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Increasing Food Storage with Coupons

Food storage is my #1 priority right now. I am doing pretty good – but have a long way to go. My current food storage philosophy is based on eating what you store and storing what you eat. Storing enough food until I feel comfortable as well as securing water supplies is critical to me. I want to talk a little about how I am approaching getting as much food as possible in a short amount of time for the fewest dollars.

Here are the main points:

• Shopping sales as grocery stores
• Using coupons on sale items
• Double the value of coupons
• Use coupon secret

 - SHOPPING SALES AS GROCERY STORES:

Every Tuesday when the new grocery store sale papers come out – I scour them for good deals. I take the time to go through each paper and circle those items that I know are good deals. I then purchase those items in quantity. I purchase enough of each item so that I will most likely not have to buy them until they go on sale again.

As an example – if Ragu spaghetti sauce is regularly priced at $2.00 per jar – and it goes on sale for $1.49 – then I might buy 10 jars. Buying 10 jars should last until it goes on sale again. Now – if it goes on sale and I have 4 jars left – then I still buy 10 jars.

I do this for almost everything. This is one of the ways I am increasing my food inventories.

- USING COUPONS ON SALE ITEMS:

Every Sunday I purchase 5 or more papers. I sit down and cut all the coupons and organize them by category. Categories include – frozen, dairy, meat, canned, drinks, cleaning, bathroom, pasta, sauces/dressings, etc. I place all the coupons in a 3 ring binder filled with sports card pages.

When I go to the grocery store – I look at the sale items that I am interested in purchasing and see if I have a coupon for them. If I do – I combine the sale price and the coupon value for added savings.

Here is an example:

Ragu spaghetti sauce regularly priced at $2.00 per jar, bought for $1.49 – and then a coupon is used valued at .40 cents = final price of $1.09 each jar. Total savings of .91 cents per jar. To look at it another way – 10 jars would cost you $9.10 versus $20.00 regular price if you have enough coupons.

This can be done over and over again on any item that is on sale and you have a coupon for.

- DOUBLE THE VALUE OF COUPONS:

All that is described above remains the same – with the added benefit that there are many grocery stores that double the value of any coupon up to .99 cents. This means that a .25 cent coupon is worth .50 cents. A .75 cent coupon is worth $1.50. Some stores also triple coupons via special sale events. The savings can really rack up.

Again – lets look at an example:

Ragu spaghetti sauce regularly priced at $2.00 per jar, bought for $1.49 – and then a coupon is used valued at .40 cents which is doubled to .80 cents = final price of $.69 cents each jar. WOW!!

 Doing this many times over can provide a huge amount of food – for little money. Just recently I went grocery shopping and filled my cart to the max – and had to cut my trip shorrt as I had no room. My visit came to $70.00. Believe me – that $70.00 bought a lot of food.

- USE COUPON SECRET:

All of the mentioned techniques for  getting food cheap is great – and there is one more.

Often a coupon can bee used for other items than just what is pictured on the coupon itself. You see, the first 5 digits in the barcode on the coupon is the manufacturers code. If you use that coupon for a different item than intended – but the same manufacturer – you can capture those savings.

So – you have a coupon for X, but item Y is on sale – and has the same manufacture’s code – use X coupon to buy item Y.

SUMMARY:

Bottom line – using coupon along with shopping sales is like a game. I challenge myself to see just how much money I can save. When you look at a receipt and it says original price: $114.00, and the total with tax is $17.14 – that is an awesome feeling.

Your Task: Go buy a few papers his Sunday and get those coupons!!!!

Rourke

 

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