Clip coupons—save a few $$$
August 22nd, 2010 Posted in OpinionBy Lindsay Blanchard
Clipping coupons can save you money and help create food storage in no time if you know how to start and what to do.
First things first, you have to know where to look for the coupons; signing up for your local paper is great way to start. Here in Logan you can have the Herald Journal delivered to your door for about $10 a month, but if you use the coupons that you find in the HJ correctly, the saving will more than make up for the cost of the paper.
Another excellent source of coupon savings is the Internet. Go to www.couponmoms.com or www.coupons.com, or just type free grocery coupons in a search engine and plenty of sites will pop up. Be careful not to be talked into the sites that ask you to pay for the coupons, as there are so many out there that allow you to print them for free. Some will offer to do all the work for you, letting you know where the sales are and which coupons to use where, which is nice, but it just takes a little work on your part and then it’s free.
The next step in becoming coupon-smart is to create a system that works for you. Start by collecting all the ads for local grocery stores. Most are delivered throughout the week in the newspaper or just come in advertisements in your mailbox. Search through the ads and match up the sales with the coupons you have clipped.
Sounds simple? It is. But you have to be organized. One way you can do that by using a binder and some baseball card sheets to organize your coupons. Try to organize them into sections such as dairy, starch, vegetables, frozen, etc. And always have a calculator with you at the grocery store. Almost all of your coupons are going to be for name-brand products, and the store brand may end up being cheaper even with the coupon, and so it may not make sense to use your coupon.
Know each store’s coupon policy—some stores do not allow the use of more than one of the same coupon. A great place to get all that information and more is www.pinchingyourpennies.com, an online forum for coupon clippers all over. There is an area for people just in Utah where you can share coupons, ideas and great deals as well.
It may seem like a lot of work to go from store to store to buy different items, but once you start filling your food shelves, you will find yourself going to the grocery store less and less to buy food because you simply will not have to.
The best part of coupon shopping is when you look on the bottom of your receipt and you see your totals. The two lines you will be the most proud of will be your store savings (“You saved $….”), which is how much you saved because you shopped the sales, and then your coupons savings, all because you took a little time to clip a few pieces of paper.
TP
Sorry, comments for this entry are closed at this time.