Ok, so people always are asking me about my couponing and how you do it! Well it’s very simple! I have one philosophy that I must share! DO NOT PAY full price for stuff you know you can get cheaper! Well you’re probably asking yourself, how do I know what I can get cheaper? Well, let me tell you a couple of steps you’re going to need to follow first and then I will get back to that question! The first thing you are going to want to do to start couponing is………….
Step one: get a binder with some baseball card dividers; these can be bought at Wal-Mart, or the dollar store. I get mine at Wal-Mart. The store I shop at they are with the as seen on TV. stuff! Make it cute, make it match your personality if you would like, or just let it be plain J Doesn’t matter it’s your book!
Step two: Start getting the weekly paper. I personally do not have a subscription, I buy them at Walgreens or Wal-Mart or where ever I can find them. I also get them on Saturday not Sunday! Reason? I want to get the coupons on Saturday in case I need some of them for my trip before the ads change on Sunday. Also the Saturday paper has the exact same ads and coupons as the Sunday paper. I buy four papers a week. Why four? Well, I want four copies of the one coupon I want. As a couponing rule you can only buy however many items you have a coupon for example: 4 bottles of shampoo, needs 4 separate coupons to get a deal. You cannot apply one coupon to multiple items unless stated on the coupon. And if you find a great deal you are going to want to get multiple of that item so you do not have to pay full price for it again, until the next time a coupon for it is printed for the item and it goes on sale again. Coupon cycles, cycle about every three to six months. If you do not want to buy papers, you can get the insert from services, one of the ones I have used was, http://coupon-wizards.com/ , this website also has tons of money saving tips on it, his style though just isn’t for me! But hey to each his own right?
Step 3: Start sorting your inserts. Now some of you say well I don’t use let’s say Wisk laundry detergent! Why would I want to cut a coupon for something I don’t need? Well, let me ask you this, if you could get laundry detergent for let’s say 1.99 or for free. Would you use it? My answer to that is YES! Of course, as long as something is a brand name and it is a product I need, I cut the coupon and try different brands. There are some things of course I won’t budge on, but most things around the house I will just because I can get it so cheap! So cut coupons for stuff you know you need in your home, it doesn’t necessarily have to be the brand you are used too. I have found a lot of items I really like simply because I found them on a good deal and bought them!
Step 4: Sort your coupons into sections that you are comfortable with. I like to have my sections in the order I go through the grocery store. I also like to have my stuff sectioned to the aisles, when I was putting my binder together, I literally went to the store and took pictures of the signs about the aisle and put my binder in that order! I love it that way!
Step 5: Get the ads of stores! I personally go to Wal-Mart, they price match and I take all the local ads and they match the prices, so I can take the Walgreens, CVS, and Kroger ad and get all those prices at one store. For those of you who hate Wal-Mart you can just go to the different stores, there are defiantly advantages of going to Walgreens and CVS separate.
Study the ads and look through them to find items that you know you have a coupon for. Ok people if you have not listened to anything I have said, hear this! DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT BUY SOMETHING JUST CAUSE YOU HAVE A COUPON FOR IT!!!!!! You will end of spending more money that way and waste your great coupon! You can always, use a coupon for something if you need a item but only buy one, don’t stock up until it is on sale. Also if for some reason the item doesn’t go on sale and your coupon expires that’s ok too. Don’t think that just because your coupon is going to expire you have to use it, you can, but you don’t necessarily have too.
OK now here is the key to couponing! You take a sales price, let’s say Shampoo is on sale normally 5.00 shampoos that is on sale for 3.00, then you have a coupon for 2.00 off, you just got that shampoo for 1 buck!!!!!!! You can do the same scenario to get something for free, item goes on sale for 2.00 you have a 2.00 coupon, FREE! Or, to earn money! This one is a little bit more difficult to do, but on sale for 2.00 you have a 3.00 coupon, you just earned a buck!!! You can take that buck from the store, or apply it to something that you don’t have coupons for like meat or produce!
This is pretty much the basics of couponing!!!! There are a couple of sites that I like www.thekrazycouponlady.com
www.sundaycouponpreview.com
The Sunday preview website will tell you how many coupon inserts will be in the paper and what coupons come in them! So weeks you will not have inserts, like holiday weekends for example. As I mentioned before, you will learn as you go along what is a good price for items, however a good rule I use is, if something is 50% off the retail price it's a good price, however, if it is up to 75% off it si a STOCK UP price, get as many as you can! You can also just Google couponing match ups and if you need to find if a coupon has a sale to go with it, you can find out that info too! OK so these are the absolute basics! You may be thinking this is A LOT of work, it isn’t really, and I find it fun, but just like anything if you want to do something well you have to dedicate some time to it and you will be successful! Hey, it’s saving you money, why not spend some time doing it! :) I will post about the different methods such as Walgreens and their register rewards soon! Happy couponing people!
No comments:
Post a Comment