the answers. I have tried coupons but we also don't eat alot of prepared mixes (plus we are vegetarians) so never seem to find the right coupons. I am looking forward to the detailed answers myself.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Thanks, I eat a lot of fresh fruits, veggies, and meat/seafood. I spend about $70-100/week and we make a lot of things from scratch. We make bread, pasta, eat brown/white rice at home, make pizza dough

Instead of store processed foods we go out to eat because we enjoy it more. So I just find it's hard to use coupons.

[annalaurab]

In all honesty, I don't think coupons are the best way to save money. Usually most of them are for brand name products which cost more anyway. Unless you can find a store which douples them. I am curious as well to see other replies.

[boefixepa]

I'm with you. I buy basic cooking stuffs, and produce and I've never found coupons to be the end all save all...I'm interested to see what others have to say.

Like most of you I believe a vast majority of coupons are for processed, uneeded items. You if you buy them even at a 'good deal' you don't save money because you didn't need them and wouldn't have bought them in the first place.

Really, I've never seen a coupon for bulk flour.

Personally, if I have to spend three hours looking through coupons for sunny D, the newest 'luch box fad', or sugar cereals to find the one coupon for something I would buy. I'd probably only save .25 cents. That's just not worth my time for me.

So if someone else shops this way and knows how to use coupons. I too am all ears.

[genmed]

In defense of couponing -- although I agree there's a lot of processed food out there and I won't argue with any of the points made. I think using coupons varies person to person. For me -- I do try to eat healthy, but I do use coupons. For an example of things I have bought in the last two weeks: Keep in mind, these are things I cook with and I use.

Perdue ground turkey 1.99/lb - 0.35 coupon (doubled)
Pillsbury Whole Wheat Flour on sale 5lb 1.50 - 0.35 coupon (doubled)
Birds Eye Steamfresh Veggies 1.00 -0.50 coupon =.50; since stores have brocolli and other veggies pretty expensive out of season I do this. During the summer I either grow fresh veggies (have seeds poking up now) or visit the farmer's market
Soymilk 1.79 on sale -1.00 coupon
No Salt Tomatoes/tomato sauce 0.60 a can on sale -.40 coupon =.20 each
Old fashioned quaker oats 1.00 on sale -0.50 coupon doubled =Free
Rotini Whole Wheat Pasta 1.00-B1G1 Free coupon =0.50 each
Yogurt 0.50 each with a coupon, sorry I can't remember the exact amount =.20 each
Recently lots of free dog and cat food coupons
Toiletries (shampoo, toothpaste, toothbrushes, etc) can be gotten often free or near free.

No, I can't get coupons for fish, some can, but I can't - I'm limited by what's available for everyone else around here. So, I buy fish and meat often full price (occassionally can get perdue/tyson coupons but rarely and only use when on a great sale). A lot of my whole grain cereal, oatmeal, quinoa, whole grain flour, yeast I can get pretty cheap. Same with soymilk. I make a lot of our own breads, pizza dough, etc. Frozen veggies can be gotten pretty inexpensively. Same with dog food/cat food/toiletries, cleaning supplies and some over the counter medicines. Also applies to low-fat cheeses and canned or dried beans.

I don't use coupons if the "generic" is less than the name brand, I buy generic.
I am not saying couponing is great for everything, but it has helped really get my costs down.

For instance, I can never use coupons with brown rice. We have a great asian store around the corner where a big bag of brown rice is really cheap. I'll never beat that using coupons and won't waste my time trying. If you live somewhere where you can get bulk whole wheat flour cheap it wouldn't make sense to use coupons to buy it in the grocery store.

My strategy on using coupons is that I have a set of items I cook with generally. I keep a list of those. Whenever they are on sale with a coupon very cheap I stock up. If I need something not on sale, I'll go with whatever brand works out to be the cheapest/do without.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Right but real couponers can live on $30/week or less. I have no idea how but I'm dying to try and find out. I'd like to at least look at a menu and see if I can live off what they are eating.

[tinapbeana]

any coupons i use are typically for toiletries, medicines, baggies/foils/wraps, and condiments. i typically don't find coupons for the actual food i buy.

[genmed]

"Real couponers" may be able to live off $30 a week or less, but yes if they are buying all processed food -- they might be coming to see me for some expensive medical bills when I get done school.

We're down to about $50 per week for 2 people, covering groceries and toiletries. Without spending a lot of hours on coupon stuff. I can't really see doing too much better without sacrificing the amount of fruits/veggies I eat.

You say you are spending $70-100 per week. Truthfully if I had kids, I have no idea how I could get that any lower.

[PrincessPerky]

I do not think 30$ a week is for 'real food'...I could be wrong, and Flash might be able to do it, but as I see it you can get some things with cupons...not all. And the time to find the things is hard!

We do find some (beer asile!) and I am perfectly willing to take any offered. Plus I will look at other peoples papers, but I wont spend a cent myself.

I think cuponing is a skill like any other...you try a small part of it, then you add on. Maybe if I keep going one day I will be better at it, but for now the occassional meat purchase at great prices (I can often get it for 50cents or less a pound with a beer cupon..no beer purchase or other purchase needed...you gotta keep looking though)

Maybe the persistance we have in the beer asile (in charlotte NC, no idea how this may vary in other states) would work if I sifted thru those sugar cereals cupons too...I dunno not ready to try yet

[Daylily]

I think that unless you live in the land of double-coupons, you won’t be able to get to the point of $30/week for a family.

I do use coupons and I enjoy it. I have been unemployed for the past three months and in that time I have definitely ramped up my coupon usage. However, being unemployed gives me the time to shop at multiple grocery stores and it gives me the time to search for printable coupons on the internet. Once I return to work (if I can ever find a job!) I won’t have as much time to devote to it.

I have recently started doing the Free-After-Rebate programs and the incentive programs offered by the drugstores. I am getting free toiletries out of this. However, it does take time and I do enjoy the ‘hunt’ and the ‘thrill’ of the freebie. Again, once I return to work I probably won’t have the time to keep this up.

As part of my coupon usage, I have started a price book. It doesn’t make sense to use a coupon on a name brand item if the generic brand is less.

Have you tried Hot Coupon World? Some of the moderators from that forum have just joined our blogs. I love HCW!!! You can find the grocery store where you shop and you can converse with others as to the weekly specials and the corresponding coupons to get the most bang for your buck.

Good luck.

[Daylily]

Have you looked at Flash's article '$330 in Groceries for $27' on Grocery Coupon Guide?

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Nope where is that article Daylily? Could you link it? And okay I don't live where they double coupons. We currently with all toiletries probably live on $75/week for 2 people. I think it's really high when families of 5 live on $250/month for food.

They do not write what they are eating however, and I do know that some do write what they are having for dinner and it's unappetizing. Like hot dogs, or mac and cheese, or just a lot of fast not freshly cooked food.

[disneysteve]

Like the OP, I am always suspicious of folks who claim to be saving hundreds with coupons. The problem is we don't see what they are comparing to.

If Kellogg's Corn Flakes are $4.00/box and you have a $.50 coupon that gets doubled, that's $3.00/box. But I can go to the dollar store and get the store brand for $1.00/box.

We do use coupons but not very much. We always try to match the coupon to a weekly sale on the item. Even then, we make sure to compare the price to the comparable store brand. Very often, even with a sale and a doubled coupon, the store brand is still cheaper.

I think coupons are best if you are very brand loyal to the major national brands. And, as noted, you eat a fair amount of processed and convenience foods.

[Daylily]

Here it is. Grocery Coupon Money Saving Guide - Saving-90-percent-on-groceries

[Daylily]

I was trying to find more examples of where someone had actually listed a breakdown of actual purchases vs. coupons over on HCW but I couldn’t find one. I’m sure that there is something like that on that site. I did find a thread where people were listing their total purchases, coupons and rebates, and out of pocket expenses for all of 2006. There were some pretty interesting numbers there. However, none gave an item by item breakdown of exactly what was purchased which is what you are looking for.

I do have issues with the way some people account for their ‘savings.’ If an item is $4.99 and then it is on sale for $3.49 and then someone uses a $1 store coupon and then a $1 manufacturer coupon for a final price of $1.49, people will say I ‘saved’ $3.50. I disagree with this type of accounting for me because I would never have paid $4.99 for the item in the first place.

Because you can’t get double coupons it may be difficult to ever get to the point of $30/week for food. I don’t benefit from the doubles either. Plus, it sounds like a lot of the food that you do eat isn’t the type of food that has coupons. I eat lots of fresh fruit and veggies and rice. We do eat meat but probably less than the average family. There just aren’t coupons for those items! At least not in my area. However, that doesn’t mean that I don’t still try to find and use coupons whenever possible. Here’s an example. There was a brand of spaghetti sauce on sale for $1.28 (normally around $2.99). I used a $1.00 coupon on it. Next, the manufacturer was offering a deal to either get your money back or get a coupon for a free jar. I could have got the $1.28 back, but instead I chose to get the coupon for the free jar. So in the end, for $0.28 + tax, I received two jars of spag sauce.

You mentioned that you spend a lot on toiletries. Perhaps you may want to concentrate your efforts here. My DH is painfully loyal to certain brands/products. Because of this, I have to use coupons and stockpile whenever those particular items are on sale. Here is a recent example. The razors that he uses are normally $6.14. They almost never go on sale but for some reason Target had them on markdown for $4.99. This coincided with a $2.00 coupon insert! Yeah! I bought four additional newspapers that week at 50-cents each just so I could get those extra coupons. Granted, it cost me $2 in extra newspapers, but there was also a $3.00 coupon that week for the coffee that we drink so it was worth it for me to buy the extra papers.

If you are not brand loyal then you are at an advantage. Definitely start taking advantage of the drug store programs. I’m actually heading to both Walgreens and CVS today. You can get all sorts of things free by shopping at these places. Hot Coupon World is really good for help matching up the weekly sales and rebates with coupons at these places. You definitely need a price book though when deciding if something is worth it or not because the prices at the drug stores are high.

One other thing I have started doing is clipping ALL coupons. I used to only clip coupons for items that I used. Recently though, I have missed out on some freebies because I didn’t have the coupon. It may have been on something that I would not have normally purchased, but if it had been free there would have been no reason not to try it. Again, I found out about these deals over on HCW.

Find out if your stores accept Internet printables. Sign up for HCW and search the coupon database. Definitely clip coupons for New products. When a product is introduced there are usually several coupons for it and it usually is on sale during the rollout. Often new products can be purchased for free or very little money.

I have been tracking my coupon usage for 2007 and have posted the results in my blog. So far, January and February have both been just over $30 in coupons. I have not posted my rebates though. This is a matter of my confusion about the accounting of this ‘saving.’ For example, I had a rebate for $6.99 for shampoo. The shampoo was free after the rebate. I did get the shampoo free but I never would have paid $6.99 for that brand had it not been free. I don’t know how to account for this so I have been leaving it out of my numbers.

I find using coupons to be fun. I realize not everyone may agree. To get the most saving, it does take time but I enjoy it so for me, it is worth it. Even if you can’t get down to $30/week in groceries, you may still find that you are able to save. However, if you don’t enjoy doing it and you find it is not worth your time, then don’t do it. Everyone is different and everyone finds their own way to save.

[sakigt]

Ive found the best way to save money on groceries is not coupons. They are, however, a great supplement. $1 or $2 here or there. Some days I dont use any.

1) Shopping sales. Especially BOGO sales.
2) Buying a lot when its on sale.

Doing this I spend $100-150 a month on feed my boyfriend and I home-cooked meals 5 nights a week, multiple leftovers for lunch and breakfast on the weekends. Every package of meat in my freezer has an "on sale" sticker on it. Ive got 20 boxes of rice and pasta in my cabinet from when its been on sale. I buy fresh veggies weekly and make sure to put a paper towel in with the bag to discourage it going bad. I also substitute frozen veggies I can stand when necessary.

[genmed]

IMHO, you should count your savings as savings compared to what you would normally spend. So, if you got a free bottle of shampoo, would you normally buy the cheapest at $1? or would you buy a more expensive brand at $2? If so, I would calculate my savings at $1 or $2 respectively. This is how I calculate my savings for using coupons.

[genmed]

Originally Posted by sakigt

Ive found the best way to save money on groceries is not coupons. They are, however, a great supplement. $1 or $2 here or there. Some days I dont use any.

1) Shopping sales. Especially BOGO sales.
2) Buying a lot when its on sale.

Doing this I spend $100-150 a month on feed my boyfriend and I home-cooked meals 5 nights a week, multiple leftovers for lunch and breakfast on the weekends. Every package of meat in my freezer has an "on sale" sticker on it. Ive got 20 boxes of rice and pasta in my cabinet from when its been on sale. I buy fresh veggies weekly and make sure to put a paper towel in with the bag to discourage it going bad. I also substitute frozen veggies I can stand when necessary.

I agree that coupons are a way to supplement, and not by any means the only way to lower your costs. One could also argue that some people are always buying things on sale, especially if they are not needed and wasting money. I would think one effective strategy on using coupons is:

Keep a list of things you cook with/use (toiletries, cleaning supplies)
Buying things when they go on sale, and then using coupons on top of the sale price to end up paying the least or buying the generic if it is the cheapest price.

[marjorie]

For me the best savings with coupons are buying non-perishable household items, cleaning agents and toiletries.
I look for the big score. I regularly do rebates and combine them with coupons for Rite-Aid (love the rebates by internet) and Walgreens. The very best deal I probably ever had was when Wisk detergent came out with disks, or saucer shaped portions of detergent. It was just compressed powdered detergent that looked like a hockey puck. They sold a package of 2 trial sized pucks of detergent for $.50. Each box contained a coupon, worth, I think, $.50. I do remember for certain that I went to a Fay's drug store that had a promotional rack of them. Becuase I want stores to value my business, I asked the manager if I could buy 4 of them. He said he was really tired of looking at the display and I could buy all I wanted. I first bought the number I had coupons for, emptied the coupon from each box and purchased the identical number the next time though. Once the manager caught on to what was happening, he actually assigned 2 employees to help me; opeing boxes and removing coupons. I couldn't believe it, but he said it was worth it to him to get rid of the product. Ultimately they loaded the whole display into my hatchback! It was 2 years before I had to buy laundry detergent, despite having small children and babysitting during the day.
Those are the deals I live for, but they are infrequent and require some work.