My coupon clipping habits of the past pretty much consisted of cutting lots of coupons and letting them fester in a plastic envelope for months (years?) past the expiration dates. Or, cutting lots of coupons for things I don't normally buy and actually using the coupons...and then not really using the items. I even subscribed to the Sunday edition of the newspaper for a time only to realize that no coupon was worth walking to the top of my very long, very steep driveway clad in pajamas. In the middle of the winter. Six months pregnant.
After reading a few posts of Money Saving Mom's regarding couponing and utilizing rewards programs at certain stores such as CVS and Walgreen's, I've decided that I need to give this a go. Her philosophy is (in a very rough nutshell--you should really go read her blog if you find yourself oddly drawn to saving money by snipping pieces of paper, as I am) that stocking up on items you routinely use when they are on sale AND you have coupons is the way to go. She apparently feeds her family on $35 a week using this method and while I'm not that ambitious (see previous post's confession of spending $26 on sushi) I definitely think we could reduce our weekly grocery bill by stockpiling certain items.
I gave this a half-hearted attempt last week. I revived my CVS extra-care card, and bought 2 12-packs of toilet paper on sale for $5.49 each. I also used a CVS coupon to save $2 and a regular coupon to save a $1.50. So now we have toilet paper galore, and God knows we need it in this household. I then hit JCPenney's with a $10 off a purchase of $10 or more and bought a pair of my favorite Carter's fuzzy fleece pjs for G3--they were on sale for $12.99. Finally, I made a side trip to our local grocery store and stocked up on baby stuff using the store coupons and buying stuff they had on sale that week. My total "savings" from the 3 stores equaled about $50 according to my receipts. Not too bad. Until G2 had a craving for sushi and I went outlet shopping with my sister. Ooops.
The downside--it did involve going a bit out of my way since the closest CVS is in downtown Hazleton, an area I generally do not frequent. I think a weekly trip will be worth it if I am purchasing a larger quanity of something at a great discount, plus you apparently rack up "extra care bucks"--basically cash off your next purchase. According to money saving mom, eventually you should be able to use this "overage" to avoid paying anything more than a few dollars.
This week's goal is to set the plan in motion. CVS has sales on 3 things I use AND have coupons for: Gerber foods, Duracell batteries, and tissues. So I will make the trip. G2 did the grocery shopping today, but I made the list based on what was on special and the coupons I had. Only one real big save--the store special was 4 boxes of General Mills cereal for $8.00--and I had a coupon for $1 off 3. So that was basically $7 for 4 large boxes of cereal; I eat cereal daily but I figure this is at least a month's worth.
I do have one other small mini-goal for the week...reorganization of my pantry and a few other insanely cluttered arenas. I don't think this task will make me thinner or greener...it might make me richer if, say, I find a lost $20 bill in the bottom of the tupperwear drawer (highly unlikely.) If nothing else, it will make me saner.
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