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My First Attempt At Using Coupons: Saved 78% At CVS

Holla if you hear me! Ok!! I just went to CVS to give this whole clipping coupons things a try and saved 78% of my ORDER using COUPONS and Extra Care Bucks. Can you stand it?! I thought I was going to do alright, but when I went home and figured out the total cost and amount saved, I just about fell off my chair. This is literally FREE money.

Here’s the deal though – did I need 6 12-packs of Pepsi this week? NOT REALLY! But it’s something you can put in your basement and store. That’s one of the main things that you have to work on — storing the items you save money on.

How did I do it???

TRANSACTION 1:

I got up REALLY early so no one would be annoyed at my multiple coupon usage. I was literally in CVS at 6:30AM because the one I go to is open 24 hours.  I first bought $20 worth of Pepsi products and then got $10 back in Extra Care Bucks. My cart was filled up, so I went to the car and dumped everything in the trunk and then headed back in.

TRANSACTION 2:

CVS was having a 3 for $10 deal on Cheerios and Nature Valley products. I printed out those coupons ($.75 off one Nature Valley and $1 off 2 Cheerios) and threw the items in my cart.

CVS is also having a spend $20 on Maalox or Benefiber and get $10 back deal. So I cut out the $5 off Maalox coupon that is in TODAY’S coupon insert in your paper and clipped a $2 off one product from Benefiber ALSO in your INSERT. Everyone has these. They are outside your house as we speak. No excuses. 🙂

Paid with my coupons PLUS the $10 Extra Care Rewards I earned during my first transaction.  Total on this bill was $11.28. I got $10 + $4  Extra Care Bucks back. If I was smart, I would have broken this one up into two more transactions and gotten the cereal for free. BUT I’m just starting, so I am going to make mistakes…

TRANSACTION 3:

Before I did transaction 2, I asked the kid at the register if I could split up my purchase into 2 and he said no problem. I wanted him to know what I was up to before he got started and he had no problem with it. I am telling you to NOT do this when you come home from work at 5PM. You don’t want a bunch of people behind you hissing at you as you try to figure out how to save the most $$. Just my two cents.

OK — so now we are onto the Airwick and Lysol products.

I had a Buy 1 Get 1 Free coupon that I clipped last week from the newspaper for refills. I also had a $4 off coupon for the Airwick kit – again from the paper. START SAVING THE FLYERS.  CVS has a deal that if you spend $20 on any combo of Lysol and Airwick products you get $10 back. I clipped two more Lysol coupons – one from this week and one from last week’s Sunday paper. All together this bill should have ran me $21 and change. BUT I used transaction 2’s $10 Extra Care Bucks PLUS $12 in coupons — I paid the guy $.27 PLUS got $10 back in Extra Care Bucks.

SO I have $14 in Extra Care Bucks for next week on TOP OF ALL THIS SAVING!!

NOW LET’S BREAK IT DOWN:

All in – without coupons – my bill would have been $69 and change.

I used or earned $54 worth of coupons.

Which means I got $69 worth of product for $15 BUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IF you don’t want me to include the $15 that I have left over for my next CVS purchase — which is understandable considering that I will use that in my next week’s discount — then OUT OF MY POCKET I spent $28.50 for $69 worth of items. Still not a bad deal.

Moving forward, I am going to be posting all of these on Deal Obsessed. I hope you get into coupon cutting — I will always show you how to make the most out of those circulars, so you don’t have to worry about the time or effort.

Sorry if I sound a bit manic, but clipping coupons is a lot of fun when you do it right. It’s like a legal high or something! 🙂 Now, if you’ll excuse me I have to Lysol my house, drink some Pepsi Max and plug in a few glade scents. 🙂

BINDER MADNESS — Here’s a video showing you how I am organizing all my efforts.

Allie Clark

Wednesday 12th of January 2011

I forgot to add that I'm using the comment above as an entry to the WallCandy contest!

Allie Clark

Wednesday 12th of January 2011

Wow, that is fabulous! I was just watching Ellen today and saw a lady that does the exact same thing and she got such great deals!

Whitney

Monday 10th of January 2011

Good for you Vera! It's awesome you are getting so into it. I know this sounds totally lame but I've always been a bit embarrassed to try extreme couponing. Besides the fact that I'm too lazy to clip, I always think, "what will the cashier think of me?" Or "will the ppl behind me get annoyed?" I know, prob shouldn't care, right? I do love your idea of getting up early so you aren't making anyone wait in line behind you tho, that's a great tip!

D

Sunday 9th of January 2011

Dont 4get to use a reusable bag,at cvs.

if you use a reusable bag and buy a green bag tag you will get 1extracarebuck after every fourth purchase. it isnt much but its a free dollar!

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