Sunday, January 29, 2012

Our Couponing Challenge

A few weeks ago on my daughter Birthday we decided to take some money given to her by her great aunt and go to Toys R Us. Because I’m one of those couponing people I already signed her up for the Toys R Us birthday promotions and got a $3 off coupon in a birthday card. So we took the $5 and the $3 coupon and found a toy for $8. When we came home with our $8 stuffed zebra my husband expressed that he would have bought the zebra without the coupon and just spent the extra $3. I guess it made an impact on him realizing how much money can be saved if you look for discounts because he challenged me to only buy things I can get on discount, with a coupon, or otherwise on sale.



So with February just around the corner- and it being a shorter month we decided it would be the perfect time to do a month of couponing, discounting, and only sale shopping. There are a few rules we decided to attach to this challenge to make sure that we are saving the most money and they are as follows.

1) The only things we are allowed to pay full price for are staples- milk, eggs, whole grains, and dried beans. If I can get a coupon for these items though they need to be used.

2) We are allowed to buy an item at Costco without a coupon if it is less than a couponed counterpart at another retailer. These items must be price checked online with other retailers, and a coupon for the item that could be used at another retailer must be present.

3) Fresh fruits and vegetables, meat and other items like these are allowed to be purchased without a coupon as long as we purchase the items that are on sale, and produce will be checked against the produce stand we often use.

4) We are able to buy the generic if it’s less than the name brand counterpart with a coupon. We are not allowed to buy the generic if we do not have a coupon for the name brand counterpart.

5) We are going to go out of our way to use the gas stations that we have discounts at, and websites like www.fuelmeup.com or www.gasbuddy.com to figure out what is going to be our best purchase price. We will also plan to fuel up when we are in the area of the less expensive gas stations.

6) Eating out is allowed only if we can find a coupon for the restaurant or can apply a discount. (Very happy my Starbucks card gives me a discount.)

This experiment isn’t aimed to totally change the way we shop, but rather is intended to make us focus in more on what are staples and what aren’t, get in the habit of price checking, and grabbing the discounts that are right in front of us that we are not already taking advantage of. I’m already a Jr. crazy coupon lady, and find ways to shave the family budget, but let’s see how much better we can do! Having Josh on board for this is going to make a big difference in our couponing and saving.

This challenge starts February first and I’ll keep a blog for the month to keep track of the savings, the discounts and the things we’ve learned.

Don't wish us luck! Wish us willpower!