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Tuesday, February 22, 2011

How to Save More When Buying Things You Use All the Time

Several of my fans have asked me how I save so much money shopping at the grocery store and drug stores.  I had been spending $150-$200 a week on groceries, toilet paper, paper towel, etc.  before January 1st of THIS YEAR- so it doesn't take long to learn how to save big.  I made a commitment to my family and a challenge to myself for the new year to save as much as I could.  Now I spend between $35-$50 a week and we have more food, etc. than we ever did.  And I am still buying all the things we like and more.  I am not compromising on that.  It has become more of a lifestyle for me.  


How do I do it?  As I have mentioned before I use websites that do the coupon match-ups for me.  (Message me if you are still looking for a coupon match-up site for your store and I will try to help.)  They match up the weekly sales at my favorite stores with coupons that are available so I don't have to.  


Saving $.50 here and $1.00 adds up but not as dramatically as if you can get more than 1 or 2 of a deal so I buy at least 10 newspapers a week.  I get one delivered, my father gives me his coupons, and I usually buy 8 Sunday newspapers.  I recently found out that the other local newspaper has the coupons in the Saturday edition and it costs $.50 less per newspaper than the Sunday paper I was buying.  I am buying a few each week for now to track to see if it is missing any coupons before I switch to buying just that newspaper.  I have also found several local FREE newspapers that come out on Thursday and also have some of the same coupons in them that the Sunday newspaper has so I am getting a few more inserts that way, too.  


But I more than make up for the $10 a week I am spending on newspapers.  Just this week I stocked up on Purex 3-in-1 laundry detergent.  Each box does 20 loads of laundry and only cost me $.99.  Say we do 4 loads of laundry a week, that is 208 loads a year.  I would need 11 packages of Purex to last me all year.  If I had 11 newspapers I would have enough coupons to buy enough Purex to last a year and it would only cost me $11 for the newspapers and $11 for the Purex.  Now if I also found a few other coupons in that same newspaper to get deals on other things I needed I would be saving even more money from that same $11 newspaper investment. 


Here is a hypothetical example on saving more money, your favorite cheese is on sale this week at Publix for BOGO.  You love this cheese and eat it every week.  You have only 2 manufacturer's coupon and 2 Publix coupons to buy 2 packages of cheese.  You end up paying $.50 for each cheese instead of the regular price of $4.00 each.  Great, you saved $3.50 each or a total of $7.00.  You usually go through 1 package of this cheese a week.  So in 2 weeks you will be out of cheese but this cheese goes on sale every 6 weeks.  What now?  For the other 4 weeks until the next sale you will have to buy this cheese at full price.  If you bought 6 packages of cheese with 6 coupons during the original sale you would be paying a total of $3 for 6 packages of cheese.  Now since you only bought 2, you will be paying full price for the last 4 packages- $1.00 for the first 2 packages and $16.00 ($4 each) for the last 4 for a total of $17.00 for the cheese.  Would you rather save $7 now on 2 but end up paying $16.00 more later to get the cheese?


I know everything doesn't have a long shelf life so some things you can't stock up on.  And I am not saying stock up for the Apocalypse or anything.  But stocking up on enough of key things you need and use often will help you save much more money. 


Another idea if you don't want to get so many newspapers is to order only the coupons you need from a coupon clipping service or ebay.  


****Just my $.02 from my own personal experiences and opinions. I know lots of people coupon in lots of different ways.  Whatever works for you is the best thing to do!  ;-) 


****I am rushing to get out my kids to school today.  Please let me know if any of this is not clear and I will fix it later.  Thanks! :-)

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