Why Do Rich People Use Coupons?

Are coupons really worth it?  Are they truly worth all the time and effort?

They can be. It all depends on how you use them and how much time and effort you spend in preparing to use them.

It may not be worth a heart surgeon’s time to clip some coupons; However, the ‘average’ person may be able to reduce their typical grocery bill be several dollars with minimal time invested.

When to Use Coupons

The whole trick to using coupons is to never pull the trigger on something that you wouldn’t normally buy. Period.

For example, you may see a really great coupon for ‘widgets’. The manufacturer’s coupon may say, ‘Buy one widget, get one widget FREE’. On top of that, the store may be running a huge sale on the exact same item. (This is where the real savings kicks in.)

At this point, you might be thinking, “Wow, I can get these widgets at less than 40% of the normal price! What a deal!”

That’s great if you already buy these widgets, but what if you have a cat, but the widget is dog food?

That would be a great value, just not for you.

At other times, you may see coupons for something that you might use, or that you could use. These types of enticements and temptations is where the coupon savings breaks down. You have to decide; However, in my case, I only use coupons for things that I buy every week, no exceptions.

Now that my rant is over, there are definitely times where you can score big with coupons. I will discuss some big ‘scores’ of my own at the end of this chapter.

For now, let’s just say that the ways to use coupons to your advantage are best when you combine several forms of saving together, like combining a manufacturers coupon with a ‘doubling’ or ‘tripling’ bonus at the store and/or combing those with a sale. The effect is that the retail price gets smaller and smaller and sometimes will even hit zero.  J

Before we cover my ‘big scores’, we should discuss some very practical ground rules.

Do’s and Don’ts

The following is a quick list of things that you should do when using coupons.

Only use coupons for items that…

1.       … you already use

2.       … you truly need

3.       … you are going to buy anyway

The next is list of things that you should not do when using coupons.

Never…

1.       …use coupons for things you don’t need

2.       …use coupons for things you don’t use

3.       …use coupons for things you won’t use in the near future

4.       …spend excessive time in researching coupons

Success Stories

Everyone has a story or two about their biggest scores whilst couponing. Here are a few of mine to encourage you.

The ‘Dijon Mustard’ score

Dijon mustard isn’t something that I would normally buy, I will admit it. However, I think you’ll agree with me that it still made sense in this case that I will describe.

I had a coupon for “75¢ off” for a jar of Dijon mustard. The store was allowing a few coupons to be tripled. This meant that the coupon was actually worth $2.25, not just a mere $0.75. The retail price was on the mustard was only $2.29.

This meant that I walked away with a jar of delicious Dijon mustard for only 4¢. That will get you excited. I felt like I was stealing. It was more of a high than having Meyer Lansky do my taxes.

It’s legal, it’s moral, and the mustard was a treat.

I saved 98.22% on that deal.

The ‘Food Container’ score

Rubbermaid makes these really great food containers (like Tupperware). I used them a lot, but sort of went through them quickly.

This could have been due to either misplacing them or perhaps filling them with food and then misplacing them, and then finding them a long time later. By that time the insides looked more like a science project then last Tuesday’s lunch. (this was during a time in my life where I was, um, ‘domestically challenged’.

It was easier at that point to throw the container out, than opening it and then having a HAZMAT team over to check it for diseases. So, I’d just toss it and buy a new one. (Just writing this I am wondering how I ever survived the 1990’s.)

As you can imagine, I purchased a disproportionately higher amount of storage containers back then, than did most other people.

I was extremely interested in getting deals on these containers, even though they were only a few dollars each.

Rubbermaid had these great coupons that were ‘55¢ off’ for any food container purchase, even the small two dollar models. My grocery store had a bunch of them for $1.99 and $2.19 (for the ‘deluxe’ really small ones).

The store was doubling each manufacturer’s coupon, so that brought the purchasing power of each coupon up to $1.10 each. I had a whole stack of these coupons ready to go. You could say that I was an avid collector.

Then, lo and behold, Stop and Shop ran a special: All Rubbermaid food storage containers were hall off.  Well, the $1.10 covers half of $1.99 or $2.19, so the containers would all be FREE. I would just have to pay the tax. (This is unless I could convince them that I was going to eat the containers….)

So, I dumped twenty of them into my cart. That’s all I bought. This was exclusively a Rubbermaid food container field trip. The lady rings it all up and says, “That’ll be forty-something dollars”.

I sheepishly said, “I have a few coupons”, and proudly handed her a wad of twenty.

She scans them all in, and then she says, “That’ll be two dollars and something…”

Again, I felt like I was robbing the store, like I planned a bank job. Hey, whatever motivates you.

The best part was that the cashier lady took it personal and even became a little offended. She said something inappropriate like, “Why don’t you leave some for someone else?”.

I thought to myself, “I did, I did. I left all the ones that cost more than $2.19.

In the parking lot, I ran into some friends. Guess what I gave them? A few food containers.

The ‘Yogurt’ score

This one is my favorite. I almost felt like a gangster.

This one fine day I found myself in a store with more coupons for Breyers Yogurt than probably any other ten years added together in my life. Something like: ‘Save 75¢ on 3’ or something like that.

Well, Breyers was on this ridiculous sale, the coupons were tripled and then when I got to the front of the store I had a decision to make. Line 1 or Line 2?  Here’s the play by play:

Line 1 – This was for sure the faster of the two lines. The cashier was an experienced vet. She probably was working that cash register for the last fifty years. Her line was like the Audubon. Fast.

Line 2 – This was the slower of the two lines, reminiscent of the lines at the Dept. of Motor Vehicles. The cashier was a somewhat clueless part-time high-school girl. It was probably the first thirty minutes of her career as a cashier.

My decision? Simple: Clueless High-school girl, hands down.

Why?

Because the more seasoned cashier would no doubt be a coupon Nazi. Nothing would get by her. She would notice if a coupon expired ten seconds ago, or if it was for a slightly different brand, etc. She’d probably even catch me trying to pass a Canadian penny.

Now, clueless high-school girl had a line that was backed up to Florida. (The store was not in Florida.) She wanted to push people through as quickly and non-confrontationally as possible.

I think some of my coupons were slightly expired and there may have been some other (geographically based) issues. Anyway, back in those days the cahier could force stuff (dollar amounts, discounts) into the computer if it wasn’t recognizing the specific coupon in the cash registers computer.

She did just that. She started pressing buttons and working her magic. I don’t even fully understand how the math finally worked out, but in the end, I walked out of that store with sixteen Breyer’s Yogurts for a mere twelve cents. I kid you not. The receipt said something insane like “You saved 99%”.

I taped that receipt to my bedroom wall. I had it there so long as a trophy that eventually I couldn’t read the print any more.

The next day I was at work, and about to consume one of my yogurts. Before lunging into it I tipped it over the trash to drain some liquid off the top. That was an error on my part. The whole thing slid out of the container and into the trash! I was upset for about a split second, but then I thought, “Well… it cost me less than a penny…”

Those are my three war stories. All true, even the humor. I hope you enjoyed them.