Getting Maximum Savings - Step 2

Ok, now on to Step 2. If you remember from the last post, my 3 main money saving steps are:

1. Watching for sales
2. Using coupons
3. Stocking up

I think the 1st step was fairly obvious to us all, you save more when things are on sale. But step 2 combines those sales with using coupons. Now I know a lot of you aren’t that excited about couponing and believe me, I wasn’t either at first. I hate clipping all those coupons and shuffling through them at the store as I shop, but there are a few ways to do this different and that’s what I want to share with you. Between this post and the next one, I’ll show you a completely different way to do coupons that keeps your time spent clipping and preparing to a minimum!

First of all, you need to find a place/website that lets can help you with this new process. I like either Grocery Smarts or Pinching Your Pennies. I have a link to both of those sites on the right hand column of this blog. Grocery Smarts needs a passcode to get you to the Utah page (the link on my blog has the passcode already entered in) and Pinching Your Pennies doesn't, but you have register at PYP (don’t worry it’s free). They both use the same lists, so it really doesn't matter. Personally, I like PYP better since there are forums you can read and see what deals others are getting (I’ll post more about this later on when I get done with these basic steps). Grocery Smarts is probably easier to use for beginners since it's a lot more simple and doesn't have all of the extra stuff.

The great thing about these sites is they go through the ads for you, determine whether the sales are a good deal or not and tell you where you can go to get a coupon for the item if it's available. And the best part? Both are FREE to use. I can't imagine how much more time it would take me to actually do all of this on my own. It's such a blessing that those who do it are willing to share with the rest of us!

To use Grocery Smarts (http://www.grocerysmarts.com):
Simply click on the link on my blog or use passcode g84cso (for Utah) from the general website page. Select the store from the pull down menu and look at the list.

To use Pinching your Pennies (http://www.pinchingyourpennies.com):
Go to the website, click on the "State Forums" link along the top menu, then scroll down and select "Utah's Screaming Deals." From there select the thread with the store and dates of sale you want to view (like Albertson's 1/14-1/20), then in the first post there will be a link to the list - usually it says "old style list" or something like that. Since they work with Grocery Smarts, they will sometimes post links to the pages on their site as well. The pages are exactly the same, just available on both sites, so there's no difference. You'll notice that there is a pull down menu at the top of this page too and if you click it, you can select different stores and dates of ads to view.

When using these sites, you'll notice there are a couple of columns. The first is a ranking - 4 or 5 stars are good deals and you should stock up on these items as much as you can. Items that are ranked as 3 stars are ok deals and if you are in need, you can feel good about grabbing one or two of these until the next sale rolls around on that items. 1 and 2 star items usually aren’t even listed – those aren’t good deals at all and should be avoided unless you are desperate and need the item right away. The next column is the item description - obviously. The next column is the sale price. The next column contains coupon information. Some are internet coupon links - these are great and you can get to them and print them (usually twice) without any additional effort.

I want to pause right here to talk about internet coupons for just a moment. These are great and require relatively little effort to obtain. Sometimes you have to sign up for certain sites in order to print their coupons – I’ve had pretty good luck with this and recommend it in order to get the coupon. The good thing about these internet coupons is that they are usually a bit better in savings than the coupons from the paper. The bad thing about these is, like I mentioned before, you can only print 2 copies of each coupon. So it’s really hard to stock up a whole ton with just internet coupons, but if you have a small family and don’t need a big stockpile of a lot of things or if you don’t want to bother with the Sunday newspapers, these are great!

Now, back to where we were. Some references in that coupon column are to coupons found in the Sunday Paper. For example you might see something like this in that column:

Nestlé Toll House Refrigerated Cookie Dough, any $1/1 (3-1-09) RP-12/7

This means you can find a coupon for Nestle Toll House Refrigerated Cook Dough good for $1 off of 1 package in the Red Plum (RP) coupon packet that came in the 12/7/08 paper and the coupon expires on 3/1/09.

I’m going to make another slight pause here to talk about newspaper coupons. Usually, the Sunday papers contain a Smart Source (SS) and Red Plum (RP) packet. Every once in a while you will get an additional packet from Proctor and Gamble (P&G) or General Mills (GM). There are however, weeks that you don’t get all of the packets (especially after a big holiday), but for the most part, you can count on at least the SS and RP packets almost every week.

Ok, back on subject. The last column is then the total price after sale and coupon that you can get the item for. Now, just imagine how good some of these deals can be! For example, the week of January 7th – 13th, Albertson's had a big Proctor & Gamble Promotion - if you spent $30 on certain products, you could get $15 in catalinas for use on your next purchase (catalinas are the coupons that print from those little printers at the register after you make your purchase - the little printers are owned by a company called Catalina, so they are referred to as catalinas). That in and of itself makes everything you buy an automatic 50% off! Now imagine how much better it gets when you combine that deal with a coupon! Here's an example of one of the many tremendous deals that were available that week:

(Click on the image to enlarge)

So Pantene Pro-V Shampoo or Conditioner - normally priced at $4.29 by the way - was on sale for 3 for $10 or $3.33 each - with the $15 back, that gives you 50% off - which makes them $1.67 ($3.33/2) - now if you have coupons from the 12/28 paper in the Proctor & Gamble insert, you have coupons for $3 off of 2 or $1.50 off of each bottle, so that makes them $1.67-$1.50 = $.17! Yes, that's 17 cents a piece! See how this works??? It's amazing when you couple sales with coupons! That's just one example of the things I was able to stock up on during that week's sale. And there were many, many more for similarly good deals.

Check back tomorrow for the final step on stocking up and some new ways to store, clip, and organize your coupons!