Coupons an Embarassment?

[DawnM]

You can embarrass yourself all the way to the bank and beyond!

You go girl!

Dawn

 

[winniedapooh]

My kids used to get a tad uncomfortable, or so I thought! They were actually having fun with me rolling their eyes and groaning as I try to save money each week. My daughter still talks about the week I saved $147 on coupons and $54 on the store advantage card for a grand savings of $201. They actually ask me what I have for coupons because they want a special deoderant or something, lol! I work FT and couldn't give a hoot about someone staring or making comments to me in line because I have a ton of coupons. I am get too excited trying to see how much I save!!!

 

[sorul82?]

I admire everyone's savings. I'm the master of Target markdowns, but not the grocery store. I spent $164 after $64 store savings and $7 worth of coupons. I must not be buying the right things; most of what I buy doesn't have coupons like meat, produce, and a couple of jugs of milk. So what is everyone buying?

 

[tngramma]

I shop Walgreens, CVS and Publix. I just found out that register rewards are actually manufacturer coupons and they scan. This week the Bayer Contour meters were on sale for $10 and get $10 register rewards I had coupons for up to $30 off so the meter was free and I am able to shop at Publix with my free money.
.

Is Publix the only place you can use Walgreen's RR or do other places take them too? I have $112.00 of RR right now that are burning a hole in my coupon binder.

Now... Don't shoot the messenger!!

Just kidding! I could not resist.

 

[disneyfav4ever]

I admire everyone's savings. I'm the master of Target markdowns, but not the grocery store. I spent $164 after $64 store savings and $7 worth of coupons. I must not be buying the right things; most of what I buy doesn't have coupons like meat, produce, and a couple of jugs of milk. So what is everyone buying?

Meat I buy when it's on sale, stock up, and freeze a lot. With produce, I buy what's on sale, and what's in season, usaully at a local farmer's market, but the stores sometimes have good sales, and if I'm lucky, coupons. Just last week there was a save $1 on produce when you bought some new kind of cereal.

I pay almost nothing for pantry and personal products. Some of the things I've gotten for free are; peanut butter, pasta, cookie mix, popcorn, crackers, cookies, salad dressing, marinade, mustard, tomato sauce, rice cakes, vinegar, bbq sauce, and juice boxes.

And that's just the stuff I've gotten for free! That doesn't include so much other stuff that I've gotten for next to nothing; Crystal Light for less then $1 a container, macaroni and cheese for less then thirty cents a box, cake mix for less then fifty cents a box, granola bars for $1 a box, salsa for $1 or less a jar, hot chocolate packets for fifty cents a box, mashed potatoes and mayonnaise for a quarter each, the list goes on and on.

And all of this is just for matching up sales with coupons. And that's just stuff currently in my pantry, (and that's not everything,) and that's not even going into my fridge and freezer.

ETA - And all the stuff is name brand too. I almost never get coupons for store brand stuff. Sometimes I do, but it's rare. I have nothing against most store brand stuff though. The only brands I am praticulary loyal to are Kraft cheese, and Coke.

 

[Disneyliscious]

A few weeks ago on eBay I bought 10 - $3 off coupons on cat food. My purchase total came to $2.49.

The cat food is $4.48 per bag. I ended up buying $44.80 in cat food for $17.29 plus tax. I didn't mind buying 10 bags at once and the cashier was like "wow"...lol

 

[Kycha]

I admire everyone's savings. I'm the master of Target markdowns, but not the grocery store. I spent $164 after $64 store savings and $7 worth of coupons. I must not be buying the right things; most of what I buy doesn't have coupons like meat, produce, and a couple of jugs of milk. So what is everyone buying?

One of my grocery stores emails weekly coupons. Usually there are $ off $$ coupons for meat and produce. And they usually don't expire for a month.
2 months ago, there was a catalina deal for Kellogg's cereal...buy 3 boxes get 1 gal of milk free, buy 5 boxes get 2 gals free, buy 7 boxes get 3 gals free. The catalina deal was for at least a month and all 2 of my local stores had Kellogg's cereal on sale a couple times during the cat deal. Plus I combined with coupons. I made out like a bandit. I think I ended up with over 20 boxes of cereal and coupons for 7 free gals of milk. And using coupons, I paid between .25-.50 a box for the cereal.

 

[disneyfav4ever]

One of my grocery stores emails weekly coupons. Usually there are $ off $$ coupons for meat and produce. And they usually don't expire for a month.
2 months ago, there was a catalina deal for Kellogg's cereal...buy 3 boxes get 1 gal of milk free, buy 5 boxes get 2 gals free, buy 7 boxes get 3 gals free. The catalina deal was for at least a month and all 2 of my local stores had Kellogg's cereal on sale a couple times during the cat deal. Plus I combined with coupons. I made out like a bandit. I think I ended up with over 20 boxes of cereal and coupons for 7 free gals of milk. And using coupons, I paid between .25-.50 a box for the cereal.

I see you're from around the same area as me, what store was that? Cause I completely would've been all over that sale. I can get cereal for cheap all the time, but I would've loved some free milk.

Also, I love that link you, (I think it was you,) posted earlier, for TaylorTown, that'll be really helpful if they post it before I get my coupons. Looks like it was accurate for me this week.

And I just noticed your signature. Was that your kitty that died? So sad. I lost two pets last year, I know how hard it is.

 

[Kycha]

I see you're from around the same area as me, what store was that? Cause I completely would've been all over that sale. I can get cereal for cheap all the time, but I would've loved some free milk.

Also, I love that link you, (I think it was you,) posted earlier, for TaylorTown, that'll be really helpful if they post it before I get my coupons. Looks like it was accurate for me this week.

And I just noticed your signature. Was that your kitty that died? So sad. I lost two pets last year, I know how hard it is.

Thanks. I appreciate that. That cat was such a pain in my @ss I always said he would outlive me just to spite me.His favorite place to lay was on my chest while I was trying to sleep. He was a complete sadist too. He would dig his claws(weapons, really) into me all while purring really loudly and looking at me with love in his eyes.But, I loved that cat to death. I'm sorry about the loss of your two pets. It is amazing how much pets impact our lives and how much we miss them when they are gone.

Anyway, back on topic...the 2 stores with the Kellogg's cat deal were Giant and Weis Markets. In fact, when I did the deal at Giant I used their coupon doublers and I think they paid me to buy the cereal and I got the free milk coupons on top of it.

You definitely need to check the grocery store forums over on afullcup.com. I don't usually shop at Giant because they are not very convenient for me. So, I just keep an eye on the Giant forum and someone invariably will post a deal that I can't pass up. They have forums for Wegmans, Acme, Genuardis, Kroger, Superfresh...pretty much any grocery store you can think of. Plus they have very active forums for CVS and Rite Aid as well as Kmart(double coupons up to $2 starts tomorrow), Walmart and Target.

Did you get your Sunday coupons already? Where/which paper do you get them? Was there a $1 off Kellogg's coupon in the Redplum insert? I'm hoping there is. Weis has Kellogg's Froot Loops, Corn Pops, Frosted Flakes and Apple Jacks 4/$6. Would make them .50 a box if I use 4 coupons. I need to stock up for my family reunion at the end of the month. A lot of hungry mouths to feed. TIA!

 

[disneyfav4ever]

Did you get your Sunday coupons already? Where/which paper do you get them? Was there a $1 off Kellogg's coupon in the Redplum insert? I'm hoping there is. Weis has Kellogg's Froot Loops, Corn Pops, Frosted Flakes and Apple Jacks 4/$6. Would make them .50 a box if I use 4 coupons. I need to stock up for my family reunion at the end of the month. A lot of hungry mouths to feed. TIA!

I get my coupons on Saturday, in the "early" edition of the Philly Inquirer. There are Kellogg's coupons! One is for $1 off mini-wheats, another is $1 off special K cereals, and the other is for $1 off the ones you mentioned I think. I'm not looking at the coupons right now, so I'm not sure, but there were def. three Kellogg's ones.

Interesting that I missed the cereal / milk sale at Giant. Maybe it wasn't at my store? But I thought those sales would be chain wide. Or I just wasn't paying any attention when they had that sale. I was pretty stocked up on cereal for awhile, now I'm running kind of low again. I do seem to have a lot of Raisin Bran though.

 

[Kycha]

I get my coupons on Saturday, in the "early" edition of the Philly Inquirer. There are Kellogg's coupons! One is for $1 off mini-wheats, another is $1 off special K cereals, and the other is for $1 off the ones you mentioned I think. I'm not looking at the coupons right now, so I'm not sure, but there were def. three Kellogg's ones.

Interesting that I missed the cereal / milk sale at Giant. Maybe it wasn't at my store? But I thought those sales would be chain wide. Or I just wasn't paying any attention when they had that sale. I was pretty stocked up on cereal for awhile, now I'm running kind of low again. I do seem to have a lot of Raisin Bran though.

Cool! Thanks for the info on the Kellogg's q's. I'll have to pick up extra papers tomorrow. Unfortunately, I don't think the milk deal was in Giant's weekly flyer. It was definitely in the Weis flyer though. And since it was a catalina deal and Giant does the catalina deals too I tried it there and it worked just fine.

 

[disneyfav4ever]

Cool! Thanks for the info on the Kellogg's q's. I'll have to pick up extra papers tomorrow. Unfortunately, I don't think the milk deal was in Giant's weekly flyer. It was definitely in the Weis flyer though. And since it was a catalina deal and Giant does the catalina deals too I tried it there and it worked just fine.

Yeah, if it wasn't in the flyer, I wouldn't of noticed it.

 

[NeverlandClub23]

A couple of months ago Kroger had the hair dye I use on sale for $5.99. I bought 20 $2.00 off coupons off of ebay for $1.00 (including shipping). I saved about $40 and then sold the conditioners out of the boxes (that I never use) on ebay for $20! So I bought the hair dye for about $2.99 a box . Of course, the cashier looked at me crazy when I gave her my coupons .

 

[Melrosgirl]

I think the lady probably meant she would be embarrassed bc it takes so much time. I know when I have more then 10 coupons, I do get a little embarrassed bc I know I'm taking a long time and I usually say "sorry" to the people behind me. Do they care? I don't know.

 

[sorul82?]

Meat I buy when it's on sale, stock up, and freeze a lot. With produce, I buy what's on sale, and what's in season, usaully at a local farmer's market, but the stores sometimes have good sales, and if I'm lucky, coupons. Just last week there was a save $1 on produce when you bought some new kind of cereal.

I pay almost nothing for pantry and personal products. Some of the things I've gotten for free are; peanut butter, pasta, cookie mix, popcorn, crackers, cookies, salad dressing, marinade, mustard, tomato sauce, rice cakes, vinegar, bbq sauce, and juice boxes.

ahh, I don't buy a lot of what you mentioned. I look through the coupons on the rare occasion that I buy a paper and most are for things I don't buy.

As for meat, if it's not on sale, I don't buy it. And, I have a certain price I think it should be on sale for. This week we are eating country style pork ribs at $1.49/lb and split chicken breast at $.99/lb using the $.75 bbq that I bought last week. Boneless skinless chicken breasts have not been our normal $1.99/lb sale in quite some time.

 

[NYCDiane]

I was checking out at the store yesterday with my weekly big order, so of course I had a bunch of coupons. The lady behind me said, (very loudly, I'm sure so I could hear,) to her husband or whoever it was she was with, that if she used that many coupons she'd be embarassed to show her face in public.

How is saving money embarassing? I saved about 75% of my bill, I don't see anything embrassing about that! She was just a rude lady, and made me so mad.

I've had that happen to me as well. One time a guy behind me let out a huge sigh and said to his wife "now she has COUPONS".... I turned to him and said "well, if you want to give me the CASH I will save with my coupons, I'd be more than happy to put them away" and I put my hand out. He said NOTHING and was clearly embarassed.

Ya gotta turn it around on people like that!

 

[Belle5]

I've had that happen to me as well. One time a guy behind me let out a huge sigh and said to his wife "now she has COUPONS".... I turned to him and said "well, if you want to give me the CASH I will save with my coupons, I'd be more than happy to put them away" and I put my hand out. He said NOTHING and was clearly embarassed.

Ya gotta turn it around on people like that!

Perfect!

 

[mommy2allyandaveri]

I would be embarassed that I was so stupid to spend full price on something when there were money saving options out there.

You are nicer than I am - I would have put her in her place.

Yep, I probably would have said something too. That was just rude...

The only time I am ever embarrassed about coupons is when I am trying to check out and the coupon won't scan and then I have to argue with the checker about if I really bought that item then we have to go digging through my bags to find the item But I stick to my guns for that $.50 off!

 

[Juliet25]

I admire everyone's savings. I'm the master of Target markdowns, but not the grocery store. I spent $164 after $64 store savings and $7 worth of coupons. I must not be buying the right things; most of what I buy doesn't have coupons like meat, produce, and a couple of jugs of milk. So what is everyone buying?

I always wonder about what people are buying when their grocery bill goes from $100 to like $6.56. I've been couponing since college, but I'm never able to save more than 25-40% on my grocery bill. At best I'll save 45%, but that's on a day when a local grocery does $10 off $50 and I'm using other coupons.

 

[minnie1928]

I always wonder about what people are buying when their grocery bill goes from $100 to like $6.56. I've been couponing since college, but I'm never able to save more than 25-40% on my grocery bill. At best I'll save 45%, but that's on a day when a local grocery does $10 off $50 and I'm using other coupons.

Oh, I definitely see how it can be done. If you're only buying the great deals that you have coupons for...yeah, it can be done. However, if you include things like milk, bread, etc. that rarely have discounts/coupons then that will skew the total back up. I typically save 25-45%, but if I worked the basket to only include the "great deals" the savings percentage would be much higher.