Learning The Art of Couponing

Well, I figured with all the newbies lately and the questions that I have had, personally, about couponing, I figured I would repost this. These are a few tips to help you get started....
1. Go slow. Don't try to get a good deal on everything at first. You will become very overwhelmed and will not know where to start.

2. Start printing your coupons. What I did was started printing everything that my family uses. Yes, you may not be able to use them right now, but there might be a sale here in the very near future. So, start printing. On most websites you are usually only permitted to print two coupons per computer. Now, there are some coupons every now and then that let you print more than one.

Here are a few sites that I use......

coupons.com
redplum.com
couponnetwork.com
bettycroker.com
eatbetteramerica.com


****THE BIG NO NO TO COUPONING......DO NOT MAKE COPIES OF YOUR COUPONS!!!!
This is considered fraud and you are not playing fair with the rest of us who are getting our coupons fair and square. 

3. Now that you have your coupons printed, try and organize them a little bit. What I did was I went out and buy a big zipup binder of some sort and then I bought some picture album inserts. Then, I organized them by category. I put the yogurts with yogurts, cereals, crackers, snacks, etc. That way when I go shopping I can just go and look in the category that I need and pick out my coupon that I need if I don't have it picked out yet.

4. Now we wait and watch for our items to go on sale, but we don't just wait for ANY sale. We want to get the best value for our money so we try to wait for when our items are at their lowest. It is hard to be patient. Remember we want this to benefit our wallet. So, we are trying to save the most amount of money that we can. Sometimes, at first, it is hard to be patient, but it will PAY off.

Look through the grocery adds, when you are at the grocery store take a look around and maybe check the prices on the items that you are interested in and make note. So, you can refer back to that in the future. One of the things to remember is to not buy something just because it's a great deal. You are not really saving money if you do that. We want to just buy what we need. Try to make a plan and stick to it.

5. Most of the time you CAN use a coupon on a clearanced item too. That is really a great way to get the best value for your money.

I also, when I am looking for good deals, check out the other bloggers out there. They are so helpful and have so many tips and hints. Remember nothing is set in stone and what may work for someone else may not work for you. There are so many different reasons as to why something may work for someone else and not you.

6. When using your coupons, here are a couple of hints/rules. So we have waited for the sales and we have coupons to use with the sale prices. We can use a manufacture coupon, which most of them say "Manufacturer Coupon" on the top or somewhere on it. You can use a manufacture coupon at just about ANY store. Well, any store that accepts coupons. Well, on top of that you can also use a store coupon with it too. A store coupon has the name of the store on the coupon. Like for instance, let's say that Fred Meyer has laundry detergent coupon in their add this week for 1.99. Well, that coupon is only good at Fred Meyer. Okay, so we also have a coupon that we either printed out off the Internet or got in the Sunday paper for $0.50. Yes, we can use them both together for one bottle of soap to make it $1.49. This is called "stacking," because you are stacking a store coupon and a manufacture coupon. This is perfectly okay. So, for every bottle of soap that you want to get at this deal, you need more coupons. Yes, one coupon per item. Sometimes the store coupons have a limit of 2 or 4, so your store coupon you only need one coupon, but you will need more of the manufacture coupons in order to get your deal.

7. Make sure you read the fine print on your coupons. You can use more than one coupon in a "transaction" if it says "one coupon per purchase." Each item that you are purchasing is a purchase. Now, if it says one coupon per "transaction" that is a different story and means you can only use one coupon per transaction, which is your whole order. Sometimes you can break up your transactions and make two or three. It all depends on the store and your cashier.

8. Remember when couponing to have fun and to be aware of those around us too. Let's try not to get too grumpy with the cashiers. They do have a job to do. If there is someone behind you that maybe only has a couple of items and you have quite a bit, plus your handy dandy coupons, let them go ahead of you. Just common courtesy. We want this to be a pleasant experience for all of us.

If you have any questions, please feel free to e-mail me..........I will do my best to get you an answer.

Good luck!

Cheryl