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After 6 months of active couponing I’ve noticed that as time goes on I am buying more stockpile items and less necessities. What once was a necessity like bread, spaghetti sauce, ground beef, cereal or lunch meat, is no longer a necessity. I have plenty. So, now I am stocking up on food that would be good to have on hand. And since I recently decided to cut back on my meat consumption and found Publix and manufacturer coupons for Morning Star Vegetarian “Meat”, I thought I’d grab a few of those, too.
I used to spend $100-$120 per week on groceries and household items. And that was buying store brands, buying only what was really needed. Now I spend about $50 per week, I have enough food to feed an army and at least once per month I don’t even go to the store at all. I no longer buy store brands and I can afford name brands for my personal care items. At one point I used the same razor for a year and a half because I could not afford a new one. Now I have plenty.
Today I went to BiLo and had a great trip. I used Publix store coupons stacked with MF coupons and saw some great savings! There were no issues at checkout. Great trip! I got Hamburger Helper for my husband. It’s great for nights when I am not home to cook dinner. And I earned $.65 in Fuel Perks mainly due to the Gerber snacks I got for Lilly. That works out to $13 off of a tank of gas! Love Fuel Perks!!!
18 Boxes of Tuna/Hamburger Helper $.75 each
12 Boxes of Scalloped/Julienne Potatoes $.50 each
18 Boxes frozen Green Giant Vegetables $.60 each
4 Boxes Morning Star Vegetarian Burgers $3.45 each
2 Boxes Morning Star Vegetarian Sausage $3.45 each
16 Packages of assorted Gerber Graduates Foods/Snacks $1.31 each (average)
4 Cans Chef BoyArDee $.50 each
2 Boxes Tampons (36 & 18 counts) $2.34 each (average)
With a little effort you, too, can see savings like this. It took me less than one hour to prepare for this trip and I saved over $100! Does your job pay you this much? As a Stay-At-Home Mom I earned more today than I would have working and paying for daycare. Gotta love it!
So, the blog has been pretty quiet lately. I’ve been covered up in inserts and my own couponing. But I wanted to take a moment to share some great scores I’ve had recently.
This first one is the start of my Christmas Gifts stockpile. Every year my husband’s family gives every person a small gift, usually a scented lotion or some kind of small tool. It took me a couple years to understand this, but I’ve learned that this makes for a great family gathering on Christmas Eve. Gifts are abundant and flying everywhere as Uncle “Santa” Rod hands out presents yelling the recipient’s name. The kids go bananas and scramble to grab the gift and find it’s home. We all leave with a bag full of presents, smiles on our faces and gratitude in our hearts. Couponing is perfect for this. These Febreze Noticeable Warmers were $2.97 at Walmart. Using my $3.00 off coupon I got 10 of these FREE and had .30 cents to apply to the rest of my purchase. I’m hoping someone will have a sale on the scents that go with these before 9/30. I have a coupon for those and would like to give those as well.
This next one is just a good example of what coupons can do. These 3 packs of Cascade are .97 cents at Walmart. I had 10 $1 off coupons and I could have used these towards the purchase of a larger bag, but using my coupons to get these FREE means I did not spend one single penny on 3o Action Pacs that will last me about 2 months. If the P&G inserts have this coupon each month I’ll never pay for dishwasher detergent again! And again, I earned .30 cents towards the rest of my purchase.
I woke up yesterday exited about the awesome 1 cent deals from Office Depot and Staples! Why? I’d have to travel pretty far to get to the closest store to take advantage of their penny deals. Well, this is why I Heart the Mart! I strolled in with my Sunday ads in hand, reviewed my plan with the Customer Service Managers and proceeded to fill two carts with penny deals that WalMart was willing to match. Bonnie and Shuly were very nice and knowledgeable about WalMart’s coupon and price matching policies. They informed me that WalMart is opening their arms to us Couponers where other stores, ehem…Ingles, are pushing us away with their ridiculous policy changes. So, check it out…..
You are looking at 46 reams of printer paper, 82 paper pocket folders and 121 packs of lined filler paper = $2.49! What will I do with all of this, you ask? I will keep the copy paper and folders for my business use and donate the filler paper to the schools.
My husband and daughter were with me for this shopping trip. Randy was a bit embarrassed and acted like I was ridiculous for getting so many of each item. He changed his tune at check-out! He was actually telling people in line behind us, “All of this was only $2.49 before tax! Can you believe it?”
While this was a big haul, I did not clear the shelves. I got as much copy paper as I thought I would need until the next sale like this and the same for the folders. As far as the filler paper, I just grabbed as much as I could get in the cart. There are many families that need help with school supplies and I will continue to take advantage of these deals as long as they last to help these families provide for their children. 
HOARDING = BAD DONATING = GOOD!! At least in MY opinion.
I also have some good news about a new policy change for WalMart and Bi-Lo, so…STAY TUNED!
Happy Couponing!
Shanna
What a great example of why it PAYS to coupon! Once you get into the habit, most couponers keep their eyes open for any opportunity they can find to save money. The other day I found a great money saving opportunity! During a trip to Bi-Lo I noticed a bunch of Tide detergent on the clearance racks. I looked for a price and didn’t see one. But I knew I had Tide coupons in my inserts at home. Since I needed to return to the store that evening to do my Rain Check shopping I made a mental note to grab the Tide coupons. Upon my return to the store I made a bee-line to the marked down Tide. This time I did find prices on the boxes: $7.50 for the larger box for 63 loads and $4.50 on the smaller boxes for 31 loads!! WOW!!! The boxes were a little beat up, but still sealed. I had eight coupons worth $9.00 so I put eight boxes in my cart.
You are looking at $97.84 in Tide detergent that I purchased for $33.00 after $9.00 in coupons and $55.84 in mark-downs from the store!!!!
AND…if you look carefully at the box on the bottom left you’ll see that I also got $3 in additional coupons out of the deal!!!
I am set for laundry for a very long time. I don’t have to deal with getting detergent, I can just mark that off my list! Plus, I basically made $64.84 in less than an hour!! I love getting PAID to COUPON! I hope you, too, can find a great deal like this, just keep your eyes open.
Happy Couponing!
Shanna
When I started couponing I noticed that there was no economical way to get the Atlanta market coupons in my small mountain town. The Sunday AJC (newspaper) is $4 here! This is because the AJC stopped delivering up here back in 2009. Someone drives down early Sunday morning, gets the paper and sells it to local stores with his markup. That makes it nice for those interested in the paper, but for those of us that want the coupons $4 is outrageous!
I decided to make it a mission of mine to get access to Atlanta coupons for a much more reasonable price. After a few months of working at it I finally did it! Now, I can get the inserts to my area for $1 per insert! I know I’m not the only one needing these inserts to save money on my grocery bill. So, if you would like the AJC Coupon Inserts for only $1 each, contact me! I make it easy to get your inserts and easy to pay for them.
UPDATE:
Ah how time changes things. I no longer offer inserts for $1. Now, I offer the whole Sunday AJC newspaper for $2.50. Whether there are 2 inserts or 6 (we recently had 6 inserts!), you only pay $2.50! Atlanta is the #1 market for coupons, we get the most and the best coupons! $2.50 gets you the most and the best! Enjoy!
Thank you for stopping by www.TheFrugalBeavers.com! As you can see this is a work in progress. But I made a promise to have the site up by Friday, May27, 2011. So here it is!
We are the Beavers…literally. My name is Shanna Beavers. My husband, Randy Beavers and I have our daughter, Lilly Beavers. Having a Baby Beavers was a dream of ours for at least six years before we were finally blessed with Lilly. My pregnancy was challenging. I had to leave my job due to extreme morning sickness that lasted through my fifth month. While everyone else struggled with the failing economy, we struggled. I had to figure out very quickly how to cut our budget. Of course, I started with the groceries. Just by paying attention to prices and sales I was able to save a decent amount on our weekly grocery budget. Soon we started learning how to “live without”. In fact, we lived without gas for heat (despite it being winter) and cooking (I used the one burner on my grill because propane was much cheaper, cooking outside in the cold sucked, though). We lived without cable, phone and internet. I lived without buying maternity clothes as my belly grew. And we lived without two working vehicles. We shared one car for some time when the other broke down. At one point I even stood in line every Tuesday to receive free food. That will humble you.
As time went on, things got better. My husband starting making more money at his job. I found a better suited home for less money per month, so we moved when I was eight months pregnant. Our family and friends really went above and beyond helping us get what we needed for the baby. And despite the death of one of our beloved dogs, things were looking up. Once Lilly arrived and I held her I knew there was no way I was going to go back to work. My daughter needed me to be with her and that was exactly what I was determined to do. Since we still needed help with the bottom line, I started looking for ways to save more money. That’s when I found COUPONS. After a couple classes and some trial and error I started to see that saving money was something I could easily do. My husband speaks in terms of money and when I showed him the receipts, the proof of savings, he jumped on board. But I didn’t stop with coupons. I do much more to save my family money and ensure my ability to be with my daughter every single day.
I’ve started this site for two reasons. 1) I want to share the savings I find with anyone who wants to know about them. 2) I want to encourage local businesses to go a step further by extending savings to their customers and encouraging NEW customers to give them a try. This site is new and will always be a work in progress. As I build this site I hope you will check back for new savings opportunities, information and news. We’ve learned to be frugal and you can, too. We’ll help you. We’re The Beavers, and now we’re Frugal!
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