Cheez-Its $.50 at Walgreens!

I think this is an unadvertised Register Reward - or at least I didn't see it in their ads and haven't seen it on any blogs yet, but there was a yellow RR shelf tag on them at my store (Mill Creek, WA).

If you printed the $1/1 coupon from the Cheez-Its FB page a couple weeks ago grab them and head to Walgreens!

Buy 2 Cheez-Its (2 for $5 sale)
Use 2 $1/1 coupons
Pay $$3, get $2 RR wyb 2 Cheez-Its
= $.50 each

Updated: Scrubbing Bubbles deal gets even better at Target!

So I told you about my great Target deals last week, but now the Scrubbing Bubbles deal has gotten even better with the addition of a Targer Gift Card coupon in this Sunday's Smart Source (SS) insert!
Here's how to make $$ this week at Target:

      Buy 4 Scrubbing Bubbles Shower Sprayer $6.99

      Use (4) printable $3/1 coupons from Target.com

      Use (4) $5/1 manufacturer coupons from SS 6/13

      Use 1 Free Target Gift Card with purchase of 4 Scrubbing Bubbles products

      = FREE + $5 Gift Card

The coupons actually save you an extra $4.04 ($8 off each $6.99 sprayer).  If you are purchasing other items you will probably get this overage off your other purchases.  That's how I ended up with a negative total last week at Target!

Ok, so apparently the cashier at Target shouldn't have let me use the Target coupons on the sprayers plus the Target $5 Gift Card coupon.  But if you don't use the $5 Gift Card coupon you can still score Scrubbing Bubbles for FREE like I did last week OR if you have more $5/1 manufacturer coupons than you have $3/1 Target web coupons (because of printing limits) and still have some of the coupons for a free Scrubbing Bubbles refill  when you buy a sprayer, you can still score a great deal.  In that case it would look like this:

Buy 2 Scrubbing Bubbles Power Sprayers $6.99
Buy 2 Scrubbing Bubbles Power Sprayer Refills (don't know price on these, but they'll be free)
Use 2 $5/1 manufacturer coupons from SS 6/13
Use 2 Buy 1 Scrubbing Bubbles Power Sprayer get 1 Scrubbing Bubbles Refill free
Use 1 Free Target Gift Card with purchase of 4 Scrubbing Bubbles products
= $3.98 OOP plus get a $5 Target Gift Card

Need Foil? New printable coupons from Reynolds!

Head over the to Reynolds website to print coupons for

$1.00/1 Aluminum Foil
$1.00/1 Parchment Paper
$1.25/1 Non-stick Foil
$1.50/1 100% Recycled Aluminum Foil

Thanks to Cathy at Fabulessly Frugal and one of her eagle-eyed readers!

Better Than Free Kraft Dressing at Safeway - PLUS a bonus!

So you have probably seen that you can get Kraft salad dressing on a Better Than Free deal at Safeway this week (the lovely Amber at Coupon Connections NW, as well as The Krazy Coupon Lady and others have been blogging about it).  But, let me tell you, it can get even better!

My local Albertsons has these little recipe books from Kraft in the produce section right now. They include a coupon for Free Produce (up to $1.00) when you buy 2 Kraft Salad Dressings.

If you combine this with the Catalina on Kraft right now this is what it looks like:

Buy 3 Kraft Salad Dressing @ $1.49
Buy at least $1.00 worth of produce (or how about a bag of Fresh Express salad, on sale for $.99?)
Use 3 $1.00/1 coupons from SmartSource in paper 6/20
Use Free Produce when you buy 2 Kraft dressing coupon
Pay $1.47, receive $2.00 Catalina

Free dressing AND salad!

Need a Coupon Binder?

FYI, I just saw some binders that would work great last night in the clearance section at the Walgreens on Bothell-Everett Hwy and 524/Maltby Rd (across from Fred Meyer). They had a couple zip closure ones like I use for $5.99 as well as a few with elastic straps to hold it closed for $7.99.

98% Savings at Target!!!

Whew, what a shopping trip! Mind you, I did all this with my kiddos in tow, so if you're thinking this is all too complicated to manage, take heart!

I hit Target this afternoon for some great deals, and even though they were out of the Aveeno Body Wash and Clean and Clear I was hoping to get for free, and the Old Spice and Oil of Olay that were both going to be moneymakers (bummer!), I still scored majorly.

I got 6 Scrubbing Bubbles shower cleaners, 2 toilet cleaning gels, two fresh brush refills, 3 boxes of band-aids, 6 packages of Rolaids, and two packs of batteries.

Guess how much? Guess again.

$1.54!!!!!!!!

This is my favorite part - check out the total. Before tax it was actually $-3.21. Tax was $4.75 so my total was $1.54. Yay!

If you want specifics, here are the coupons I used

Scrubbing Bubbles shower cleaner: $6.99
$5.00/1 coupon from Sunday paper 6/20
$3.00/1 Target coupon from website
= -$1.01 each

Rolaids 3 packs: $2.24
$4.00/2 from Sunday paper 6/6
= $.24 each when you buy 2

Nexcare Strawberry Shortcake bandaids: $1.47
$1.00/1 coupon from Sunday paper 6/6
=$.47 each

Scrubbing Bubbles toilet gel: $3.94
Scrubbing Bubbles toilet want refills: $3.94
Free refill when you buy gel from coupons.com
Free refill Target coupon when you buy gel
=FREE

Rayovac batteries: $1.00
$1.00/1 coupon from Rayovac website
=FREE

How can you not get excited by saving $81.96? :)

Crazy facts about e-coupons

So as you may have heard there are some great places you can get e-coupons directly added to your store loyalty cards.

Cellfire and Shortcuts both let you add coupons to your Safeway or Fred Meyer cards.

Through P&GeSaver you can also add Proctor & Gamble coupons to your Safeway card.

It takes only a minute to link your cards to these sites and add coupons and it is well worth it.

All of these e-coupons come off automatically when you make a matching purchase and enter your card info at the store. These coupons can be used in addition to any store and manufacturer coupons you may be using for your purchase. This means that if the coupons all lined up right you might purchase a $4 item and have a Safeway store $1 coupon, P&GeSaver $1 coupon, Shortcuts $1 coupon AND Cellfire $1 coupoon and get the item for free.

Here is a real example I did a Safeway a couple weeks ago so you can see how it works:

Purchased (3) Tuna Helper on sale for $1/ea
Used 1 paper coupon $.75/3
Loaded 1 Cellfire coupon for $.75/3
Loaded 1 Shortcuts coupon for $75/3
Total cost $3.00 - .75 coupon - .75 e-coupon - .75 e-coupon = $.75 OOP

Now I'm sure there were folks excited about Tuna Helper for $1/ea (the store special) or $.75/ea (price with only paper coupon), but I'd rather get it for $.25/ea, how about you?

As nice at that is, however, what I discovered yesterday is even more interesting.

It looks like both Shortcuts and Cellfire sometimes release new coupons that are valid while a past coupon for the same item is ALSO valid. So yesterday I ended up with all of the following, unexpired coupons loaded on my Safeway card:

Shortcuts - Wheaties Fuel cereal $1.00
Shortcuts - Wheaties Fuel cereal $.75
Shortcuts - Wheaties Fuel cereal $.75
Cellfire - Wheaties Fuel cereal $1.00
Cellfire - Wheaties Fuel cereal $1.00

I bought one single box of Wheaties Fuel cereal that was $3.99 and gave the cashier a $1 off 1 box of Wheaties Fuel paper coupon.

I swiped my Club Card and guess what happened? ALL the e-coupons above automatically came off. So I saved $5.50 on a box of cereal that cost $3.99. That means that I not only got the cereal for free, but saved $1.51 extra off my bill, making the ground beef I was also buying a lot cheaper. :)

Yay!

Nivea for Men - Better Than Free at Walgreens

So you've probably already seen the money-making scenario on Nivea Active 3 bodywash at Walgreens. However everywhere I've seen it based it on using a $3/1 coupon from Red Plum on 5/2 or 4/25. Well since I just stared couponing and maybe you did too, we don't have those coupons saved!

However, there is a $1.50/1 Nivea Men's product coupon in the Safeway June coupon book. You can use that to still make the Walgreen's Nivea Active 3 deal Better Than Free!

Nivea Men's Active 3 bodywash - $5.99 + tax = $6.56
Use $1.50/1 coupon
OOP cost = $5.06
Get Register Reward for $6.00
Actual Cost = $-.94

Have fun!

Better Than Free!!!

In the last couple few weeks since I started couponing I’ve posted on Facebook about some pretty amazing deals I’ve been getting and more than a couple ladies have contacted me asking for details. I thought I’d share my purchases at Walgreens this week to give you a concrete example of how you can get stuff for BETTER than free! Yes, I am actually getting PAID to shop sometimes!

Here is a photo of what I’ve bought this week


A few points to keep in mind as you read the below:

1. Register Rewards (RR) are coupons that the Catalina machine prints out when you finish a transaction. (The Catalina machine is the little machine next to the one that prints your receipt.) Register Rewards is just Walgreens' specific name for a Catalina, at other stores they’re just called Catalinas.
Catalinas (RRs) are a credit that a manufacturer gives to you when you buy specific products. They will say something like “Save $5 Off Your Next Shopping Order Over the Value of Coupon.” That means that if you spend at least $5, you can use that to take $5 off your total bill.

This is what a Walgreens RR looks like:


2. I count RR as credit towards my total purchases because they really are unrestricted money I will spend on my next transactions in the next week or two, especially since Safeway now has the official policy that they'll accept any Catalinas from any store.

3. I’m still not a huge believer in Mail-in-Rebates though many coupon-ers have now assured me that they pretty much always receive these rebates eventually (e.g. if it says 4-6 weeks, it will likely take 6 weeks to come). For this reason I do NOT count Mail-in-Rebates as a credit towards my total purchases because frankly I’m not really sure yet that I will ever get that money! LOL!

I have noted them at the end, though, so you can see how Better Than Free can become Much Better Than Free if this whole Mail-in-Rebate thing actually pans out! :)

4. Most deals you will see on other coupon blogs and sites only figure total cost before tax. Because we unfortunately live in a state with near-the-highest sales tax rate in the nation, I am actually figuring mine WITH sales tax – 9.5% to be specific since that’s what I pay at most places around here (different cities can vary slightly). I’ve called out the price and tax for each item separately so you can see.

With all that in mind, here is what I bought at Walgreens this week:

Schick Hydro 5 razor - $7.99
Used $5 coupon from paper 6/13
Each Item Total = $2.99 + $.76 tax = $3.75
Received $4.00 RR for each razor
Purchased 5 razors total
PAID = $18.75
RECEIVED RR = $20.00

Listerine Whitening - $5.99
Used $3 Walgreens in-ad coupon
Used $2 manufacturer’s coupon printed from internet
Item Total = $.99 + $.28 tax = $1.27
PAID = $1.27

Neutrogena Makeup Remover wipes - $5.99
Neutrogena Face Wash Bar - $2.61
Neutrogena Face Wash Bar - $2.61
Used $1.50 off any Neutrogena item x 3 (one per item)
Total = $6.71 + $1.06 tax = $7.77
PAID = $7.77
RECEIVED RR = $10 (for buying 3 Neutrogena items)

Total paid for all items above = $27.79
RR received = $30.00
Real cost for items = $-2.21

And with rebates figured in it gets even better. I’m submitting the following:

Schick Rebate = $7.99
Purchase a Shick Hydro Razor and receive a rebate of the full purchase price up to $10.99.

Listerine Rebate = $10.00
Purchase ANY Listerine Whitening or Rembrandt product and receive a free $10 prepaid debit card

So, if you figure in the rebates, assuming they come (do I seem pessimistic enough?) Then buying all the items pictured above will actually have MADE me $20.20!!!

Amazing, huh?

My Intro to Couponing

So I must admit I have looked into couponing a couple times in the past, but never tried it. I read some blogs and saw all the crazy deals people were getting but just didn't believe it was possible! It didn't help that lots of the blogs mentioned stores that double coupons regularly (a practice I remember from my early years back east) - I figured since ours here don't then it would never work. Happy to say now - boy was I wrong!!!

On May 24th Amber, the wonderful woman who runs Coupon Connections NW, put on a class for my church. Looking at her examples and great presentation suddenly made it all click in my head - and the list of suggested 'stock up' prices she included blew me away. Really?! I should really only stock up on toothpaste when it's FREE? This happens?!?! I was ready to jump in with both feet and give this a shot!

I started by subscribing to my local paper using the great 5-Sunday-papers deal that Coupon Connections NW has negotiated (definitely visit her site for more info) and visited stores to build up my stash (Safeway May coupon book, Add Dairy to your Summer coupon book, etc.)

To organize my coupons I also pulled out an old zipper-closure binder I had sitting unused and ordered a 100-pack of baseball card protector sheets from Amazon. I'll take some pictures of my binder to post later.