I was reading Money Ning recently, and they had an article on ‘The coupon Lady‘. Now, my mom was a massive bargain shopper. She took Winn Dixie for everything they had on triple coupon day. However, this lead her to purchase a lot of items we normally would not need just because they were on sale.
Don’t let this make you afraid to take advantage of a good deal though. Make a plan before you go, and don’t buy what you don’t need! It’s not a good deal if it goes to waste. While you probably don’t want to buy large quantities of fresh produce other items may be a good idea. Frozen foods, paper goods, and canned items that you know you’ll use namely. Often times you can get better deals buying these items in larger quantities, and you have plenty of time to use them before they’ll go bad.
If you don’t have time to clip coupons from papers, or they don’t have what you want inside there are other options. The internet is by far the most impressive tool I’ve ever come across for my day to day life. While many argue I need to see more sunlight, (that’s what laptops are for!) it’s really true that you can find pretty much anything you want on Google these days. Deals, savings, and coupons are no exception.
There’s countless sites that offer printable coupons free for the taking. A quick search brings up a medley of products I purchase all the time. Let’s take a look at coupons.com.
The coupons are grouped by category so you can bypass anything you don’t want immediately. In a few minutes I can download coupons from biscuits, crackers, cereal, and many more items. Right now the site features 64 coupons just in the food section.
Some of the sale items included popular brands like Land O Lakes, Hamburger Helper, Pillsbury, and Chee-zits. A lot of these sites pass around the same or similar coupons though I’ve noticed.
There’s even entire forums dedicated to coupons. People post printable offers, sale information, and anything else you need to know by store! You can browse the forum, pick up the links, and be on your way to savings.
If clipping coupons isn’t your thing you can still get a deal by purchasing gift cards. Many websites sell gift cards for below value. Make sure you’re getting one that’s usable though. Many credit cards also give you cash back on groceries, but remember.. if you’re accumulating interest you didn’t save anything. Pay it off immediately if you use this plan.
I’m not a big coupon user just for the reason you mentioned: it causes you to buy stuff you don’t need sometimes. But I should take more advantage of all the coupons on the internet somewhere - this is something I haven’t really looked into yet, but will for my next big purchases (laptop, etc.).
I liked it. So much useful material. I read with great interest.