coupon queen

I am very coupon savvy.  My friends call me the Coupon Queen.  I love couponing.  Saving money makes me happy.

My friends are always amazed when I tell them my coupon stories, like when I got $60 worth of groceries for just $7 (see picture below).  Yep, all of that for just $7.  And the $3 milk wasn’t even on sale.

The other week I got all of the groceries here for less than $20…

 

Now the fun part…..the couponing tips!

• Ask family and friends who get the Sunday paper to save the coupon inserts for you that they haven’t used. Most people just toss these out, and that is a shame!

• You can print coupons online.  At least half of the coupons I use are printed right from my home printer.  And it is FREE.  There are a number of websites like Coupons.com,RedPlum.com, SmartSource.com, even companies like Betty Crocker have bunches of coupons available each month.  All you need is a printer, ink and some paper!

• Find your favorite brand of foods online.  Sign up for their newsletters and like them on Facebook to have easy access to their coupons and promotions.  For example, I love Wholly Guacamole.  They offer $1 off coupons every month that they send right to my inbox.  I started a separate email account just for my coupons so they don’t bog down my regular account.

• Ready for a super secret tip?  Any coupon can be printed twice!  All you have to do is hit the back button on your browser and the coupon will magically print again.

• Get a binder and some clear plastic sleeves to organize your coupons.  This will keep everything in one place and easy for you to sort through.  I always organize my shopping trip and pull my coupons before heading to the store so I don’t look like one of those crazy couponers….even though secretly I am a little.

• It’s all about the matching up the sales with the coupons.  Or waiting for a store like Harris Teeter to have a Super Double Coupon or Triple Coupon week.  That is really when you hit the jackpot.  IT IS SUPER DOUBLE COUPON WEEK AT HARRIS TEETER STARTING TODAY!  They will double coupons up to $2.00 – limit 20 per day.  See the Harris Teeter website for more details.

• There are bloggers out there that do all of the hard work for you.  I visit MyCouponTeacher.com every week to see what the latest coupon match up deals are for my local Harris Teeter.  These couponing bloggers will tell you what items are on sale and which coupon to match it to to get the best price available.  Sometimes they even link to the coupons that you can print out for free.  Like I said, they do all of the hard work for you.  I just skim the list each week and see which products I am interested in that match up with whatever coupons I might have stashed away.

• You can get free groceries.  I often get free items at the grocery store by matching up sale items with coupons.  Even if I am not interested in the product I will go ahead and get it.  I can always give to a friend or donate to someone who could use it.  I will never pay for another toothbrush, chapstick, mustard or hot sauce again.  I get those free all of the time.

This is an example of what your receipt might look like when you start couponing – notice the coupons tendered at the bottom.

This really only scratches the surface of couponing.  There are many more tips out there that I have even yet to learn.  Please feel free to comment on this blog post if you have any amazing coupon tips to share.  I would love to hear them!  HAPPY COUPONING!