Combining Sales, Discounts, and Coupons

Let’s talk about utilizing coupons in the fullest measure.  Coupons are a dime a dozen these days.  You can find or print coupons within minutes from just about any computer.  They’re in the mailbox every week.  You’ll find them falling out of your newspaper on Sunday.  So, with so many coupons, everything must be a bargain, right?  Absolutely not!  Coupons are actually a marketing tool to advertise to a part of your brain that makes you think you are getting a deal that nobody else can get.  If you are new to couponing, you are more likely to buy something with a coupon than you would buy something that is on sale the same amount.

So, how do coupons make a good deal?  When you use the coupon on an existing sale!  If your favorite Chex mix is $2.79, and you use your 50-cent off coupon, it brings it down a little.  However, if the next week, Chex mix is on sale for $1.79, and you use your coupon that week, now you’re getting a great deal!  Manufacturers will try different marketing techniques–they may issue coupons the first week of the month, and then promote sales at grocery stores nation-wide the last week of the month.  Save those coupons when your favorite grocery staples and snacks are discounted, on sale–or even better–on clearance!