Extreme(ish) Couponing

Matt recently discovered a show on TLC (the network that gave us such gems as "I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant" and "Freaky Eaters") called "Extreme Couponing." We're always on the lookout for ways to save money, so he dug into couponing a little more and found that there are a lot of resources online to help you out. One in particular is a lady out here in Chandler who runs a blog called Bargain Believer. She matches up all of the deals stores are running that week with newspaper inserts and online coupons to get smokin hot deals.

We decided to give it a try, and signed up for a newspaper promotion that gets you the Sunday and Wednesday (ad-day) papers each week for only $1. Then I bought myself a cute little coupon binder at Wal-Mart and started clipping away. We wanted to make sure that we didn't turn into the kind of people who would buy something for the sole fact that it was on sale, so we set some ground rules for this experiment:

1) Only buy what you would have bought anyways (without a coupon)
2) Don't go too out of your way to get a coupon deal (I struggle with this one)
3) Don't spend too much time looking for deals

I'm sure there are a few more, but those are the main ones we chose to follow. The last one is tricky because it's tempting to spend a ton of time looking for the absolute BEST deal and making sure you are saving every penny possible. But that would require giving up time that we could be spending doing more productive or fun things.

The first couple of times out, it was just to test the waters of this coupon thing. We got a few free things (Matt was excited for the free candy) and a few hot deals, which motivated us to try even harder the next time. I think I've got the hang of it now, as witnessed by my trip to Fry's yesterday. I spent about an hour prepping my list and coupons to make sure I was ready, and then headed out. The best deals of the day:

- $2 off any Ice Cream and $2 off any produce for "liking" Fry's on Facebook
- Free Seattle's Best Coffee with a coupon from Sunday's paper
- Free Nestle Crunch Bar, Free Tic Tacs and Free Carmex Lip Balm with online coupons (Fry's makes all manufacturer's coupons worth a dollar, which is how you get hot deals on cheaper goods)
- $1 off Milk with a Fry's online coupon
- And then the best deal: $10 off your $50 order by using a Fresh & Easy coupon (since Fry's accepts competitor's coupons)

I ended up saving 57% off my order without buying anything frivolous or that I wouldn't have normally purchased. Plus, you get fuel reward points from Fry's that you can use at any Shell and Circle K stations to get $0.10/gallon off gas, so that's an added bonus. I love me some Fry's.

Then... THEN!! If you really want to get crazy (which I do), you head on over to the Wal-Mart and price-match the heck out of stuff that's on really good deal from other stores. While Fry's has the best coupon policy, Wal-Mart has the best (only) price-match policy. So you can cherry-pick the super hot deals from all of the other stores and get them all in one spot without having to drive around. And since we live in the same market as a Food City - which has LOW prices on produce - we take advantage of the policy.

So I walk in with print ads from 5 different competitors and match up the best prices from each one:

- Pineapple: $0.99 each (Fry's - they were OUT when I went there!)
- Sweet Corn: 6 for $0.96 (Food City)
- Red Seedless Grapes: $0.59/lb (Sunflower)
- Strawberries: $0.77 for a clam shell (Sprouts)
- General Mills Cereal: $1.77 each (Albertson's) + my $1/2 coupon from the paper = cheap, yummy cereal!

I'm sure if you really had the time and the patience, you could put together a pretty sweet price-match-up and get EVERYTHING on your list for dirt cheap at Wally-World, but for us that violates rule #3, so we don't.

So that's my experience with extreme(ish) couponing so far. I like saving money, so we'll probably stick with it for some time!