An Introduction to Serious Couponing, Part 2 (a.k.a The Massive Coupon Binder Revealed)
In my last post, I described how to gather coupons, how to find out how to use them, and what your potential savings could look like. I know for me, every time I go to the grocery store, I walk away with at least a few free items (legally! :) and many items under a dollar or close to a dollar. This is the way to grocery shop! The more I save on essentials, the more I can spend on outings and vacation, or the quicker I can save for big-ticket items.
My first step in preparing to grocery shop with coupons is to make a list. These lists are prepared by coupon bloggers’ sites and come from the weekly ads the grocery store release. These lists feature all the items that a grocery store has on sale that week, as well as coupon match-ups that show which coupons to use on what items, as well as your potential savings.
I keep track of my favorite coupon blogs using Google Reader. If you are interested in having the news come to you, instead of you chasing after it, you will definitely want Google Reader. Like other Google stuff, it’s free to use and easy to set up. Just Google it (pardon the pun).
The coupon blogs I heart are:
Coupon Cravings (www.couponcravings.com)
Deal Seeking Mom (www.dealseekingmom.com)
Econobusters (www.econobusters.com)
I Heart Publix (www.iheartpublix.com)
Mom Saving Mom (www.moneysavingmom.com)
Southern Savers (www.southernsavers.com)
The Thrifty Mama (www.thethrifymama.com)
Using a Google Reader to look at these sites’ contents helps me a lot, because the reader filters out all of the side ads, blinkies, headers, and other (possibly ugly) site features. And of the best thing about using a reader is that the news comes to you, instead of you going to it!
Once I have my grocery list (printed from an orderly ad match-up list provided for free by Southern Savers’ site), I take the list to my large coupon binder and select my coupons. These I put in an envelope and I am now ready to shop!
Here are some pictures of my coupon binder:
Getting a binder that zips is essential, because if you turn your binder upside down by accident, piles of sorted coupons will flutter away and you will be left wishing for a zipper.
The Binder opened. Every month I go through and clean out the expired coupons and set them aside to donate to an overseas military wife who is allowed to use expired coupons at her commissary. The coupons are organized by catagory, in a way that makes the most sense to me.
Close-up of my label.
I use different kinds of inserts and page protectors. If I can remember what coupons are in a certain coupon booklet, than I won’t clip all of them. I’ll just file them in these large page protector sheets.
Sorry this one is not rotated. For some reason the rotate didn’t translate onto my blog. I also use small baseball card page protectors to sort coupons.
Here is a picture of my Southern Savers list and coupons that I’m planning on using. I take this and my binder to the store. My binder is in case I find sale items or clearance items that I have coupons for. It’s always fun to find a clearanced item you can gain an even bigger discount on with a coupon from your binder!
And one last picture of my massive binder. Yes, it is a lot of work, but it is so worth it!
Sometimes I need to take a break from couponing, because I feel that it is taking too much time. So I cut back on the deals I pick up, how often I shop, won’t check the blogs, won’t buy a paper to get the coupons, etc. It’s easy for me to go overboard on stuff like this. However, I’m hoping to learning to enjoy a good thing and not get obsessive.
Hopefully this post will answer the questions that a lot of you have asked about coupons. I hope your own coupon journey will be as fun as mine is!
