Coupon shopping at your grocery store.
Devilish Southern Belle says she needs help shopping for groceries and saving money using coupons, so I told her I would explain how I do it.
I'm not one of those CVS deal getters, or points people, I only shop for food at grocery stores and use coupons.
I probably could save far more money, get more stuff for free if I did did those other things, but I like to get in and get out, not spend a lot of time going store to store.
So here's how I do it.
I make out my weekly meal plan list, what I want to cook every single day for meals, and also add in extra foods like snacks, fend for yourself meals, and desserts and treats.
Then I make out the shopping list based on the meal plan list.
Then I go through the cupboards and fridge/freezer, crossing things off of the list that I already have on hand so I don't buy duplicates of on-hand items. (unless the item is running low and I need it anyway)
Then I go to my store's website to see the list of sale items for that week.
I use Publix, and they publish the weekly sale flyer on line every week.
I go through their list of sale items and add a check mark to anything on my list that is on sale.
If they have my item as a buy 1 get 1, I check it plus add a "+2" next to it.
I do this for the whole list.
Then I go through the flyer again, adding items they have on sale that I just want because they are good deals.
Then I go grab all of my coupons and go through my shopping list and add a "C" next to any item that I have a coupon for.
Then I go through the sale flyer on their site again, and matching any coupons I have to any items they have on sale that are a really good deal.
For example, do I have a coupon for say, Buy 2 boxes of General Mills cereal, save $3.00, and do they have it on sale buy 1 get 1? If so, I add it to my list.
Or they might have buy 1 get 1 on Campbells select soups, and I have a coupon to save $2 off 1 can? The price per can is $2.35, I save $2 + I get 1 can free, making my total price for 2 cans of soup just .35 cents.
I stack all of my going to be used coupons into a pile, grab my list, stuff it all in my purse and head out to the store.
When I get there, I stop at their rack of other sale flyers from vendors, and go through it to see if there are any coupons for anything else on my list I didn't already have one for.
If so, I tear out that coupon and add it to my pile.
My first stop is always the clearance rack or table, to see if any items on the table are on my list, because that's even bigger savings.
It's usually stuff like shampoo/conditioner, soaps, cleaning products etc, so if they're on my list and/or have a coupon, double, sometimes triple savings.
The least amount of money I've ever saved on a shopping trip has been about $20, and the most has been almost $100, so I always use coupons on every single trip to the store, and speaking of, I'm outta here.
