Frugal Living for your Modern Family
I hear it all the time, “I’m too busy to coupon!” I was in the store last week and the lady behind me saw that I had saved 70% off of my grocery bill. She said ” I wish I could do that but I just don’t have the time.” I then told her how I make couponing easier and that I only spend about 30 minutes a week getting my coupons together.
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We all know the best places to find coupons are in the newspaper and online coupon sites. But sometimes you can’t find coupons for the items you use the most and buying several copies of the newspaper can get a little pricey. The secret to getting some really great coupons and possibly even free product coupons is to email companies directly. This is how to get coupons for free.
I have been doing this for a while and I’ve gotten some great high value and free product coupons for products I love and actually use. I’ve even gotten a case of a product sent to my home! I usually will go through my house and make a mental list of all the products we use on a regular basis. I will then contact the companies that make those products via email. I’ll usually email around 5 companies a day so it doesn’t take too much time and my mailbox will usually have some coupons in it everyday. It’s nice to get something besides bills :).
I just added a new page to the blog. It is called Store Coupon Policies. I’m hoping this will be a big help to all my readers. I know when I first started couponing, one of the things that I could never find were my store’s coupon policies. They either weren’t on the website or were not clearly marked. So, I have put together a list of all of most popular store policies. Most of the store’s listed are the ones I could think of off the top of my head. If you see a store that you would like added, just leave me a comment below and I will gladly add it to the list 🙂
It is always a good idea to print out the coupon policies for the stores you shop at the most and keep them in your purse or coupon binder. You never know when you might run into a problem at checkout that could be easily resolved by just showing the cashier the store’s policy.
Manufacturer Coupon: A Manufacturer coupon will clearly state “Manufacturer” at the top of the coupon ( usually beside the expiration date). You can use these coupons at any store that will accept coupons. The barcode number will usually start with a 5 or a 9. They will be found in newspaper inserts, magazines, and online.
You may remember in this post, I listed my reasons for couponing. Everyone has a different reason, mine is to save up for luxury things we otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford. Well, one of those things arrived today. I was able to save up enough money to buy my boyfriend what he has wanted for the past two years…..a huge TV! This counts as his Christmas/ Anniversary present. He got a 55″ 3D TV. Needless to say he is like a little kid on Christmas morning. I don’t think I’ll be getting any of his attention for the next week :).