Tag Archives: Target

College Ready: sharing what I’ve already learned (part two)

17 Aug

We spent one full day and shopped til we dropped, hitting three major stores to get the bulk of what we needed. We scored deal after deal.

Earlier this week I shared Part One of my College Ready posts. I don’t know it all, I don’t even know as much as other people know, but in a short time, I’ve learned a lot that I can at least share out. Those who need to know can add it to what they’ve learned, save it for later when they need it, or toss it.

Here’s what I’ve learned: college is expensive, and college needs are expensive. We hear a lot about tuition, room and board, and books all being expensive, but what people don’t really talk much about is the huge expense of getting a student ready to live on campus. Not everyone lives on campus, but if your student is going to, start early saving some money for dorm expenses if you can, and start saving coupons and watching for deals. Get those deals when you can and put them aside if you have to. Shopping for something big like this is like a sport. You need a strategy. Here is our strategy.

Many people know that Bed Bath & Beyond prides themselves in being a go-to for college dorm shopping. (And no, I don’t make any commission off of these posts from them.) When you tour dorms there are often BB&B advertisements in the rooms which have been outfitted by the local store, and you see their ads often on social media, television and in print. Their coupons arrive in the mail regularly: 20% off one item, $5 off your total purchase over $15 and $10 off your total purchase over $30. You can even order all of your dorm room supplies online and have them shipped to the local BB&B near your school so that you can pick them up when you arrive for move-in day.

My advice is simple: save every single coupon. Don’t ever throw them away. They have expiration dates on them but they don’t actually expire. They  will accept them forever, and they let you use more than one per shopping trip. Take every single one of them with you if you choose to shop at BB&B for college dorm needs. More importantly, save every coupon to every store that you get during this shopping time and make the most of the deals that pop up as you see them. You may not realize you need something and you don’t want to throw away a good deal.

We opted to first use any store gift cards our daughter had received as graduation gifts towards her college shopping needs. We advised her to save any visa gift cards for books, since we had a little bit of money put away for shopping already, and to save any Amazon gift cards as well, unless we found something cheaper on Amazon (which we didn’t).  We would combine any gift cards with coupons and then after exhausting that option, we’d use the money I’d put aside from January to June with coupons next. This would not touch the money in her savings account at all, which would be saved for when she was living at school.

She had the most in gift cards at BB&B, then at Target, and although we did not have a gift card to At Home, it was my birthday in August and I’d received a “15% off your whole purchase” coupon. She signed up for their loyalty program and received a “10% off your whole purchase” coupon too, but we didn’t need it. Additionally, we visited Five Below, where everything is $5 or less, and looked to see what we could get there since she had a small gift card there and they have some cute dorm decor items. We planned to save our trip to Walmart for last because although it’s slightly cheaper than Target or BB&B, we would be paying entirely out of pocket with no coupons or gift cards at all, and it ended up being cheaper for us to shop with gift cards and coupons first, exhausting all of those before Walmart.

You can make money-saving magic happen with your coupons if you’re strategic.

Just in our BB&B shopping alone, we saved $100 in coupons (we used a total of 14 coupons in two visits, six one time and eight the next time, and we have some left if we need them) and we used $150 in gift cards, only paying $165 out of pocket total-and only on the second trip-the first trip was totally free. We got the bulk of what we needed there, from a comforter set to all of the under the bed, next to the bed and above the bed storage items. We also got a few decorative items there. We saved $21 at the At Home Store with my birthday coupon, and used $30 in Target gift cards before paying anything out of pocket at either store.

Since we don’t know if we’re 100% correct in everything we’re getting, we are saving every receipt. At BB&B they also told us to save all the packaging for returns as well. A good friend once said to me, “You know, it is possible to over-shop,” and I can totally see how that can happen. There is SO MUCH out there and there are so many suggestions of “must haves.” I tried to look at several lists and compare them to each other, and to listen to other people’s advice as well as knowing what we already had or didn’t have before we shopped. If I saw something come up on every single list and it matched up with what other people told me we’d need, it definitely went on to our list as well. If it was something we already had at home and could spare, we tried not to duplicate. We looked at her room layout to see what we thought would fit, and where. Some things just seemed over the top, or extra. We tried to balance having some cute decor items with having the more functional items first and foremost. Some nice-to-haves are okay, but the must-haves had to come first. We were lucky too, that a friend gave us her daughter’s memory foam mattress pad, which everyone now calls a “must have,” but which is very expensive. (Those didn’t exist when I went to school, I had a foam egg crate topper.) I found this type of shopping to be very similar to when we outfitted our RV for the first time. Function was first and foremost, space-saving was key, and money-saving was of the utmost importance.

So now, we wrap up, picking up the last few little things over the next week or so and then start to pack up and move on out. We’ll see how well we did once she moves in; how on the mark we were, what we still might need or what needs to be returned. Keeping our fingers crossed that we are more on the mark than off!

Fingers crossed…

 

 

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Summer Couponing Update

14 Jul
Last week's CVS haul was amazing!

Last week’s CVS haul was amazing! I spent $6 on all of this, which is equivalent to paying for just one purple bottle of the shampoo shown here. I had $25 in Extra Care Bucks and a variety of manufacturer’s coupons to combine with the CVS weekly promotions and sales.

It’s been such a long time since I did a couponing post. The springtime is so busy at work and at home that I don’t have as much time to devote to couponing as I’d like, so I didn’t have a lot of really great hauls to write about. I got lots of little deals here and there, but nothing really blog-worthy.

However, this summer in just one week’s time or so, I had two huge hauls and when I posted the photo shown here on the left on Facebook last week, I had a lot of “Please tell me how!” type of requests, so I decided that I’d do a post about couponing soon.

On the night that I came home with all of the items shown here, I said to my husband, “And I bet when I go back, I’ll have earned $5 from the Beauty Club too!” At CVS, for every $50 you spend on beauty products you get $5 back. Shampoo, conditioner, hair color, hair supplies, body wash, and all makeup products count as beauty supplies. With three girls and myself living here, we go through a whole lot of all those things. At CVS there’s always great sales and great CVS coupons to stack along with the  manufacturer’s coupons for all these types of items, you can’t go wrong.

Sure enough, when I went to CVS tonight (I realized we were completely out of extra toothbrushes and I’d just tossed mine in the trash) my $5 Beauty Club reward popped out, but so did a $5 Prescription program reward! I walked into the store with $10 to spend for free! (At CVS, for every 10 prescriptions you fill, you earn $5. You can sign up three customers per loyalty card.)

My coupons and Extra Care Bucks rewards in hand, I headed straight to the toothbrush section. After comparing prices and sales, I opted to just go with a basic set of two CVS brand toothbrushes. From there I moved on to the makeup section because when I’d scanned my card at the CVS machine, a coupon for $4 off $12 of makeup popped out. I try to keep things like foundation, mascara, and concealer, on hand because again…a house full of women, two of whom use makeup, we go through quite a bit.

This week's haul was just as good, if not better, than last week's! I had $22 in Extra Care Bucks and several manufacturers coupons to combine with the new week's sales and promotions at CVS!

This week’s haul was just as good, if not better, than last week’s! I had $22 in Extra Care Bucks and several manufacturer’s coupons to combine with the new week’s sales and promotions at CVS!

Imagine my surprise when I came upon the Physicians Formula makeup section and saw those bright yellow CVS signs that said, “Buy any 2 Physicians Formula items and receive $10 in Extra Care Bucks!” I couldn’t believe my luck! I had $4 off already! I grabbed two of the concealers that we use, which are $6.99 each, which gave me the $12 I needed to spend to use the CVS $4 coupon, knowing I’d earned my $10 back.

I moved on to the cereal section. We go through tons of cereal for breakfast and snacks, especially in the summer. I buy a huge variety usually, and we range from the healthier types to the sweeter types, depending on what coupons I have, what’s on sale and what’s left on the pantry shelves.

I had a $1 off 3 Kellogg’s cereals coupon as well as a $1 coupon off two boxes of the Cheerios in the yellow box, which also had a “get $2 Extra Care Bucks Back” sign on display.

In the end I had a total of $22 Extra Care Bucks and spent only $7 out of pocket for my entire haul shown here. That’s equivalent to paying for just one of the concealer sticks!!

I can’t emphasize enough that it’s so important to utilize all aspects of any store’s promotions in addition to manufacturer’s coupons when you shop, no matter what store you’re at. If the store utilizes a customer loyalty program, sign up for it. If they accept their own store coupons, internet coupons, manufacturer’s coupons or any combination of those things, use them to your benefit. Try to shop the sales and promotions even if you don’t currently need a particular item. If it’s something you use, it’s better to get it for free or almost free, ahead of time than to pay full price for it the day you need it. My toothbrushes are a perfect example. I’m usually very good about keeping them on hand from sales and promotions as well as from the dentist and I have enough toothpaste to sink a small ship, but somehow I’d forgotten to keep up with the toothbrushes, so some of my first $5 of Extra Care Bucks went right to a 2-pack of toothbrushes. That’s kind of a waste of Extra Care Bucks, but at least I had them to use and I didn’t have to pay for them anywhere out of pocket.

In my first week’s haul shown above, the majority of my coupons were CVS store coupons coupled with their own store promotions. At CVS you can stack their own store coupons with each other, so for example, if you have a CVS coupon off of Almay makeup for $2 off $10, and you have a CVS coupon for $5 off $15 of makeup, you can use both. If you have manufacturer’s coupons off of Almay you can use those as well. And if you’re lucky there may be a promotion going on such as a Buy One Get One 50% off, or an Extra Care Bucks promotion where you earn back some of what you’ve spent. If you have two manufacturer’s coupons for the same item and you buy two of that item you can use both coupons in addition to your CVS coupons. You can use manufacturer’s coupons off of the half-priced items and even off the free items for a Buy One Get One Free promotion.

No matter what store you go to, be sure to know their coupon policies before you go in. Not all stores are the same. I do the best with my coupons at CVS and Target in my area because they have their own store coupons and promotions to couple with the manufacturer’s coupons.

If you’re new to couponing, or want to be, I’d say start small. Pick just a couple of stores that you frequent most and try it out there before going all over the place trying to hit up every store in your town with your coupons. And remember, anything you save is better than not saving at all, and you’ll get out of it what you put in to it. If you have lots of time to devote, you’ll save more money. If you have a little bit of time to devote to it, you’ll save a little less money, but every penny saved is money in your pocket rather than someone else’s pocket!

Good luck and happy saving!!

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Monday Musings: raising socially conscious kids

19 Aug
You wouldn't think that buying a doll could help others, but it can.

You wouldn’t think that buying a doll could help others, but it can.

This has been an amazing, interesting summer.

We have had our usual tons of fun at the beach, visiting with family, and taking advantage of some local tourist attractions we hadn’t visited yet.

But there’s been more than that, and it’s really had me thinking over the past week or so.

Our kids have been really trying hard to find ways to make a difference in the lives of others more than ever, this summer.  They seem to have really found a global awareness of the plight of others, to have developed a true social consciousness. I find the whole thing interesting, amazing, and of course, I’m so proud of them. They’ve always wanted to find ways to help others, they’re always asking and searching, but this summer it seems they’ve found ways on more than one occasion to put their desires to help into action.

Summer started out with Elizabeth’s birthday, which she dedicated to raising money and supplies and creating crafts for the local Ronald McDonald House. The idea was one she came up with herself, and I wrote about it here. We were so proud of her.

We are grateful to be able to help others with these bags of snacks and drinks, but those who receive them are giving blessings to us in return.

We are grateful to be able to help others with these bags of snacks and drinks, but those who receive them are giving blessings to us in return.

Then came the second Healthy Lunchtime Challenge/Kids’ State Dinner 2013, which although we didn’t attend this year, we were privy to all of the excitement that we got to read about on our Facebook group page. It was on there, that I read this article about Braeden Mannering of Bear, Delaware, this year’s HLC winner from that state. In the article I read about Braeden creating what he called his “Brae Bags,” which he keeps on hand, filled with food, water and brochures; “a soup-kitchen-to-go” as he calls them, to help people who are in need whenever he encounters them. I was particularly struck by Braeden’s idea of his bags because all of my kids are always asking what we can do to help those who are homeless or in need, whenever we pass them on the road. I never had a good answer, until I read the article about Braeden. I thought it was such a great idea that I read it to my kids and they agreed. We went out a few days later and bought supplies to fill our own bags (cereal bars, a bottle of water, fruit snacks and two pieces of hard candy) which we handed out to people as we came across them in our travels. We first filled six bags and within about seven days we filled six more. We keep them in a cardboard box in our car, ready to go. It gives us all a great feeling to be able to help someone else in need. We filled our bags with items from Dollar Tree, so it’s not a costly way to help others, and the value far outweighs the cost. Although we are helping others, it is us who leave feeling blessed. It’s reminded all of us how lucky we are and how little it takes to help someone else.

It was this tidbit that sealed the deal for Elizabeth. She fell in love with the doll and the ability to help others with her purchase.

It was this tidbit that sealed the deal for Elizabeth. She fell in love with the doll and the ability to help others with her purchase.

Recently we started to give our kids an allowance each week. It’s a new initiative at our house and so far it’s gone well. It’s good to see the girls working hard, saving money for college (part of their allowance goes into savings) and saving money for fun things they’ve always eyed but been unable to buy. Elizabeth found a new kind of doll at Target, and I was fascinated when she told me all about the Hearts for Hearts dolls and why she wanted to buy one. It turns out that each doll is from a particular country and comes with their own story. The doll she first fell in love with, as she tells it, was the one from Afghanistan, and the biggest thing for Elizabeth was that by purchasing her, learning her story, which is quite sad, she was helping girls from around the world who are less fortunate than she is. You can read more about that here. This doll is one of her top favorites and since she’s gotten her, she’s already started planning her next purchase.

And finally, for now anyway, around the same time, Elizabeth stumbled across another Target initiative. They’ve teamed up with FEED USA, to offer a wide variety of products designed to help feed children and families across the country. That’s all she needed to hear. Having gone a whole school year last year with the same backpack from the previous year, I’d promised her an update for this school year. When she saw that Target had a backpack in the lineup of items for the FEED USA program, she insisted that had to be her backpack. Each item in the product line has a number stamped on it, the number of people it will feed by your purchasing it. Her backpack which would cost $28 at full retail price (I never pay full price for anything) and would feed 28 people. She was thrilled. We had to order it online because our store is sold out of many of the FEED USA items. I used my Target Red Card which got me free shipping and saved me an additional 5% off the price and I had a $5 Target gift card as well. For $23 we fed 28 people. Since the backpack hasn’t arrived yet, I don’t have a photo to show you. Once I do, I’ll add it in.

So all in all, it’s been a great summer. We’ve spent time with family, been to the beach, a mansion, and a water park. We’ve fed 28 people across the country and helped at least seven of those who are homeless in our own community. We’ve also helped to ease the plight of girls less fortunate than us around the world and given some comfort to those whose children are receiving treatment at our local hospitals. We’ve been busier than I thought.

Our awareness of others in need and of our own blessings has been raised significantly. I can’t point to just one thing that made the difference, but rather a combination of things we’re all involved with, from church, to school to scouts, to national events, to our dinner table conversations. Whatever it is, I’ll take it. I like the socially conscious people that our children are becoming and I hope that we as parents can help to encourage that type of social awareness even further in the coming months and years so that when we let our children go out into the world on their own, we can be proud of the adults they’ve become.

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End of Year Couponing Update for 2012

3 Jan
Hot off the press!

Hot off the press!

As many of you remember, I accepted a challenge from my college roommate, Karen, last January and tried my hand at couponing. I began at the end of January, right around the 28th of the month, or thereabouts.

My first couponing trip was to CVS and with that one trip, I was hooked on saving money!

This week marks the start of the new year, a whole new year of saving money. To celebrate, I am sharing with you some photos of a local magazine article in which I was one of the couponers featured. This magazine, Prime Time, is the January issue and it’s put out by the same company that puts out the two newspapers I work for, Beacon Communications. I was so excited when they asked if they could feature me for the story. Also featured is my friend Pam, who has been so helpful in teaching me her couponing strategies along the way.

Clip, clip, clip...

Clip, clip, clip…

I thought that with the feature story coming out today, it’d be a great day to share with you some of my couponing savings totals for the 2012 year.

Remember, all of the items I purchased were from places I already shopped, for things I already buy. I did not add any other stops to my already busy schedule and I did not start purchasing things I don’t need, like baby wipes for example, when I don’t have a baby, just to use the coupons.

Ready?

CVS: I saved $1604.36 at CVS this year. At CVS I utilized their own store coupons, stacked with manufacturer’s coupons, along with sales and their Extra Bucks Rewards to make the very most of every penny I spent there. I also made sure to enroll in their Beauty Club and just yesterday, their brand new prescription program, both of which earn you additional Extra Bucks for purchasing things you already were buying.

TARGET: I saved about $90 this year just by using my Target Red Card, which is not a credit card since we do not use credit cards, but rather a debit card. This does not count all of my savings from manufacturer’s coupons or Target store coupons, which I stack in order to make the most of my savings. With the Target Red Card you save an additional 5% off your total purchase after coupons. Caroline recently used our Red Card herself when purchasing an item that was over $200. She had saved up for months and used her Christmas money and a Target gift card for the rest, and saved herself quite a bit of money out of pocket by using the Red Card.

STOP AND SHOP: I only recently started popping into Stop and Shop  due to our new dietary needs, for things that my other grocery stores don’t have. Therefore, I only have one month’s worth of savings on my last receipt there, but I have saved $62 in that one month alone, according my last 2012 receipt.

I have also saved with coupons at Walmart, Staples, AC Moore and Michael’s. I’ve saved online using Groupon, Living Social and other group buying deals, throughout the year. I accumulated over $200 in rebate money through the year, which I used to start off my Christmas shopping early this summer.

My kids and my husband have also picked up some great couponing skills. They all scan the CVS card when we enter the store, as many times as it will let us, and they can spot a good coupon right away. We recently went to CVS to get some Zyrtec. I had a $4 manufacturer’s coupon and when we walked in, a $5 store coupon off that very product came out of the machine. Elizabeth came running down the allergy aisle holding it up. She knew we would now save $9 off a product we used to pay full price for.

Of course, being my competitive self, my goal for the new couponing year is to beat the 2012 totals for the next year in order to save my family even more money!

Time to get clipping!

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To Coupon or Not to Coupon: The Update

29 Feb
Coupon holder

I will not be an Extreme Couponer, I will not be an Extreme Couponer, I will not be an Extreme Couponer, I will not be.... Remember when I said that??

It’s been exactly one month since my post where I announced that I had decided to try couponing. If you remember, my friend Karen had recommended that I try it out and I decided that even though my grocery stores didn’t accept coupons, I did enough shopping at stores like Walmart, Target and CVS, all of whom did accept manufacturer’s coupons, that I’d try it out and see how I did.

Holy Cow.

It’s addicting. It’s exhilarating.

I love it.

I’m very good at it, or at least I think I am.

And, best of all, I actually have been saving us tons of money, while getting us tons of free stuff we need too, for one month now. Because of our tight budget, having coupons on name brand items has allowed us some treats that we normally couldn’t afford, along the way as well, and that’s been fun. I’ve never seen my kids so excited for yogurt as they were the night I brought home all the Yoplait Crunch yogurts and the Yoplait flavored yogurts. They took turns calling out who was getting to eat which flavor and Alex took over loading them all into a special spot in the fridge. Yogurt. Really.

Here’s my recap of the last month; how it’s gone and what I’ve learned.

First, before I begin, I can’t thank my friends Karen and Pam enough. Both of them provided me with lots of couponing advice and Pam is local, so she was even nice enough to come with me a couple of times and was very patient as I shopped. Both of them were also extremely patient all month long as I would shop and then send them photos, texts and instant messages of what I’d just scored for free. Very patient, very good friends.

So here’s what I learned:

Free pens at Target

I found that I got the best deals once I'd gathered lots of coupons. These three packs of pens were at Target for 97 cents but I had three one dollar off coupons so all three packs were free!

1) To actually be a couponer, you actually have to *have* coupons. That may sound basic and obvious, but it’s actually more important than I knew. For example, if you can find multiple coupons for the same item, you can buy lots of it when it’s on sale and that’s what helps you get your items for free. The very first time I really went shopping with my coupons I spent more than I had to out of pocket because my coupon stash wasn’t up to snuff yet. I still got free stuff, but I knew that if I had multiple coupons, I’d have done much better than I did that first time.  To that end, I began following several different coupon sites on Facebook and on various websites (Coupon Hauls, Dreamzncolor, Coupon Mom, Simply CVS and Coupon Divas are just a few of the ones I’ve found and used.) I know that on TV they show people “dumpster diving” for multiple sets of coupons, but I have found that getting them online has been helpful and one week my friend Pam gave me A TON of coupon booklets that she was done with, and after three hours of cutting them and filing them, I was in business for real (at least until all of those expire!)

Coupon files

My first purchase: a way to organize and store my coupons. Organization is key.

2) To actually be a couponer, you need to have an organized way of storing your coupons. People use binders, expandable files, bins and more. I chose to buy two expandable files, each one has 13 spots plus extra spots in the front. I got them at Target. I chose to organize them in alphabetical order so the first one is A-D and the last one is D-Z.  So far, I haven’t had any problems with this method.

3) It’s important to go in with a list. Know what you’re looking for, what you have coupons for, what you’re getting for free, and what you need to put into separate transactions, if applicable. Being organized is key. Several of the sites I mentioned above do this organizing for you. They tell you what’s on sale at a store, what manufacturer’s coupons are out there and even give you a link to print them from if available. They also often tell you the best way to get the most for free, as in which coupons to use and how to organize your transactions. There’s lots of information and help out there.

My first coupon haul

This was my January 30 haul of free stuff from CVS-every item seen here was free- but this was not my best one. I put out more out of pocket money then I like to now. But, I'd just started. What did I know?

When I wrote my original post in January, one of the things I said was that I didn’t want to go to more than the stores I normally would go to, that I just wanted to save on what I already bought, where I already bought it. I’m pleased to say I’ve stuck to that, but I can tell you it’s SO tempting to look at other circulars and see what else is out there, where else I could go. For now though, I’m sticking to my guns. I normally shopped at Target, Walmart and CVS for my non-food items and that’s where I’ve focused my couponing efforts.

I also had two other goals in mind when I decided to start.

The first was that I didn’t want to spend hours and hours doing this. I didn’t want it to take a whole lot longer than making a normal shopping list would take. I will say the very first time I did it, it took me a little bit of time to organize myself, but overall, I don’t spend a ton of time on getting ready. I am not one who wants to make this my full time job. I don’t want to spend 40 hours a week couponing and shopping. Maybe some day I will change my mind, but at this point, I’m not feeling it. I like going on my way to or from work or when I have a few minutes before I need to pick up my kids at school, but I don’t spend 13 hours in a store, or 40 hours a week making lists, the way I’ve seen on TV.

Health and beauty shelf

Here's where I store all body wash, shaving cream, shampoo, conditioner, deoderant and toothpaste. Once it's full, it's full. There's no more space now, and this photos doesn't even show it completely full.

The second goal was that I would never buy more than I could store. It’s only been a month, but I can already see why these extreme couponers end up storing 200 rolls of toilet paper under their kids’ beds and in their living rooms. I can see how it can get out of hand.

The first thing I had to do very quickly was figure out where I was going to store the things I was getting for free; or what everyone calls their “stockpiles.” Since I was mostly shopping for health and beauty items, I went into my downstairs bathroom and completely cleared off one shelf in there. I decided that was my space for stockpiling and once that space was full, I’d not buy those particular items again until I had more space to put them on the shelf.

My shelf was full in two and a half weeks. Full.

Medicine and makeup basket

Here's where I currently store any medications and makeup items that I get for free, as well as anything that won't stand up on a shelf, like toothbrushes.

I took a big basket for any medication type stuff I was getting for free as well as makeup items. That basket was pretty big and many of those makeup items are pretty small, so that basket isn’t filling up as quickly as my shelf.

My pantry shelves in the garage are still for food items, but since I buy most of my food items at stores that don’t take coupons, that hasn’t been much of an issue, except for the week when I got ten free boxes of Cheerios at CVS. That created kind of a storage issue. However, we go through a lot of cereal so it was only a temporary storage issue.

At Target on Saturday night I got all this for just $20 because I had so many coupons. I didn't have coupons for the eggs, sausage and tortilla wrappers (wrappers not shown) but everything else I did. For example, the vitamins which are normally $6 I paid $2.16 for.

My most favorite and most successful shopping trips have been at CVS, with Target being a close second. The reason being that they both provide sales and their own store coupons that can be combined with manufacturer’s coupons too. I never knew that. So for example, if you see something on sale at CVS, and they have their own coupon for it, and you have manufacturer’s coupons too, and if by chance you get their Extra Bucks as a result of purchasing said items, you’re golden. CVS also recently changed their coupon policy too, where you can not only use coupons on the items you buy, but if you have a buy one get one free sale, you can use coupons on the item you buy as well as the item you get free. That’s how I ended up with so many boxes of cereal. CVS also has a coupon machine when you walk in the door where you can scan your CVS card every single day, several times in one trip, and get coupons and sometimes even Extra Bucks too. I spent a lot of time in February getting reacquainted with my local CVS stores.

On the list of things I never knew was:

Getting better...at CVS on February 13 I spent $20 out of pocket for items not pictured here, and then got all this totally free with coupons and Extra Bucks I'd earned. Pam was there, I did a little dance when we left the store. I couldn't believe how well I'd done.

1) How often CVS has sales where you earn Extra Bucks just by making a purchase. “Buy this item and get $4 Extra Bucks at the register.” You then can turn around and use those extra bucks to purchase more items, totally free. On one of my trips I earned $42 in Extra Bucks. I spent them on items that earned me more Extra Bucks and earned $12 more Extra Bucks. Additionally, all quarter long you’re earning an additional percentage your spending back in the form of Extra Bucks that you’ll get at the end of each quarter. CVS also has a Beauty Club and every time you spend $50 you get $5 Extra Bucks, even if the $50 you “spent” was on things you “bought” for free. On your one year anniversary with their Beauty Club you get a 10% off your next Beauty Purchase coupon and it’s off your entire purchase plus what you purchase earns you more extra bucks. It’s never-ending.

2) Target’s Red Card can be a debit card OR a credit card and every time you use it you get 5% off your purchase plus your school of choice earns points. I always thought it was a credit card only and we don’t do credit cards, so I never applied for one. Now I have one and use it every time I shop.

Free stuff from CVS

Another CVS haul. I spent $27.10 out of pocket for items not pictured here, and got all of this for free, earning more Extra Bucks from this purchase as well.

Another goal I had was not purchasing anything I wouldn’t normally use or need at my house, just because it’s free, and so far I’ve been good at that. But I will say, I’m an easy-to-please shopper because in general we are not brand-specific unless there’s something we totally hate and won’t use. So for example if Crest Toothpaste is free one week, I’ll get it. If Colgate Toothpaste is free another week, I’ll get it. If Dove Body Wash is free, I buy it, and if the next week it’s Softsoap body wash, I get that too. Until I find something I hate, any brand is good. And I can tell you, I won’t need to buy body wash or deoderant or shaving cream or shampoo and conditioner for a long…long….time. Although on the flip side, with four women in the house, we go through one bottle of shampoo and one bottle of conditioner every single week on average. So although it looks like a lot on hand, it goes fast.

My month’s end total for spending and saving is as follows:

What I would have spent on Health and Beauty at Target, Walmart and CVS this month before coupons and Extra Bucks:  $588.31

What I actually spent: $317.50 (and sometimes what I spent out of pocket was just paying tax, 91 cents here, 42 cents there….)

That’s a savings of $270.81 of items I got for free.

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100% free at Staples if you mail in the rebates. That to me, is worth it for the 42 cent stamp

What I got back additionally in rebates (another new-found joy I’ve discovered in this experience): $31.96

Total out of pocket this month after the rebates: $285.54 ($71 per week)

The biggest difference I see is that normally each month in between the grocery shopping at Price Rite or Aldi’s I’d be spending at least $100 or more every pay period at Walmart or Target or CVS on needed health and beauty items, over the counter medicine, paper goods and cleaning items and I’d only buy what I needed because I was paying full price for them. For example, in my basket photo, notice the Align? It’s normally more than $30 a box for a month’s worth of pills, which I’d pay out of pocket for every month because my daughter has to take it every day. Of the three in the basket, two were free, and one I got down to $14.

This month I noticed already that my usual “big” shopping at Price Rite two weeks ago was also less than normal, under $200 for two weeks’ worth of items and I know that it’s partly due to the fact that many of the items I automatically bought there, I now had on hand for free because of my couponing (like cereal, lunchbox snacks like granola bars, and Kleenex for example). Now that it’s time to shop again, there’s very little that I need because of my new “stockpile,” so I expect my next trip’s total to be way down as well.

I also noticed that I didn’t need to make not even one single Walmart run this month for health and beauty items or cleaning items. I got them all using my coupons at Target or CVS and earned a large portion of them for free. That’s the kind of thing I was just automatically buying as needed before, and paying full price. Now, not only did I buy what was on my list for right now, in some cases, I also have it on hand for later too, saving me money down the line as well.

Because my first shopping trip on January 30th was the one where I spent more out of pocket than I wanted to, I am curious to see how month two goes, now that I know what I’m doing and now that I have more coupons. After that first trip, my next trips had shockingly less out of pocket than that first one, so I know I’m already doing better.

VO5 Free Shampoo and Conditioner

This was one of my favorite CVS hauls because it was a total shock. I ran in for conditioner one night, we were totally out and the kids were IN the shower at home. I quickly scanned my CVS card, and to my surprise I found that I had $5 in Extra Bucks. I went to get my favorite shampoo and conditioner, the VO5, which is normally 99 cents a bottle. It was on sale for 77 cents a bottle. I came home with seven bottles and paid 42 cents out of pocket.

So there you have it. My one month update on couponing. I love it, I now see a huge value in it, both in the money I’m saving and the fact that I have things on hand now that I don’t have to buy just when I’m out of them, in turn paying full price instead of having gotten it on sale with coupons and stockpiling it.

I shudder to think of all the coupons I’ve tossed in the past, all the money I could’ve saved, but my friend Pam is good about telling me not to look back, to only look forward.

And then, she gives me more coupons.

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