If you have ever said that they don't make coupons for the products or brands you use then this blog post is for you.
First, I want to say....you do use toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant, soap, shampoo, razors, and you do clean your house, right? Then there are definitely coupons out there that can save you money. Even if you don't use a coupon for anything else purchasing these products with coupons can save you hundreds, even thousands of dollars a year. Furthermore, if you are stuck on the same brands all the time and you are not willing to try other brands, there are still ways to save tons of money couponing.
Lets chat about the pharmacies. For a very long time I avoided the pharmacies. It's common knowledge that their products are marked up as compared to the large discount stores such as Walmart and Kmart and even compared to most grocery stores. I only went there on occasion when other stores were not open (like in the middle of the night with a sickly child) or when I was in a hurry and didn't want to deal with the crowds or size of the other stores (like when on vacation or running late for an appointment). I rarely purchased anything other then exactly what I entered the store for in the first place. I even remember getting a Register Reward from my local Walgreens only to throw it away (gasp!! I know it's terrible!!) as it was a coupon and I never used them. Then one day while working my 9-5 office job someone mentioned that they were saving tons by shopping there and sometimes they even got products for free! I got very curious and decided to see what the fuss was all about.
I began couponing and shopping the deals, mostly at the Walgreens and CVS and realized that I could get toothbrushes, toothpaste and razors all for FREE! And we aren't talking about the cheap ones either! That's when I was hooked.
You see, the pharmacies regularly put items on sale and give rewards that print at the register (called catalinas) that you can use toward future purchases. Every week there are rewards to be earned. At Walgreens they are called Register Rewards, (abreviated RR on coupon blogs). CVS rewards are called extra care bucks (ECB) and Rite Aid's are called UP rewards. If you roll your rewards every week into other deals you can stretch your money even further.
To give you an idea of some of the deals that I get and how much I save week to week here are two real shopping scenarios that I actually did.
CVS is a great store to start in and learn to coupon. Make sure to take advantage of their kiosk and scan your card for more deals. I recently went to CVS for my weekly shopping trip. We had recently been on vacation and so I had no ECB to roll over and had to pay for everything OOP (out of pocket) but in the end it was still an awesome deal.
Here's What I purchased.
2 Dawn Dish Soap
2 boxes of Finish dishwasher detergent tablets
2 Softsoap Body wash
2 Aussie hairsprays
1 Aussie Hair Gel
1 Aussie Mousse
3 Airwick i-motion air fresheners
1 box of Wheat Thins crackers
1 box of St. Joseph's Aspirin
AT the time of my trip I actually was out of body wash and needed to purchase some anyway. Plus I have always tried to purchase products we use regularly when they are on sale to save money. My girls use the Aussie hair products and they were on sale even before coupons. If I had purchased only those products at Walmart it would have cost me about $21 (thats 2.97 x2 for the bodywash and 3.94 x4 for the Aussie hair care).
When I purchased all these items which were on sale or had rewards on them, I ended up spending $23 out of pocket and got back 16 ECB to be used next time. That makes my net cost that night only $7 for all those products and I still had 16 ECB to use the next week!
Now this week I made a trip to Walgreens that was especially exciting. I had 12 RR to roll over in the deal. I did 2 early transactions and scored 10 more RR and then put them all into purchasing my main transaction which was items I really needed at the time or items that were an already awesome deal with sales and coupons. 3 transactions ended up costing me a total of $11.60 OOP and I got back $5 more register rewards.
Here's what I came home with:
2 12 pk cottonelle
2 35 ct clorox wipes
2 Lt Brown Sugar boxes
1 4# domino sugar
1 Re-nu solution
1 Schick Men's Quattro Titanium razor
1 Schick Women's 4 pk refills
7 or 8 different character pencils
4 Hershey's chocolate bars (not shown)
The toilet paper we desperately needed as we were down to less then a roll in each bathroom in our house. I already own a quatro razor but I needed the refills. Just for arguments sake lets say I want to Sam's club and bought the cheapest brand of toilet paper (probably 32 rolls) for around $17 and went to walmart and bought the cheapest razors for around $3 then I would have spent $20 out of pocket, not gotten all these products or any rewards to use next time. Talk about smart shopping!! And these are all name brand products, not generic.
The trick with all this is to pair a sale with a coupon. All the items in my pictures I had coupons for so that cuts down my OOP. Some items I even make a profit on in the end.
The Cottonelle is always on sale for $5 each 12 pk, but this week there is a instore coupon (in their savings booklet) for $1 off, that deducts $1 for both packages at once. Then I had coupons for $0.75 each package, bringing the cost down to $3.25 a pack. That's a pretty good deal right there $0.27 a roll. **hint - you can stack a store coupon with a manufacturer's coupon at Walgreens**
The Schick Quatro razors or refills were the most exciting deal this week at Walgreens. They were on sale for $8.99 (from their normal $9.99 price) but gave you 5 RR when you purchase them. Well low and behold there was a $5 coupon that showed up last week on the coupon sites and that makes a $1 profit on that one. There was also a $4 off coupon for the refills making them completely free.
The more I do this the easier it gets. You just have to hold on to the coupons until a sale that makes it a much better price you can live with or until you have rewards to go toward the purchase.
The purpose of this post was only to show you that you can absolutely get name brand items much much cheaper and that there are coupons out there for items you use. You just have to pay attention.
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