Act fast! Egg coupon!

Egg coupons are extremely rare, and don't last long, so if you're interested, go HERE and get this one!
It' s $.55 off any two dozen eggs. Buy them at Rite Aid with +ups, while you're there ;)

High Value Smart Ones printable coupon!

Go HERE to print a $5/10 Smart Ones products coupon! Get it quick, these things always go fast. :)

Organic coupons galore!

Earth Fare has a new page of organic coupons available HERE and if you had to get a raincheck for the Cascadian Farms last week at Publix, like I did, you're in luck as there is a $1/1 printable for the fruit and the granola bars. I have a raincheck for the bars, but not the fruit, wish I did! :)

Many of these q's are manufacturer coupons, and they're unlimited prints! If you want them, print them now, I suspect they will be pulled quickly.

Don't let these q's expire on you!

There's a few q's expiring soon that you might be able to get some good deals out of.
As always, overage is 100% YMMV. Depending on your store, the mood of the cashier, the phase of the moon, rotation of the earth, etc and so on.

*$3/1 Schick Disposable Razor (excluding Trial size) 2.7.10 SS
Use at Wal-Mart. 10-12 packs of Schick disposables are reported to be in the $1.37 price range.

*$3/2 Old Spice Red Zone body wash, 1.7 or larger 2.21.10 P&G
Use at Wal-Mart. The 1.7 oz is the travel size and it's around $.99.

*$4/2 Gillette Antiperspirant/Deo or Bodywash (excludes trial size) 2.21.10 P&G
Use at Target on the .5oz Deo in boxes or the 8oz body wash priced at $1.79

*$3/1 Gillette Antiperspirant/Deo (excludes trial size) 2.21.10 P&G
Use at Target on the .5oz Deo in boxes priced at $1.79

*Free Gillette Body Wash wyb deo 2.7.10 P&G or 3.7.10 P&G
Use at Target wyb your free deo (above)

*$1.50/1 ANY Vicks product 3.7.10 P&G
There are lots of ways and places to use this q. Think small. It does not excude trial, so at a store you know will give you overage, use it on the small packs of cough drops, or the travel sized packs of Nyquil/Dayquil.
*Free Puffs wyb 2 Vicks Products 2.7.10 P&G
when you get your free Vicks above, be sure to also get your free Puffs!

Why it pays to coupon

I know I'm preaching to the choir, but today I was running all over town and decided to price check an item.

Here's the deal, I thought I would see how much Purex detergent was at each store. If I was a shopper that just bought what I needed at whatever store I was at, without bothering to look for deals, I would be wasting a lot of money.

@ Kroger: Purex detergent $4.12
@ Target: Purex detergent $4.99
@ Wal-Mart: Purex detergent $4.49

If I just needed detergent, saw my bogo coupon from last week, I might grab two bottles while out doing my other shopping. I would pay the above price for two bottles with one bogo coupon.

But, if I were me :) I would go to Walgreens. Purex is $5.99 and it is bogo all month long! So I pay nothing for two bottles.

The High-Value P&G booklet is back!

Around this time last year, P&G had a deal- if you bought $50 of P&G products, and submitted receipts, you'd get a coupon booklet- it was known as the $120 booklet and there were some SUPER coupons in it!

It's going to be available again very soon- so, if you're getting in on these deals at Rite Aid, or buying P&G products anywhere else, hang onto those receipts!

Go HERE for more info.

A special Kroger survey

Somehow I was invited to join a special "consumer Panel" through Kroger. I suspect a lot of people got these invitations, but I'm not sure.
I went to fill out the survey, and here was my favorite question (paraphrased, I don't remember exactly word for word):

How many coupons do you use on your average shopping trip?
*A large amount (more than 6 coupons)
*A moderate amount (3-5 coupons)
*A small amount (1-2 coupons)
*I do not use coupons

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wow. Are they out of touch. 6 coupons is a large amount??I guess my coupon use must be "glacial". heh.

I hate confrontation

And I am starting to wonder if many grocery stores require their managers to be complete morons. Sorry, but I am so tired of having to explain why coupons are legitimate and why it is ok to use them. Today, at Kroger, they told me they couldn't take the $5/1 Nature's Bounty coupon on a bottle of vitamins that was $3. No matter that they've done it a million times before. No matter the store will get reimbursed $5.08. Nope, can't take it. I said to the dense manager, "These are legitimate coupons and using one coupon on one bottle of vitamins is a legitimate use of the coupon a stated on the coupon. Kroger will be reimbursed full face value for the coupon when presented." His response? "But the register won't allow it". I said, "You're right. The register is telling you the coupon exceeds the value of the item, but all you have to do is override that." To which he replies "The register won't allow it". *pulling my hair out* "You do it all the time, why is today any different?" "Well we're not supposed to." "Why not? It's a legitimate use of the coupon?" And around the merry go round we went, several times. Finally I said, forget it.

Although, I wonder, if the pre-sale price was above $5- would the q have beeped? I bet not. I'm going to try it. lol.

Joke's on them though. They didn't realize I had other mm's I had already gotten that the cashier pushed through. My total was $22.93 and I had a large bag of dog food. I went ahead and paid, then turned around, went to customer service and returned the dog food, getting $22.98 back. lol. They paid me $.05 after all. HA! And they didn't get the $58 of coupons in payment I would have spent there. Their loss. I went from Kroger to Rite Aid and used the same coupons for overage, and got my dog food free.

Kroger:
Total value of items purchased: $60.33
Spent: -$.05

Rite Aid:
Finished off my RA gift card by buying $7.49 Nature's Bounty vitamins, used the overage for dog food. Free Chex Mix. Used a gift card I got with overage yesterday to pay for the total. :)
Total Value of items purchased: $26.24
Spent: $1.03 on gift card.

Total profit today: $.05

I've been thinking

ETA: I've had several requests to be able to copy this post and/or link to it. That is totally fine. :) If you'd like to copy or link to my post, please just credit me when you do so. Brandy @ ipreferpublix.blogspot.com


One of the things that bugs me the most about being a couponer is that people (and by people I mean, cashiers, managers, other customers) think I am getting away with something, ripping off the store, cheating the system, some even say I am stealing. And it makes me furious.

This attitude comes from a lack of knowledge about how coupons work. If you're here reading my blog, you probably know how coupons work. Here's a quick reminder for all of us...

Manufacturer's coupons: When the stores submit these to the clearinghouse, they are reimbursed FULL FACE VALUE plus $.08 per coupon. So the store makes MORE money by accepting your coupon than by the average shopper handing over cash/credit.
*If a coupon is difficult to read/scan at the fault of the manufacturer/design, the store can charge the manufacturer even more for the handling of these q's.
*Most Clearinghouses are huge conveyor belts that scan coupons to tally the reimbursement value, so that cashier that agrees to "give it to you for free, shouldn't that be enough?" by marking your $1 coupon down to $.75? Just made $.25 for the store. That huge scanner doesn't pay a single inkling to that little $.75 the cashier wrote on your coupon.
*Stores even get reimbursed postage for the cost of shipping the coupons to the clearinghouse.

Doubling/Tripling coupons: A gimmick to get you in the door. The store eats the cost of doubles/triples. They consider it worthwhile if it causes you to shop there rather than at... Wal-Mart.

Competitor Coupons: This is truly a loss for a store. There is no reimbursement value for competitor coupons. Like doubling/tripling, accepting competitor coupons is a gimmick to get you in the doors to buy all your other items at their store rather than the competitor. Stores that accept competitor coupons are using a brilliant marketing strategy. They are counting on you wanting to buy all your items in one place, and hoping that if you have a competitor's coupon that you can use at their store, you'll stick around for the other things as well.

Store Coupons: Store coupons are a little tricky to define. Let's take Publix as an example. Regular Publix shoppers will notice that those Advantage Buy Flyers have coupons and sales that rotate on a regular basis. One that appears often is the $6/2 Sundown Vitamins coupon. The CEO of Publix may be a nice guy, but he's not browsing the local store looking for things to give away. I promise. :) What happens is, some head honcho at Sundown gets together with some head honcho at Publix and they strike a deal. The value could be based on number of coupons redeemed, or number of stores that run the sale. Specifically for Publix, the most recent numbers show that Publix is getting reimbursed approximately 75-80% of the Store coupons' face value. So don't let anyone say to you "Publix doesn't get reimbursed for these" "We can't give it to you for free" "We can't pay you to take it". Because that shows lack of knowledge of how these q's work.

BOGO deals (Publix): You may not be aware of this, but like the store coupons, sales like the Mega sales at Kroger and BOGO sales at Publix are also marketing ploys that are reimbursed by the manufacturer! If Publix is selling Scrubbing Bubbles BOGO at $3.99/ea, that means, you, the consumer, will pay half price for the item, or $2.00. At the end of the sale, Publix tells Johnson and Johnson, hey, we sold 100 bottles of Scrubbing Bubbles, costing us $199, now pony up. And Johnson and Johnson PAYS Publix for running the special and promoting the product. It is another form of advertising. Most recent numbers show that BOGO sales at Publix are reimbursed at approximately 70-80%.

ETA: It occurred to me I failed to mention rainchecks. Rainchecks are another loss for a store. The store is reimbursed the difference of the sale to the store, but if a raincheck is issued, the store is the one to eat the cost when you do use the raincheck. The manufacturer will cover the "deal" for the week the item is on sale, but the store is responsible for keeping the items in stock. If a store has to issue a raincheck, then the amount of discount given is lost since it is beyond the sale week. This is a reason you will have limits enforced on rainchecks.

It makes me crazy that people have this mindset that people who use coupons are abusing the system. I hate that. As long as you are an honest couponer, using legit coupons and following the store rules, then you are doing no such thing. Abuse comes from illegal photocopies, stacking two manufacturer coupons on one item, and so forth. That is true abuse of the system. Most of us? We are just honest people looking for a good deal.

And in the end? The store wins. The store wins BIG by catering to couponers. Let me show you what I mean. . .

When I shop at Publix, I use the trick of buying multiple moneymakers to build up overage to afford the items I need. This helps reduce my out of pocket expense. Do I need 10 bottles of Aleve? 8 Rolls of J&J gauze? 10 boxes of Phazyme? Not right at the moment, and I certainly wouldn't walk into Publix and pay for all of that with cash. So Publix makes a higher profit by selling to me than the average person who runs in for a few things.

My most recent shopping trip:

For Items I use regularly that I stockpiled or needed (eggs, Morningstar, fruit, etc)
Total Cost: $125.61
Total store coupons: $5
Total Mq's: $64.15
(Quantity of mq's presented: 51: $4.08 handling fees)
Total doubles: $4.50
Total BOGO: $60.49

For Moneymakers:
Total cost: $108.96
Total store coupons: $103
Total Mq's: $82
(Quantity of mq's presented: 41: $3.28 handling fees)

For this scenario, we'll go with an 80% return on BOGOs and store q's.
So, for this trip, after reimbursement, the store will have received approximately $288.50, losing $38.20 in store coupons, doubles and BOGOs.

BUT If I wasn't a couponer, and only bought the items I needed/wanted, and we're assuming I am still stockpiling... The store would have made $120.62, losing $17.60 in store coupons, BOGOs and doubles.

When I shopped, I cost them $20.60, but I brought in an additional $167.88.

Now. Which stores was it that wanted to turn away the couponers????


*Disclaimer: I worked as a budget/price analyst for four years for a Publishing company, saving my company more than $1.5 million in residual effects in a single year, so I am pretty darn good with numbers.

Hold it! Don't recycle your paper just yet.

If you bought papers today, look for the USA Weekend (or Parade in some areas). Some of these inserts have a $2/1 Huggies coupon in them. I bought five papers and 2 of the 5 had a Huggies ad with a $2 coupon. The other three had an article/ad for a varicose veins study. It was on the second to the last page, on the right.

For fun...

How many papers do you normally buy? Do you pay cash for them or try to work them into deals (overage at Publix or use rr's/ecb's)?
How many did you buy today?
Do you dumpster dive for inserts?
Do you ask friends and/or neighbors to pass along unused coupons?

What other methods do you have for getting inserts?

Maybe by sharing, we can give each other ideas!

To answer my own questions...
I normally buy between 6-10 papers depending on how good I think the q's are. I generally use rr's on them, but ocassionally will pay cash at Dollar Tree (since the Sunday paper is cheaper there).
Today I bought 27 papers. LOL. And picked up 4 out of the recycle bin.
My grandparents and mom give me their inserts and I shop for them.

I also have a deal with the store manager at Food Lion, he lets me come in on Saturday afternoon and get any leftover inserts from the previous Sunday (although I sometimes forget, and sometimes there aren't any, this is a pretty good deal sometimes!)

New coupon book at Publix!

MORE COUPON BOOKS!!!!!!

Allright- if ANYONE finds these, puuuhhhhllllease let me know where! I need a few of these pretty badly. :D

(Thanks Southern Savers for the pic and type-up)

One Stop. One Store.

The coupons are:

Manufacturer’s Coupons
$2 off Huggies Diapers
$2 off Pullups
$1 off Earth’s Best baby food
.55/1 off Earth’s Best Sesame Street product
$3 off Purina One dry dog food 8lb or larger
$2 off Purina One dry cat food 3lb or larger
$2 off Purina One biscuits
$3 off Purina Beneful dry dog food 15lb or larger
$1/2 Purina Beneful prepared meals
$1.50 off Purina Beneful Snackin Slices
$4 off Glade Sense & Spray
$2 off Glade Plugins Scented Oil twin refill
$3 off Glade Fragrance collection
$1 off Pledge
$1 off Scrubbing Bubbles
$1 off Nature’s Source
.50/1 off Clorox Bleach 96oz or larger
.50/1 off Clorox wipes 35ct or larger
.50/1 off Clorox Clean-Up 32oz or larger
$1 off All Laundry Detergent
.55/1 off Snuggle Liquid Softner or Dryer sheets
Free Publix Bag wyb Angel Soft 4 double roll bath tissue and Sparkle 2 roll paper towels

Store Coupons
$3 off Enfamil powder (don’t forget about the $5 off printable)
$3 off Enfamil Convenince item
$2 off Enfamil Restfull Formula
$1 off Iams dry dog or cat food
.50/1 off Bounty six rolls or larger
.50/1 off any Febreeze
.40/1 off Palmolive Aroma Sensations
.50/1 off Suavitel fabric softner
.40/1 off Fabuloso cleaner

What is overage?

This is a word we extreme couponers love. Overage.

Overage is when you have a coupon (or coupons) for an item that are worth more than the item itself. The overage is the extra leftover. Some stores will allow you to have that extra to use toward other items in your transaction, others will reduce the value of the coupon to the amount of the item.

Opinions vary on this topic, but in my humble opinion, you should get the full value of the coupon used, because the retailer will be reimbursed full value no matter how much the item purchased costs.

There are several ways to get overage. The best way is to find a store that has a very good coupon policy, like Publix. Because the more types of coupons a store accepts, the more opportunity there will be for overage.
1) An item is on sale and you have a coupon for a larger value than the item.
i.e. Cheerios are on sale for $1.00 a box. You have a coupon for $1.50 off one box. What happens to the $.50? Overage, if your store allows.
2) You have a manufacturer coupon and a store coupon for the same item. When used together at a store that allows stacking, it adds up to more than the value of the item.
i.e. Cheerios are $1.00. You have a manufacturer coupon for $1 off one and a store coupon for $.50 off one box. When used together, you have $.50 overage.

I believe that overage should be given for any items you purchase that the item is less than the coupon. Unless the coupon states "minimum purchase", then the manufacturer knows what they are doing when they put out their coupons. Sometimes I think people think the manufacturers are just oblivious. They're not. When they do not "exclude trial sizes" on their coupons, they understand people can use them on trial sizes. And often, that is their plan. They want you to try their product for free so that you will then like it so much, you'll purchase it full-size and full-price. They are not stupid!

As I said, opinions vary, but since this is my blog, and mine is the only one that really counts (heh) Overage should be given on all coupons that do not disallow it.

A good example is the $6 pork coupon. This coupon states that you can save $6 off of any "the other white meat" when you buy Kingsford Charcoal and another {participating item}. There is no minimum requirement. If this coupon stated "Save up to $6 on the other white meat, value of coupon not to exceed item value" then I would say absolutely not. No overage should be given. But it doesn't. So I am happy to use this coupon at a store which allows overage.

The thing we have to remember is that the average shopper does not use coupons. The occasional shopper uses a few coupons (probably saving up to ten dollars per transaction). It is a very rare shopper that does what we do. So at the end of the month, when the retailer turns in their coupons to the clearinghouse for reimbursement, there is plenty of pork sold to cover everyone. The $20+ of overage I am getting is way outweighed by the hundreds or thousands of dollars in pork sold by the retailer in the month.

Regional coupons and What exactly is out there?

It is amazing to me the variation on coupons.

I don't post where my coupons come from, so I understand that sometimes that can be a little confusing. Our papers often have very different coupons from what is available elsewhere.

It also seems that Publix is the King/Queen of coupon booklets and there are SO many different ones! LOL! The Toss For Cash is a good example. There are two very different versions, but around the blog-osphere, they are referred to as the same, so you never really know which one you're looking for.

Peelies/hangtags/winetags/blinkies also seem to vary be region and store even. Finding coupons that look the same but have different wording. For example, I once found blinkies for a Lotion that said "excludes trial size" at Publix. Then I went to Food Lion and they had the same blinkies, but did NOT exclude trial size. I know there are Johnson&Johnson product coupons that have been similar.

Basically, what I have learned since couponing for over a year now, is to read your coupons carefully. Make sure you are purchasing the correct items as described on the coupon. Then, go crazy trading and buying for ones not in your region. I have gotten some great coupons by trading on HCW. I have made some friends in other regions and we trade booklets and regional q's. It has helped my couponing and allowed me to get the crazy deals shown in my blog!

Anyone spare some Chef Michaels coupons?

So does anyone have any $3/1 Chef Michaels coupons from last week's insert they won't be using and can spare for my doggies?

My doggies thank you.
:D