What is Sunday morning like in your house? Do you sleep in, enjoy a late big breakfast with a hot cup of coffee and read the paper? If you're anything like me, Sunday morning is usually all about the coupons in the newspaper! Being a student, stay at home mom and living on one income- coupons help our family get what we need without paying full price. Some items I even get for free! Yes, you read that right FREE! Just today I got 2 ten pack of razors and eye shadow for free and I even made a few cents off of each! It's an awesome feeling when you see the total! You may have seen the show Extreme Couponing on TLC or some other channel showing couponers getting hundreds of dollars of products in one shopping trip for just a few bucks. Seems crazy right? Well I still haven't quite figured out how to pull a huge haul off like that but I do save some money. I don't have many stores to shop at where I live and I only have 1 store that doubles coupons. Therefore, its a little harder for me to do what those people do.
How do I do it you ask? Well first off you need to understand that it takes time to coupon. There is time put in for finding, cutting, organizing and planning. Also, don't expect to do what they do on TV. It just gives unrealistic expectations, but it is fun to watch :)! The next thing to do is find your coupons! Depending on where you live, you may get some really good coupons in your Sunday paper, if you don't you could maybe find newspapers from bigger cities around you at your local gas station or market. My city doesn't provide very good coupons so I actually get a Baltimore Sun, Pittsburgh Post Gazette and Washington Post. I usually only get 2 papers so I pick 2 that I like. It usually costs me $6. If your not up for buying a whole paper you can buy inserts online. I'm still looking for the best place to buy inserts from so once I find one I like- I'll let you know! You can also buy coupons from all over the country from www.Klip2save.com. They are a coupon cutting service. You buy however many coupons you want and they ship directly to your home already clipped! Shipping is cheap too! I use this service when I want more than 1 coupon that I found to be a great deal!
Another place to find coupons is online. Websites such as www.coupons.com, www.shopathome.com and www.redplum.com are all great resources for coupons! In order to print, you'll need to install a coupon printer on your computer. This is because each printer is only allowed to print 2 of each coupon. It's quick and very easy to do, I definitely recommend it. You can find many high value coupons online.
Next step- Where do I go from here? You'll want to do ad match ups to check items on sale with what coupons you have! You don't have to do this on your own. www.couponmom.com has ad match ups for stores all over the country such as Wal Mart, CVS, Rite Aid and Dollar Tree. I use Coupon Mom all the time to find the best deals. On this site she breaks it all down for you with how many coupons (and from which insert or online), product price, and price after coupons! It's pretty great- check it out! Before you begin any couponing make sure you know the coupon policy for the store you will be shopping at. It's important to have a copy of the policy with you when couponing so print it out and put it in your binder.
The final step is prepare your list, gather your coupons and go shopping! Of course this is a rough breakdown of couponing but in future blogs I'll break down a couple transactions, show you my method of organizing and get into more couponing details. Until then begin gathering coupons and check out the websites that I provided here to get started!
What do you think about couponing? Is it worth the time and effort?
Happy Clipping!
Danielle Marie
