Grocery Prices..or How to utilaze the coupon

I just figured I'd write a post about the power of the Sunday inserts.

Groceries have gone way up in price now, and a lot people have gone from Pain at the Pump gas, to Pain in the Isles.

I rarely use coupons, and when I did it would be for 1 or 2 items for .55 cents off. Not a big savings there. But this past week and the shit economy with low income coming in, I had to think about a way to get what I needed, with what I had.

1: Make a list of everything your planning to buy. Include household items (shampoo, pet food etc), dinner ingredients, snacks, the whole 9 yards.

2: Look in your Sunday papers for your local grocery stores insert to see what deals they have. This helps when comparing multiple stores and then writing which stores to get them at next to your item on the list.

3: Look for any coupons in the inserts. Obvious!

(Now the fun part!)

4: Now go online to look for more coupons. The most common one is www.coupons.com . Which you have to install a small printer java applet thing, but it's 100% spyware/trojan free. Look through all the pages to see if there is a better savings coupon not in your Sunday inserts.

5: Go to the manufacturers website. More than often the manufacturer has coupons directly on their website, and at a much greater discount than ads. A lot of people hardly go straight to the source (like I use to), but there are great deals if you take the time to visit them! (Such as a Del Monte Harvest Bowl coupon which currently is a "Try one Free on us!") coupon, which I printed out 50 of them and everyday that's my lunch..for free!

6: If you have something on your list that a different manufacturer makes, try the competition's website as well! They may have a bigger discount for the same thing.

7: After you have all your coupons, check the local grocery ads again and see if there are any specials that you can take full advantage of. Our Kroger here currently has the "Buy 10 mix and match items for $1.00 each, we'll take $5.00 off the total". So it becomes $5.00. Now add any coupons to the products such as "Take $1.00 off the purchase of so-so" It now becomes 10 items for $4.00. Keep adding the coupons for different products and you essentially just got 10 items for free. (This is especially good if your buying 10 of the same item, and using printable coupons, which you can print as many as you want, you can use all of the same coupons as long as you have an item for each one! It's not doubling!)


Some of you probably already know all this, but if you are like me, then you just discovered it! I just went grocery shopping yesterday, and what all came up to $150 in groceries, ended up being $52. Almost $100 saved, by simply googling for barcodes.

Hope this helps some people save some money in this current "depression". :p:

Thanks! Good information!

My major tips:

- learn to cook. Food cooked from scratch is nutritious and often inexpensive.

- Buy produce at farmer's markets rather than the grocery store. It's fresher, cleaner, and cheaper.

You're such a great guy Voldta! :)
Thanks for advice. Unfortunately it doesn't work that way here in EU.

Here is one for you. List a good coupon web site.

One of my fav's is : http://www.hotcouponworld.com/forums/printables/

Or http://www.thegrocerygame.com/ - Which is a subscription based one for 1.25 a week..but they do all the searching and matching for you every week to know what's the best deals in your area.

:^)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 00goddess

My major tips:
- Buy produce at farmer's markets rather than the grocery store. It's fresher, cleaner, and cheaper.

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that's not always true. I went to the farmers market here and they wanted $7 for two(yes 2) red bell peppers that were conventionally grown, and covered with dirt. I could spend less on two organic peppers in pristine condition at whole foods or harris teeter. i'll never shop the farmers market here again. its a rip off.