Sunday, October 23, 2011

Water, water everywhere: Target gift card deals

Each store has its own benefits and drawbacks, but this week I am loving Target.They run promotions where you get $5 giftcards when you purchase certain items. There is no limit to the amount of gift cards you can earn, at least not that I have noticed.  You can either do separate transactions and roll your gift cards over to reduce the out of pocket expenses and use them that day, or you can use them for the next time you go, OR you can also give them as stocking stuffers or appreciation gifts.

You are not allowed to use them on the same transaction. For example, I cannot buy ten Vitamin waters and use the gift card I earned buying them to pay for them.

Target had Vitamin Water, buy 10 and get a $5 gift card this week. The waters were 1, so after the gift cards they would be .50. They also had a deal where if you bought 2 of the $5 Vaseline lotions, you earned a $5 gf. I had coupons for buy one Vaseline, get a smaller size free. My Nana and daddy use lotion a lot, so I had already planned to get them some as part of their Christmas baskets.

I had planned to do separate transactions to reduce my OOP, but the line was busy, so I just decided to do one big one.

I bought:
2 of the larger Vaseline lotions
2 of the smaller ones
20 Vitamin Waters

Used (2) BOGO Vaseline coupons

OOP: $34, received $15 in gift cards.

I took the Vitamin water to my car and decided to go back and get some more with my gift cards.
Went back and got 20 more of the vitamin waters, and they also had some of the 1 liter SOBE waters on sale for .88. They weren't part of the deal, but that was a good price, so I bought those.

Went back in line, and split the transactions. Fiance met me in the parking lot to hang out, so I just had him do the second transaction (and carry the water to the car! :) ).  I bought:

10 Vitamin Waters
4 Sobe waters on sale for .88

Used two $10 GC
Paid ...3.67 maybe for the Sobe waters
Received another $5 GC.

Fiance bought
10 Vitamin Waters
Used two $5 GC
Spend $0 OOP, and received another $5gc

SO, we bought 2 large Vaseline lotions, two small Vaseline lotions, 40 Vitamin waters, and 4 large Sobe wates for about $37 dollars, AND we still have a $5 gc left, so $32 altogether.

The razors and Snuggle you see here are from a Walmart trip.

So, Target's gift card promotions are great, and even better when you can use coupons with them as well. Remember that Target will allow you to stack one Target coupon and one manufacturer coupon for an item as well.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Target Mobile Coupons

So, if you have read my other posts, you know that at Target, you can use one Target coupon and one manufacturer coupon per item, which can add up to some great savings.

You can print the Target coupons here.http://coupons.target.com/

However, there are OTHER Target coupons you can get on your phone! They are Target mobile coupons. Sign up at the website, and you will receive coupons to your phone via text message. This is the only way to get these coupons; they cannot be printed online. You can use them along with a manufacturer coupon, just like other Target coupons. Just open the text message, and get the link. Then, the cashier can scan your phone and get your coupon! I used mine twice this weekend, and it works in Danville!!

Sample deal!

Coupons.com had a manufacturer coupon for 5.00 off a Transformers toy of 5.99 or more. Target mobile sent me a coupon for 5 off any Transformers toy of 9.99 or more. I was able to get a 9.99 Transformers toy for FREE.

They also had $2 off any two bags of MMs pretzels. They were on sale for 2/4, and I also had a coupon for 1 off, so I got two bags for 1.00.

So, be sure to sign up for those coupons! You can also use each deal in each text message once, but they will send you two a month. I went on Friday and used my coupons for the Transformers toy and the MMs, and then went again Sunday and got another toy (and some other things).

Happy saving!

Piggly Wiggly deal on Campbell's Soup!

Piggly Wiggly has extended their deal on Campbell's tomato and chicken noodle soup. They are 10/5, with a limit of 10, making them .50 each. I had two .40 off 4 coupons, making mine 4.20, or .42 cents each. That's about as cheap as you will find those anywhere.

Sad note: PW in Danville (the one near Cane Creek, or the airport, depending on how you orient yourself) does not accept internet coupons.

Nothing else spoke to me at PW, but you can check out their deals at http://www.idigthepig.com/

Good deals at Farmer's this week!

Farmer's has a few sales worth mentioning.

Hamburger Helper is on sale 10/10. There have been several coupons in the papers the last month for .75 off 3. Remember that Farmer's will double up to one dollar, so the coupon becomes 1.00 off 3, so you get them 3 for $2, or .67 each.

Green Giant frozen boxed vegetables are on sale 10/10 as well, and with a .60 off 3 coupon, which doubles to 1.00, you can get the same deal as the HH, .67 each.

Hunt's spaghetti sauce is 10/10, and the Ragu is still 1.25, which is a really good buy if you have a coupon. I used one ;ast week for .75 off of two, which doubled to 1.00, so I got two for 1.50, making them .75 cents each.

Select Dawn dish soup is 1.99, and with a .50 off coupon, it is only 1.00 when doubled.

Progresso soup is 4/5, and there are several 1.00 off 4 coupons on http://www.bettycrocker.com/, http://www.progresso,com/, and www.coupons.com , making them 1 each.

Last week, I received a $10 off your next purchase coupon for buying select General Mills products, which is still going on this week, but the GM products aren't on as good of a sale. Remember, that the way to really get the best deals is to match the coupons with the sales to maximize savings. I can save my GM coupons for another day and save more money.

There may be some good deals on meat, but I am not a good judge on that. Check out the full Farmer's ad at http://www.farmersfoods.com/.

Here is what I got from Farmer's this week:
6 Hamburger Helper boxes (2  .75 off 3 coupons, doubled to 1.00 off)
6 Green Giant vegetables (2 .60 off 3 coupons, doubled to 1.00 off)
4 Progresso soup (1 off 4 coupons)
2 Dawn liquid soap (2 .50 off coupons, which doubled to1.00)
2 Pillsbury cookie dough packages (.50 off coupon on the cookie dough, doubled to 1.00)
2 La Creme coffee creamer (I had a BOGO coupon)

I also used my 10 off coupon, making my purchase $10.47.

The other 14 dollars of my shopping trip came from the Cottonelle from Walgreens ($12 for 4, using Walgreens coupons, manufacturer coupons, and RR), and the four 2-liters of Pepsi Max from CVS (2.00 total, .99 each, used two 1.00 off two coupons from the Pepsi insert on 10/2)


Also, in an earlier blog, I said that there was a Farmer's in Danville. There ISN'T, but there is one in Martinsville. There is also a Kroger, about two minutes away from the Farmer's. Too far for my SoBo peeps to drive, but if you live in Danville, and there were good sales at both Kroger and Farmer's, it may be worth the drive.

And a final note, Farmer's will no longer accept internet coupons (such as those printed off of coupons.com) for amounts over 1.00. This is not a huge blow because most food coupons are under 1.00 anyway.

Happy shopping!

Monday, October 3, 2011

Granola Bars at Walgreens!

Walgreens is having a great sale on Nature Valley granola bars. With the coupon in the monthly booklet (get one at the front of the store if you don't have one) for 1 dollar off, they are 2 for 3, or 1.50 each. These same granola bars are 3 dollars for one at Walmart, so this is a great deal. Plus, if you are a couponer, you may have a .75 cents or 1.00 off two coupon, which would make them either $1 each or...about $1.12? each, depending on the coupon you use.

Why Shop Where

So, I've been doing this for about a month, along with my dear friend from work, Courtney. We don't have as many stores as some of the people on the show, Extreme Couponing, but here is a little breakdown of the positives (and negatives) of our stores in the area.

Farmer's Foods
Locations: South Boston (Hupps Mill Plaza) None in Danville

They will accept manufacturer coupons and they will double up to a dollar. So, a fifty cents coupon will become a dollar, and a seventy five cent coupon also becomes a dollar. I don't believe they have any limit on the number of coupons you can use.

Many of their prices are higher than Walmart, but they do have sales every week, and their sale prices are pretty close to Walmart's regular price. Depending on the coupon, it would be worth going to Farmer's even if their price is a little more than Walmart, because the coupon will double.

In addition, I have been there twice when they were running special promotions where you spend 25 dollars in certain products, and get ten dollars off coupon for next time.

They are very nice and friendly, and there is a Redbox in the store if you need to pick up or drop off a movie.

Walmart
Location: Danville and South Boston

Walmart's prices on "coupon items:" medicine, toilettries, food, are pretty steady. Sometimes there are rollbacks, or you can catch something on clearance. And they don't double coupons. However, you can count on Walmart to be a good place to use your coupons, since you know their prices are close to anyone's sale. In addition, Walmart is one of the few places that will give you cash back for coupon overage. For example, if a coupon is for three dollars off, and the item is only two dollars (becase it is on clearance, or just really cheap), Walmart will either you give the difference of the dollar, or allow you to use the dollar towards other purchases. This works, because I have done it several times.

Both the Danville and the South Boston Walmart have Redboxes, as well.

Food Lion
Does not double coupons, but they are a bigger grocery store and may have more flavors or types of food availabe, as opposed to Farmer's. They do have decent sales sometimes.

Target
Location: Danville

Target does not double coupons, but you can stack coupons. Target puts out its own coupons on its website http://www.target.com/. You can use one Target coupon and one manufacturer coupon on an item, which can really save you money. Target has decent sales, some of which rival Walmart's regular prices. Plus, Target has great clearance if you walk around the store and check out each department.

Kmart
Location: Danville
Doesn't have the greatest sales, and usually isn't my favorite store. However, they are doubling coupons this month if you are a Shop Your Rewards member (if you aren't, just fill out a form). They double a coupon up to the face value of .99. So if you have a coupon for .99 off, it will double to 1.98. Funny thing, I don't have any .99 coupons. They are all 1.00. But, this does mean that a .75 cent coupon will double to 1.50. Combine this with a sale, and that would be a good deal.

CVS
Locations: Two in South Boston, several in Danville.
CVS has great deals with the ECBs (Extra Care Bucks). Certain items will often be on sale, and then when you purchase them, you get ECBs, which are like gift cards to use on your next purchase. You can also split transactions to get your ECBs immediately and apply them to the rest of your purchase, making your out of pocket expense (OOP) much lower. You do have to have a CVS card to get these deals, but again, it's a form. The ECB deals are tied to your CVS card, so you cannot repeat the deals to get more and more money back, which you can (sort of) do at Walgreens. The good news is that because of this, CVS doesn't seem to run out of stock as quickly as Walgreens.

CVS also has the Magic Coupon Machine, where you scan your CVS card as soon as you come in, and get bonus coupons. Quarterly, you get ECBs back based on how much money you spent. That's free money!

For my SoBoVa people, the CVS over near Italian Delight has very nice employees.

Walgreens
Walgreens also has money back deals, called Register Rewards (RR). Anyone can use RR, as there is no card for Walgreens. However, if you use a RR to purchase the same deal, a new RR won't print.

So, if I buy Colgate toothpaste, and pay five dollars out of pocket and get five dollars in RR, I essentially got the toothpaste for free. I can use the RR to buy two more tubes of toothpaste, and not pay anything of out pocket for that toothpaste, but I won't get another RR.

If I used the RR to buy candy, and got a RR for the candy, I could then use the candy RR to buy more toothpaste, and get more RR.

A bit confusing, I know.

Also nice about Walgreens is that they have a coupon book in the store for each month, and you can use a Walgreens coupon with a manufacturer coupon to save even more money.

There is no Walgreens in Danville, but the nice people in SoBo tell me they are going to build one there soon.

Downside of Walgreens is that because you can replicate RR, and there isn't really a limit, they sell out FAST. We went on Monday afternoon, and the sale started Sunday, and they were out of pretty much all of the items that gave out RR.


Family Dollar and Dollar General will take manufacturer coupons, and there may be a sale there that is a good deal, so you can check those coupons.

Piggly Wiggly in Danville does not double coupons, but they do accept coupons. They also have good deals on meat.

Petsmart and Petco in Danville sometimes have really good deals. They also have savings booklets of coupons in the front of the store, loyalty cards, and tearpad coupons throughout the store. I will have to get back to you on whether either of them will let you stack a PetSmart coupon with a manufacturer coupon.

I LOVE Farmers!

When I lived in Halifax, there was a Farmer's up the street, and we used to walk up there as kids with Mom to get a few things. But other than that, I have never really shopped at Farmer's. And now it's my favorite store because they double coupons.

We went there today because they had the Toaster Strudel and Toaster Scramblers on sale for 2/4. Now, they are always that price at Walmart. They may even be 1.97. However, I had 50 cents off coupons, which double to dollar at Farmers, making them 2 for 3, or 1.50 each. Taking that same coupon to Walmart, they would have been 2/4, with the coupon 2 for 3.50, or 1.75 each. I bought eight boxes because you can freeze them, and Fiance really likes them. Plus, there are six of them in a box, so if we both eat two, we've eaten most of the box.

Sometimes, Farmer's has really good deals. They had Frosted MiniWheats in Blueberry for 1! Sadly I had no coupons for them, but a dollar for a box of cereal is a really good deal. They also have Apple Jacks for 1.99, and I had a fifty cents coupon, which doubled, making Apple Jacks 1.00.

We got a few more things, including free Birds Eye brand steamable broccoli (10 for 10, use a fifty cents off coupon that doubles to 1). They rang up my purchase, which was 56 dollars, then scanned my Farmer's card, which brought it down to 36. After running all my coupons, the total was 29, and after THAT, the register printed a Catalina coupon for 10 dollars off my next purchase. So, 29 out of pocket, and with the gift card for next time, that's 19!

I believe I received the Catalina because I bought 25 dollars in General Mills products, which I did a few weeks ago. I didn't realize the promotion was still going on, so if you live in South Boston, take your coupons for General Mills products (Pillsbury, Betty Crocker, etc) and go to Farmer's!


These is the haul for the day. We hit CVS and Walgreens as well. There were coupons for BOGO on Dove and Tresemme. CVS has a promotion right now where if you spend 15 (before coupons) on Dove products, you get 5 ECBs back, so I paid for two, got two free, and got a Dove deodorant with a 1.00 off coupon. Plus, the deodorant was a twin pack, so four shampoos and two deodorants for 9, plus five dollars in ECBs, made this deal 4 dollars. :)

I am done couponing for the week. And I am done buying shampoo! Now I am off to find a place to put it!

Saturday, October 1, 2011

Shopping Trip and Updates

This is mostly a breakdown of today's shopping trip. If you are not interested in the breakdown, I put the lessons learned and information gathered in bold for easy skimming. :)


So, I found out that Piggly Wiggly in Danville does not double coupons, more's the pity.

However, if you have a Kmart loyalty card, you can get double coupons on weekends this month up to .99. So, a .75 cent coupon will double to 1.50.

We took advantage of that today! They don't have a ton of groceries, and some of them are a little high, making it not the most exciting place to coupon. BUT, they had a sale on Edge and Skintimate shaving gel, BOGO, reg. price 2.79. And we had a coupon for .75 cents off of one, which doubled to 1.50. So, for two shaving gels, I only had to pay 1.40.

COUPON LESSON: Combine BOGO sales with coupons for even better savings!


Here is the most "extreme" couponing of the day. I purchased this stuff for 3.43. I got the cat food from Petsmart; they have coupons for 5.00 off the cat food, which is on sale for 5.99, and you get two cans of cat food free when you buy it. There is also the Edge shaving gel, which is from KMart. If you live in Danville, it may be worth running into Kmart on these double coupon weekends to see what you can find, but I'm not sure it would be worth the trouble for my SoBoVA friends, unless you were already in Danville.

I needed some soda at Walmart, and the Dr. Pepper had peelie coupons on them for .35 now, so I saved .70 there, and then I got the razors, 1.97 reg price, used a 3 coupon off each, and got the whole thing for .06.

Today was the first day I ran into some opposition. The cashier at Walmart told me I couldn't use the razor coupon because it would make them free, and she would have to go ask. I offered to give her my copy of Walmart's coupon policy to save herself the steps, but she insisted on asking. Even after getting the verification that I was right, she wasn't too friendly. Alas.

Are you familiar with the Magic Coupon Machine? At every CVS, there is a tall red machine that you can use to price check items. However, if you scan your CVS card, you will get coupons! And apparently once a month or periodically, or something, you get 2% back of what you have spent. (*Maybe it's quarterly? I will check!*) Anyway, today I scanned my card, and I got $2.50 free Extra Care Bucks, which are like money at CVS. If you don't have a CVS card, please get one! You can scan your CVS card once a day for coupons.

At CVS, I got 2.50 free Extra Care Bucks! They had Always pads on sale for 3.99, and I got $2 off coupon, so I got those for freeee.

We also went to Target today, so here is everything I bought today.

Grand total: 57.89. Plus, what's exciting is that black and white bag thing is a twin comforter set with the comforter, fitted sheet, flat sheet, dust ruffle, and pillow case :)

Walk around the store to look for clearance items. It's good exercise, and sometimes there are clearance items in little corners of the store!

I got several things at Target today on clearance. The twin bed in a bag was only 15, the large organge piggy bank was only 2.50, and a pink ombre curtain was only 3.74. The curtain and the piggy are for my classroom at school! :)

Nothing super exciting to report on the rest of it. I used lots of coupons and got good deals (the little first aid kits, and the travel size Aquafresh were free).

Looking at the sale papers for Walgreens and CVS, there isn't anything super exciting for me this week. However, I would definitely get a Sunday paper this week, because it looks as if there will be some really good coupons!