Guide to Supermarket Savings

Have you tried couponing but felt that it was not helping any? There is a better way than just using a coupon whenever you buy an item.

Here is a quick guide to getting the most groceries for your dollar:

1. Cut ALL coupons or Save all inserts from the Sunday paper. If you save them entire insert to cut as needed make sure you mark the date on insert so that you can find it when you see a coupon can be used.

**If you are already thinking why do I need them all just wait until you see a Blood Glucose meter go on sale at CVS for $20 and giving back 15 ECB and you didn’t cut the -$20 off coupon that would have made it free and them just hand you ECB for spending nothing**

2. Start to shop buying only the things that are on sale and using your coupons then. Also when an item is on sale you STOCKPILE. Some sites recommend 12 weeks worth because that is the common time it takes for an item to come back on sale. Thats great if you have the space, if not get enough that if you shop at two different stores you can hold off until it goes on sale at the other store. Once you have a good stockpile you will only be shopping for sale items and never having to pay non sale prices. Also once you pay an amazing price for something like .90 cents for cereal you will not want to have to pay the regular price ever again.

3. Make a menu for the week based on what is on sale that week at the store. An example being don’t plan fish when no one has it on sale and you are paying top dollar.

4. If you know that you are going on a trip or having a special event in the future start a separate stockpile early for those items so that you are not paying top dollar just because you are on vacation for your groceries. Paying $3 for 5 12pks of Coke at CVS a month before a trip is much better than paying 4.50 a 12pk once you get to the beach!!

5. Give up what brand loyalties you are able. There is nothing wrong with be bought for a price if it is a good coupon and makes the Old Elpaso beans .10 cents but you have always bought a different brand. If you want to pay the full price for the other can go for it, but I’ll use my coupon. If Herbal Essences shampoo is .20 cents a bottle it can’t hurt to give it a try.

6. No house brands are not the best deal. National brand items bought on sale with coupons become incredibly cheaper than house brand items. That was a hard lesson to learn after years of automatically grabbing the house brand item. If you can buy house brand butter for 2.49 or get Land o Lakes butter for .80… thats not hard math. Remember a store wants you to buy their house brand because they keep all the money, they will try to make it seem like a deal but your interests are not what they have at heart.

7. Shopping at Costco and Sams will become a thing of the past mostly. I get dairy items there that do not have coupons often or are rarely on sale. Most of the time though buying the 4 boxes of cereal for $10 at Sams never compares to getting 4 boxes for 2.50 (the average price of cereal when bought correctly is .70-.90 cents). Personal Care items that could be a good deal can’t even touch being FREE at CVS.

For more indepth tips read our Extreme Couponer 101 Column posts.