Punny Money’s Grand Coupon Experiment, Part 1
Author: Nick
Category: Money
Topics: coupons, food, frugality
On Friday, I lamented my coupon-free lifestyle but promised to give those adorable little paper clippings a fair chance. You may recall the challenge I posed for coupons:
If I can turn 30 minutes of my time into a genuine savings of ten dollars on our grocery bill over the next 30 days, I’ll reconsider my stance on coupons.
My Grand Coupon Experiment began today with a trip to the local Safeway. We also needed some milk and fruit, so the trip wasn’t an inconvenience. I was amazed to see that the middle inserts of the Washington Post were covered in a white plastic bag–probably to discourage folks from loading some extra coupon books into their copy of the paper. Including tax, the newspaper set us back $1.58.
Back at home, I had to resist scouring the advertisements for expensive computer equipment I don’t need or videogames that’ll drop in price six months from now. Instead, I extracted the three packets of coupons, grabbed some scissors, and started flipping the pages in search of great deals.
Twenty minutes later, I had about a dozen coupons clipped and ready to use. I was careful to cut out coupons only for products we already use (or could substitute for products we already use) so we don’t end up with items we don’t really need. I’ll go over the list of coupons–and our progress using them–after we make our next trip to the store.
Grand Coupon Experiment Net Savings: -$1.58, -20 minutes
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10 Responses »
1.
J.D. @ Get Rich Slowly
May 7th, 2006 at 10:46 pm
You’re making this too difficult!
Don’t you get weekly mailers filled with coupons? We do. Just this week we received at least two mailers that we’ll use for sure. I know this because my wife has cut out the coupons and stuck them on the fridge. There’s a coupon for the local Ace Hardware where if we spend at least $15 on Ace-branded merchandise, we’ll get $5 off our total bill. We spend about $25/month at Ace, so that’s an easy five bucks. There’s also a buy-one, get-one-free coupon for a local burger hut, a place we eat at about once a month. That’s another $3 or $4.
Today we made a grocery trip. Our bill was $110. We didn’t buy anything unusual. After coupons, our total was about $80. We make a couple trips per month. (Sometimes three.) We get similar savings with each trip. If you’re shopping at Safeway, look for their “save $5 on $50 purchase” coupon or “save $10 on $100 purchase” coupon. These are like gold, and generally available in the weekly Safeway flyer.
2.
Nick
May 8th, 2006 at 10:32 am
We don’t get any useful coupons mailed to us. Most of them are for restaurants we’d never go to or windows we don’t need replaced.
The current Safeway promotion around here is a $10 coupon for spending $30 on various foods we don’t eat.
You’re probably right that there are others ways I could be going about this; and if this experiment works, I’ll be sure to look into those others ways.
3.
Brian
May 18th, 2006 at 7:01 am
My May 18th post provides a time-saving reference for coupon users. Go to homemakeover.blogspot.com and take a quick look at the five steps to save with coupons. The Interent reference I give should help minimize your time spent. I’d like to know what you think.
Thanks
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[...] You may recall that one of my main complaints about clipping coupons to save money at the grocery store is that it takes time. I noted that I wasn’t prepared to give up 30 minutes a week to cutting out coupons unless it was worth my time… but I didn’t really comment on how much my time is worth. [...]
Pingback by Punny Money — May 9, 2006 @ 9:57 pm
[...] For those of you following the Grand Coupon Experiment here at Punny Money, I figured it’s time to update my status. [...]
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