What can a family buy for $17 these days? Generally, not much.
In the photo below, you'll see what I bought a few weeks ago for $17, at our local Walgreens.
By combining Walgreen's sales and coupons from their weekly sale flier with coupons I get from the Sunday Oregonian almost every Sunday, I've learned how to get some great deals!
On this occasion, I was able to purchase the following:
*6 boxes of Kleenex
*3 rolls of Bounty paper towels
*6 cans of Cream of Chicken/Cream of Mushroom Campbell's soup
*2 boxes of allergy relief eye drops
*1 bottle of mousse (hair!!!)
*3 tubes of toothpaste...
...and, I think a couple of other little items that were hiding in that photo. I don't remember. Sorry, it was a few weeks ago.
I had always thought to myself that I would never have enough coupons for items that our family truly needed, so I would be taking a big chunk out of our monthly purchasing.
Well, I was wrong!
I watched the very helpful videos at:
and was pleasantly surprised to see that for about $25-$45, I could have a very handy zippered 3-ring binder to store my coupons in an organized manner.
My husband thought it would be good to give this a try, so I zipped out the door and purchased a zippered 3-ring binder and sports/trading card plastic pages (I found some nice ones at Fred Meyer in our town).
Now, at first, this seemed a bit expensive, until I really began utilizing all those coupons I had collected from the two copies of the Sunday Oregonian we purchase every Sunday on our way home from church. We get our local newspaper on a daily basis, but because we live in a small town, our coupons are very limited. However, if you purchase the larger newspapers in your state, you will find a much better selection of coupons.
I have chosen to save every coupon, IF the item is something that our family would use if it was free or cost less than 50 cents or so.
For example, if the coupon was for a brand of toothpaste I had never used before, I still would save the coupon IF I was willing to use the toothpaste if I received it for free or almost free. Make sense?
Even though we are spending around $5 each week for the two Sunday Oregonians, I am taking $50-$150 off of my weekly groceries and sundries bills. This dollar amount varies depending on how much time I have each week to go to the various stores for the sales. Lest you think that I used to spend $150 or more each week, I actually didn't. But now I can purchase more items we need, usually the better name brands, than what I was doing before. I am spending fewer dollars each week, so my husband is very pleased with this!
You'll not only have a list of coupons that you will need for each particular item, but you will know if that is an incredible deal, a so-so deal, or one that is more like regular price.
***"Coupon Queens" generally recommend that you have purchased four weeks of newspapers (major city newspapers) in a row before beginning to do this kind of coupon shopping. Otherwise, you'll find that you just won't have saved the right coupons to get the items free or at a very low cost. ***
Other sources I use to find items which are on sale and matched up with coupons are:
PYP (Pinching Your Pennies) also allows you to do searches for great deals (but doesn't match them to coupons) for the following stores:
Albertson's, Kmart, Super Target, Family Dollar, Rite Aid, Super WalMart, Fred Meyer, ShopKo, and Walgreens.
Just put in your zip code at the bottom of the "Grocery Guide" screen, and it will show you the stores that are possibly available for your area.
Who should NOT be doing "coupon queen" shopping?
This isn't for everyone, or every family. Some of you have either been rolling your eyes through this entire post, or you've already deleted it and can't read what I've typed right now. (!)
1. If you make every item in your kitchen from scratch, then coupon shopping like this is probably not for you. Once in a while, you may find coupons for milk and eggs, but it will not be frequently.
2. If you refuse to use other brands from what you are currently using, then this kind of coupon shopping is probably not for you.
3. If you want everything in your home to be organic, then you will probably decide that this is not for you.
4. If you have very young children and are very limited on the amount of time you could leave in the early morning or evening to coupon shop without them, then this is probably not for you.
5. If you live more than 15-20 minutes from the stores you would consider using these coupons, then this is probably not for you.
6. If your children are too young to help you cut out coupons and sort them, and you don't feel like you have the time to do this, then this is probably not for you.
7. If you are opposed to going to most large chain-type stores, then this is probably not for you.
For my family, my children are ages 9 and 11, and they enjoy cutting coupons with me and sorting them. While I also enjoy shopping locally vs. chain stores, I'm willing to go to chain stores as well. At least one of the locally or regionally owned stores that I like (BiMart) is not open late enough for me to do some of the coupon shopping I'd like to do, so I don't always get around to using that store each week.)
I don't mind switching brands of toothpaste, deoderant, toilet tissue, "Kleenex", etc. In fact, I've often been able to buy better brands using coupons than the regular store brands I usually use.
While I have made some of my cleaning products homemade, I also don't mind buying them from the store, especially if they are very, very cheap combining sales and coupons.
We do buy organic items, but not all of the time. We do cook a lot of our foods from scratch, but not all of the time.
So, coupon shopping is working for me. Just keep in mind that on holiday weekends, there are no booklets of coupons in the Sunday papers. Why? I think they just want to give us a break, so we don't spend the holiday reading the paper and cutting out coupons! But be forewarned...either the weekend before the holiday, or the weekend after the holiday weekend, will have double or triple the amount of usual coupons.
What have your successes been in getting better deals on your groceries and sundries?
