Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Getting the hang of couponing!

Over the last 6 months I have really been trying to figure out the whole cutting coupons thing! In the past I had dabbled in them and used them if I remembered, but now I am cutting with a purpose! In the past I cut them because I thought it was fun to save a few dollars here and there but now I have a whole new perspective. I spend the time going to couponing sites and cutting/organizing coupons mainly because I want to be a good steward of the money God gives me. It has been so much fun over the last few months seeing my saving increase. This year I even downloaded an Excel spreadsheet so I can track what I save on each of my visits. For the month of January I saved $285.91 using coupons which was 38.5% savings for the month. My goal is to save a minimum of 50% off my bill for the month.

It takes a little bit to get the hang of the whole couponing thing. You have to figure out what stores accept what coupons, who doubles, where can you stack, etc but in the end it is well worth it. For me anyway it has been worth the $285.91 that was saved last month! For example take my Target trip today. Today I saved $31.33 at Target and received 4 things FREE!

How did I do this???? I am glad you asked! The first thing I did was look at my favorite sites. My personal favorite are:
www.hip2save.com
www.couponingtodisney.com
www.faithfulprovisions.com

These ladies work so hard and do a great job to help me save money. They each have Target post about what is on sale this week and the best coupons to use. I read thru each of them and then figured out which coupons I had. I made my list, gathered all my coupons, and headed to Target. Now, all together I probably spent around 30-45 minuets doing the above. That is a good chuck of time but you could also look at it like I paid myself $31.33 for less then an hours work! I had coupons for everything I bought except the pink marshmallows that were thrown in for my 3 year old (not pictured)!



My total before coupons was 47.55
After all my coupons $14.22

My free items were:
  • Double Stuff Oreos (I became a fan on facebook when they were having a special promotion so they sent me 3 FREE coupons)
  • Olay Body Wash (In Sunday's Paper there was a coupon for buy Venus razor get Olay body wash for free)
  • Venus razor- This normally cost 9.99 but Target had them on sale for $6.99. I had a Target coupon for $4.00 off and then a manufacturing coupon for $2.00 which dropped the price down to .99. However, I had an overage of .99 on something else I bought so that made the razor FREE!
  • Herbal Essence hair gel(Sunday's paper had a buy a Herbal Essence shampoo, conditioner, or styler and get a styler product for free. This coupon did not have "excludes trail sizes on it so I purchased a .97 cent travel size conditioner and got the styler which normally cost $2.99 for FREE!
Items I had to pay something for:
  • Johnsons Bubble Bath and Body Wash is normally $4.39 I paid $1.39! I had a $2.00 Target coupon and a $1.00 manufacturing coupon
  • Pedisure Nutripal drink is normally $4.99 I paid $1.99! I had a $3.00 off manufacturing coupon.
  • Boost Kid Nutrition 6 pack chocolate milk is normally $9.79 I paid $4.79! I had a $3.00 Target coupon and a $2.00 manufacturing coupon. I almost did not get it because that is still a lot to pay out of pocket but since it has immunity boosters in it and my child LOVES some chocolate milk I decided it really was just .79 a drink so that was not to bad.
  • Post It Notes are normally $2.59. I paid $.59! I had a $1.00 off Target coupon and a $1.00 of manufacturing coupon.
  • The Aqua-Fresh Toothpaste came from WalGreens not Target. It is normally $2.19. I paid .24 cents! WalGreens has in store coupon making it .99 cents and then I had a manufactoring coupon for an additonal .75 cents off!
The simple breakdown is I paid around $9.00 for everything in the picture! In my opinion it was well worth my time! I am excited about continuing to learn how to navigate this coupon world and everyday becoming a better steward of God has entrusted my family with.