Monday, June 29, 2009

Why Coupon Shop?

Now, just as I never thought I would be a "blogger", I also never thought I would be a "couponer". It's amazing what life and the economy can change about our lives. So....a few months ago, I started to pick my friend's brain about couponing b/c I desperately needed to save money. Things were really tight and I had little to no money for groceries, so I had to do what I could. After working on it for a few months, I'm down to a couple of hours a week and I've been able to reduce my grocery budget to 1/3 of what it used to be.



Today I spent $31 and saved $76!!!


For those of you that have heard of people being crazy coupon freaks, no worries, I'm not one of those (yet). I don't go dumpster diving for newspapers to get coupons that people have thrown away, but I have hit up my parents and my grandparents for their coupons. They both get the Sunday paper and don't use their coupons. This is another money-saving method b/c I'm not paying any money for the paper (or coupons) to start with.

For any of you who don't have a clue about couponing, here's the 1-2-3 of saving money at the grocery store:
1) clip all coupons that come in coupon booklets in the Sunday paper
2) check out what all of the Buy One Get One Free deals are at your grocery store of choice
3) Use coupons that match up with those items (sometimes only buy 1 item instead of 2 b/c it's 1/2 price with the deal)

I wish that it really was just a 3-step process, but there's is definitely more to it. For example, you need to organize the coupons if you're going to do this more than once. It takes a few weeks of doing it to build up your coupon selection and to come across the deals that you want. You need to be prepared to stock up a little...when you can get something really cheep, buy a few of them and then you won't have to buy it for a while. And lastly, be willing to try new things. I have become a better cook since I started couponing b/c I've bought things that before I would have never thought to buy.

Is it worth it? That's your call. It is for me.

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