Are Coupons All They're Cut Out For?

First of all, my apologies for the corniness of the title. Even though I usually skirt the edges of corniness, today I just dove right in. Somehow, I just thought "coupon update" was too boring.

I decided a photo would help me summarize my coupon experience so far. Voila.

That's right, my zen experience of coupon cutting has since been trumped by a few facts: 1) the stuff that has a coupon is stuff I never buy (mostly brand name products and prepackaged food) and 2) the whole waiting-for-things-to-be-a-low-price-before-using-the-coupon strategy seems to lead to a lot of crumbling expired coupons into my purse. A few lessons:

Coupon websites will only get you far if you are a certain kind of buyer.

If you do buy a lot of packaged foods or brand name products , here are some sites where you can print coupons:
www.coupons.com
www.smartsource.com
www.coolsavings.com
www.printable-coupons.blogspot.com
www.wow-coupons.com
To be fair, I did find a coupon for Sean's contact lens solution and a coupon for Benefiber that saved us a combined $2. Sean also has a bizarre fascination with the smell of Tide so I'm keeping the Tide coupon in reserve. That was about it.

In-paper coupons seem better in both quality and useability in your area.

My combined coupon savings from coupons I've physically clipped from fliers have saved me much more money (about $6) then searching and printing off of online websites.

Usually there is a reason they are giving a coupon for a product.

As far as deals went, I found the lower unit price was often on a generic product or on a similar version of the product not on sale. The coupon sounded like a good deal...until you had to buy in major bulk (do I need 3 Tide-to-go pens ever?) or try some new gimmick-y product (that cereal that comes pre-poured into a bowl just seems lazy to me!).

That said, there is plenty of useful information online.

Freebielist (free samples by product type)
A great system for keeping track of mail-in rebates (from Sense to Save).
Eating healthy with coupons (from Cheap Healthy Good)

And add these two blogs to your RSS reader:
Money Saving Mom (she breaks down the sales flier for you for the best deals)
Spending Less 101 (how I saved $8 on my senior dog's expensive food)

If you buy online, see my buy online guide. It'll change your life.

Summary: While I'm not cheerleader-excited about coupons, I'm going to only spend my time going for the ones I like.

I'm going to check online coupon sites only monthly; stay subscribed to the coupon blogs above; and read my grocery and drug store fliers religiously. Saving money on food is certainly worth a little effort but only if it pays off.

This post was submitted to the Carnival of Personal Finance.

Comments

[Megan]

I agree with you on all counts with the coupons. Unless it's something I use frequently, being required to buy more than two is a bit ridiculous. I'm just going to check coupon websites and clip newspaper coupons for the items that I use, and if I can match them up with sales, great, but if not, that's ok too.

[Andrea]

I've tried the coupon thing more than several times. It just doesn't work for me. I end up in the store and find a comparable brand that is cheaper without a coupon--so the coupon and my time become wasted. I've since saved more money just planning my shopping around bogo offers at my local grocery store.

[Kelly from My Small Cents]

I almost never use coupons; like you I find they're just not for stuff I buy! I do look for loss leaders in grocery stores, and plan my shopping trips around those.

And I too have an almost unhealthy obsession with the smell of Tide, which (un)fortunately is not available here in France, so I have to make do with the good for the environment alternative!

[balunov7]

Thanks for share good topic. Nice post, keep posting.