By John
Coupon shopping (online and offline) has become a perpetual habit for millions of budget-conscious shoppers.
Does couponing save you money? Absolutely! How much? That depends entirely on how much effort you put into it. A casual coupon user can easily knock $10 off the monthly shopping bill but ferocious ones talk about savings of over 80%! If you are the average American family spending between $500 and $1000 per month on shopping, work it out!
Coupons have been around for years, in one form or another. Collecting and redeeming them was pretty easy and people were grateful for the occasional small benefit they brought. Now, with prices rising all around and people desperate to save money by all means, more and more people are using coupons as a planned method of saving money and as a result the coupon business has become an industry. You need to know your way around this industry to gain optimal benefits. And it takes time.
Collecting coupons
Coupons are generally provided by manufacturers and store owners. You can usually find them in Sunday newspapers, print them out and redeem them at the checkout counter when you shop. Some people buy several copies of the paper just for the coupons alone, and also regularly swap coupons with family and friends.
Online, they are found on manufacturers’ and stores’ websites, and on dedicated websites, again for printing out and redemption at the checkout counter. Quickly establish which websites are the most useful ones for you in order to avoid wasting time.
Further, there are dedicated outlets for coupons for online shopping as well. Interactive websites now enable e-coupons (including coupons for online shopping) to be linked directly to store loyalty cards. Smartphone apps exist that are particularly helpful with this, as the app enables you to search for coupons, do your math and make your purchases on the ground, as it were, actually looking at the products.
Learn the ropes
The industry has spawned its own language which you need to learn to get the best results. You also need to learn about stores’ policies on coupons – specifically the combinations of coupons that they permit to be used on each product. Doubling-up and tripling-up can produce a massive discount.
Which coupons?
As with all comparison-shopping you need to make sure that a coupon is actually going to save you money. Key question: Were you going to buy that item anyway? Remember — no matter how little you pay for a product it’s not a bargain if you don’t need it in the first place and is not saving you money. Is the quoted price without coupon the regular price or a hiked one? Wherever possible compare unit costs of the product, post-coupon. A valuable exercise too is to learn which products tend to carry the biggest percentage reduction in price post-coupon – for example, washing detergents, or personal grooming products, or food ingredients. This will help you to spend more time searching for deals that will save dollars instead of cents.
Always check the expiry date of coupons that interest you.
Organization
The more coupons you collect the more important it is to collate them, by store, department, product type, and expiry date. Putting them in appropriate envelopes will help you when you compile your shopping list and save you (and all the other customers!) time at the checkout counter.
Yes, coupon-shopping will save you a lot of money but it takes time and effort.
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