Couponing for Seafood

It really pays to scan the wine and beer aisles for coupons and rebates because sometimes you can combine the offers for amazing deals.

For instance, today I bought:
Beautiful X-Large Wild Caught Shrimp on sale for $6.99 pound at Harris Teeter
I bought 1.5 lbs. for  a total of $10.50.
then I used a wine tag for $1 off seafood (instant savings) which doubled because coupons double this week
=$8.50 for 1.5 lbs.
then I will send in a beer rebate for $5 off of a purchase of $10 or more of seafood (they don't care about the coupons, as long as the original price is greater than 10 bucks)
=$3.50 for 1.5 lbs. of shrimp OR $2.30 a pound for shrimp

I did a very similar deal with chicken.
2.5 lbs. of chicken breast were on sale at HT for $4.99 ea. (1.99 lb.)  I bought three packages for a total of $14.99
Then I used a 1.00 off of chicken wine tag (instant savings) which doubled (I used 3 of them for $6 off)
=$8.99 for (3) 2.5 lb. packages of chicken
then subtract the $6 beer mail in rebate when I buy 10 bucks or more of chicken
=$2.99 for (3) 2.5 lb. packages or .39/lb. for chicken breast
Now it isn't local and not sustainable.  We are working going more that route by buying in bulk but we can't do that until we buy a gigantic freezer.  If I keep making amazing deals like that we should have the money saved up for that in no time.  For now, it just going to have to work this way. 

I have even better rebates on seafood and meat that don't require a wine or beer purchase.  One will give me $5 off when I buy $5 or more of seafood.  That's basically free seafood!  Those don't expire as quickly as the one's above though so I'll wait for another deal to get my money's worth for those. 

Pretty incredible huh?!  We love seafood but it's so expensive.  It's nice to be able to get the good stuff and still stick within a budget!

Pizza Obsession

We finally polished off the 18 tombstones we bought in early June before we left GA. Just when I was getting nervous and thinking I might have to pay too much for the frozen pizza Nick loves... Nick found a coupon in the beer section of Food Lion for $2 off ANY frozen or fresh pizza. Tombstones are on sale for $3 this week so that means I was able to get them for just $1 ea with the coupon.

BUT, it gets better. There is a separate rebate out there for $10 when you buy 4 pizzas.

Here's the breakdown.
$4.00 for 4 tombstone pizzas ($1 a piece AC)
-$10.00 rebate
= $6 MONEY MAKER on 4 pizzas... that's right. I get paid $6 bucks to pick up pizza.

We are limited to only one rebate per family, but that didn't stop us from picking up 20 (should last until summer). With the rebate, that makes the pizzas just 50 cents ea. Mind you, I thought $1.16 was a good price last time!

I need a larger freezer.

Adventures in Savings Coming to an END???

I think there won't be a lot of Redskins talk on this blog in the next coming months. I don't think we could get much worse this year. Check out this article on Yahoo. Despite the "soft" schedule, they've been playing some kind of terrible. At least I have my Hokies. Their first game against #3 Alabama just about ripped my heart to shreds, but they are building my hope back up. Tech is currently ranked #4. Hopefully, they'll knock some GA Tech #15 butt come Saturday.

Well, today I bought a dozen eggs for 39 cents and a gallon of milk for 9 cents. Pretty cool... but I'm no longer impressed by my money saving skills and I'm considering making some changes. Why???

Having just read the "Omnivore's Dilemma" By Michael Pollan I feel like maybe I could be making better choices even if it's going to cost me money. Charlottesville has an awesome network of local farmers that I need to tap into more (specifically for meats as we grown our own produce). In fact, one of them, Polyface farm, is featured in the book Ominvore's Dilemma. You can check out Polyface Farm HERE.

I found the book to be a great critique on "organic" foods. The author is quick to point out that certified organic foods aren't always that environmentally friendly. Like, how environmentally friendly is an organic avocado flown in from Equador when in consumes so much fuel to get it here? He also analyzes those farms that haven't earned the "organic" label (like Polyface) who are indeed environmentally friendly but refuse to qualify as "organic" because doing so would compromise his high environmentally friendly standards. There's a thought!

I highly recommend this read. It's very insightful regarding the food production industry. The first several chapters reminded me of the documentary "King Corn." It's really got me thinking about what I'm ingesting. Though I like the idea of eating less meat less often to compensate for the higher cost of grass fed meat, my husband is less willing to budge. For us, I think the best thing we can do right now is start to really look at our options. Maybe we will continue to buy *some* meat at the traditional market, but maybe we can also make some of our meat purchases from local, sustainable grass farms in bulk once or twice a year and store it.... maybe even Polyface.

Well, enough of my soap box. I hope you guys are having a wonderful fall.

Too Much Soap?

This is my current kids' soap stash. I LOVE this stuff. The coupon marketing worked. I'd buy this product even if it wasn't free (though I won't have to buy it for a really, really, really long time). What I love about 'em is that there is no need for a wash cloth. It suds like a body wash but without the goop or special sponge. It also smells really good.

My current soap count is 29 bars. 29 free bars of soap!! BUT, that's not it. I still have coupons for 12 more bars of soap PLUS a never ending rolling coupon. Apparently when you buy exactly 3 soaps at Kroger, you get another coupon for exactly 3 more bars of soap. I'm going to do this deal to the end (i.e. when the stop offering the coupons at check out). Once the deal is done, I'll decide how much we can use over the coarse of 3 years and donate the rest to charity. Note: I do have to pay tax on the full retail, so "FREE" is actually 5 cents in sales tax.


On race day, they are having another SUPER doubles event at K-mart. Hmmm. If I plan it out well enough, we might just be able to work it in after the race before we get home and most importantly, before they are out of all the good deals.

Free Stuff: Is it worth it?

It seems that the FREE TP deal is DEAD!!! Kroger took the stuff off of the shelves this weekend. Alas, all great deals must come to an end eventually. But, as we couponers lament, we take solace in knowing that there are other deals to be had and we, gosh darn it, will find them.

Today we ate dinner for $1.20 TOTAL. I got a free coupon for a crock pot meal writing Banquet. Honestly, I'd never buy that stuff if it wasn't free. It just doesn't take much effort to do it yourself and fresh is best. BUT, I can't deny free and it's easy enough that Nick made this meal himself. In fact, I've had a weekend reprieve from meal making... that's right, ALL WEEKEND LONG. Nick did it all. Lovely!

We can look forward to the Banquet meal every three months (when I'm able to write the company again and request more coupons.) Add in the $.20 Pilsbury biscuits deal I got and $1 for romaine lettuce and you've got a meal for a family of four for $1.20 (with just two adults and one child not even really eating much there is a ton left over for several lunches this week... this could easy serve 5 adults). Not bad at all.


Which gets me to coupons and shopping fever. This meal was an exception. There are a lot of things I simply will not purchase, free or not. It's hard to resist shopping fever when I can get Betty Crocker Warm Delights and Resses Whips for nothing at all. But none of that kind of sugary crud belongs in the house. There's a reason some of the stuff is free.

But when you fine that gem of deal, of a product worthy of much more, it makes me quiver with delight. Take this deal for example, I got 16 bars of children's soap this weekend at several places for free. I was careful as to not draw attention to myself and do it in one place. The soap is great stuff. Check out this blog on how to do it:

http://www.dealseekingmom.com/free-johnson%E2%80%99s-buddies-soap-coupons-reset/
(NOTE: I did have a little trouble at Wal-mart when purchasing my first batch of soap. The cashier refused to take the IP's, but I called for the manager and told them this wasn't their corporate policy and that I'd be reporting them to corporate. They quickly apologized and took my coupons.)

On a separate note:, I'd also like to send a shout out to my step-dad Mike who printed out a bunch of extra Huggies coupons for us. Thank you!! As Nick said, he is helping to feed my habit. He's an enabler. Thanks to him, I won't be paying over 5 bucks for diapers for a very long time. If that wasn't enough I discovered how to get an additional .75 cents of rebate on every pack of diapers here on top of my already great deals! I'm getting nice quality diapers for less then generic. (For my Albuquerque readers, you can do this at Smith's. Even if you are a cloth diaper person, you can always use one or two sets for when you are in a pinch!)

Huggies on sale for 9.99x2=19.98
-(2) $5 IPs on gentle care
-$3 cellfire/2
-1.50/1 u-promise for college
-.75x2 caretakers rebate
=3.98 for 2 packs of diapers or 1.99 each.... that's right two bucks for diapers!!!

At this point, I'm considering getting free (or close to free) pantry staples, diapers, and other hygienic products I don't really need together for a food pantry and/or homeless shelter. It's so easy to give back that way, it's a shame not to. The money I'm not spending in toiletries, diapers, and the occasional processed food item I can now roll into our garden or farmer's market in summer. I don't know why I didn't do this sooner.

K-Mart Rocked My World Today

I haven't been to K-mart in years. I would have probably made it another several years if I hadn't learned thanks to Hot Coupon World (HCW) that the store was having this SUPER double coupons sale (i.e. they are doubling coupons up to 2 bucks). I don't know what bugs me about the store so much, but I thought I'd give it a go. They have made a lot of changes since I last went. The store looked nicer then I remembered.

Anyway, this sale was soooo good that my heart was racing in the store. Here are SOME of the deals and the break down (BEFORE the 5 bucks off coupon!).

Vaseline Renewal Lotion $2.99 - 1.50x2 MFG = FREE
Revlon Tweezers $1.99 - 1.00x2 MFG=FREE
Vaseline 13 oz. lotion $3.29-1.25x2 MFG= $0.79
Xtreme Razors Schick $5.00-2.00x2MFG= $1.00
Bandaids $2.19-1.00x2 MFG= $0.19
Secret Deodorant $4.29 - 2.00x2 MFG= $0.29
Scott Tissues 24 rolls $5.50 - 1.00x2 MFG=$3.50
Soleil Razors $5.49- 2.00x2=$1.49
I got some other things for free as well, but I don't really feel like mentioning them.

Before the coupons, it came to over 50 bucks. Then you subtract the 5 bucks printable coupon from K-mart if you purchase 50 bucks or more (thank you again HCW!). Then, you hand over the rest of your coupons. Basically, I got 50 bucks worth of stuff for about 9 bucks (for 13 items!!!). Not bad at all. Of course some things were wiped clean before I got there. I would have loved some free Dawn, but alas, it was not my day on that one. I'll know better next time that during their super double coupon days I better get my butt there fast.

Faulty Hot Pockets

Nick and I never like to call companies and complain. When Nick opened his 525,998th hotpocket on July 8, 2008 and he found there was no filling inside of it we never thought hey, maybe we should contact the company and let 'em know. Rather, he took a picture of it and eyed it with utter amazement. See below. I found the pictures amongst Green Eye's newborn photos. Wow, huh?

So the other day, thanks to Hot Coupon World (HCW), I discovered this is a major faux pas and I'm just throwing money out the window letting these sorts of things slide. I spent roughly and hour writing companies either complaining (as in the Hot Pocket incident) or cheering (mostly cheering) about their products in the hopes of receiving coupons. I asked them to to be on their special promotions mailing list, etc. As a result, I received a gazillion coupons in the mail this week.

You can find a list of companies to write for coupons at HCW here. There are at least 100 on that list and I've only done the companies I buy from frequently. Some responses have been disappointing, but for the most part they have been great. For instance, I did complain about an issue I had with some Huggies Diapers (a simple sizing complaint). I now have a free Huggies coupon worth 10 bucks and several other regular coupons. What's even better? There are either no expirations on the coupons or if there are expirations, they don't expire for a year or two. I'm still waiting on a reply from HotPocket's but I have a feeling it's going to be positive one too.

For cheering, I have free Zatarains, turkey burger coupons, johnsonville brat coupons, free deli meat, and a whole bunch more. According to HCW, I'm supposed to write these companies every three months to keep on their lists. With these kind of results, you betcha!

Disturbing Coupon Trends

I've had to adjust to this no more coupons in the paper thing. Luckily, there is a lot out there on the internet. So, last night I went printing away in preparation for going out today.

I didn't go to my usual Kroger. The sales weren't that great this week. So, I went to Harris Teeter (HT) instead. I did all of my shopping and I got into the cashier line. The woman rings it up and what do you know, the cashier says she may not be able to take them as they are going to start limiting internet coupons. WTH? I mean, where are the coupons going to come from if not in the paper anymore? Duh, HT, they are going to come from the internet!! So now they are going to limit those too? The manager told her to go ahead and ring all of them up. Close call. They never did tell me the exact number limit but I guess my order didn't reach it. I had twelve.

Anyway...

I scored some really great buys at Harris Teeter. I kind of thought that place was unnecessarily expensive but clearly, I am wrong!! You just have to stick to the list and be REALLY strict about it.

Arm and Hammer Laundry Detergent for $2 ea.
Progresso Soup for just 40 cents ea.
Fiber One Cereal (this stuff is not cheap!) for just 50 cents ea.
Smart Balance Popcorn $1
Delmonte Low Sodium Vegetable, FREE
and of course
MORE FREE TOOTHPASTE. We are now good on toothpaste until 2011 (when they expire).

I hope y'all are having good days out there!

I was just getting started?

"Every Sunday, faithful coupon users open up their local Sunday newspaper and look for one thing, the coupon inserts. That has all changed now the one of the coupon insert distributors has decided to pull their inserts from local newspapers. RedPlum, also known as Valassis has switched from providing their coupon inserts in the newspaper to mailing them directly to consumers."

More at: http://www.bringbackthecoupons.com/

Guess I'll be cancelling my subscriptions. I didn't get any this week. I guess this is why. Oh boy.

Deals I scored this week

I won't get into the details, but I went to Harris Teeter at 7:30 in the morning to take advantage of their triple coupon event.

dang it... I did good!

Beechnut Arrowroot Cookies - two boxes for FREE

Smithfield Bacon - $.85

9 0z. Hilshire Farm Deli Meat -$1.85

Viva Paper Towels- $.30 ea.

8 oz. Kraft 2% cheese - $.25 each!!! (I thought 1.25 last week was good?!)

Skippy peanut butter- $1.09 ea.

Sweet Sue Chicken-$.74 ea.

Pepperidge Farm Garlic Bread - $.57ea.

Worth another shot?

So after what went on last week, I was pretty upset. I wasn't about to go back to the same Kroger. But I couldn't go to Food Lion though either. The prices are terrible. In reality, Kroger is a good deal. So I shirked and went to a different Kroger down the road even though I should not go based on principle. I guess they win and the prices are currently worth the horrible service FOR NOW.

I got A LOT for my money this time. My most notable deals:

Colgate Toothpaste $2 each times 2 tubes
minus two 1.50 coupons from the paper
minus 1.50 on shortcuts e-mail coupon
=-50 cents. I made 50 cents on this and got two free tubes of toothpaste. Holla.

Cottonelle Toilet Paper
original cost .99
had four .50 cent coupons i printed out from the web... they get doubled
add an additional .25 off from cell fire
=Made .25 cents and FREE TP, again. Four things of it!!

Green Giant Steamers
original price 1.49
minus.50 shortcuts e-coupon
minus .50 MFG coupon doubles to -1.00
=FREE

Two Percent organic KRAFT cheese
on sale for $2 each
-.75 when you pick up the coupon in the blinkie machine at the cheese aisle
=1.25 ea (regularly 3.50). I stocked up and got 5 of them. It freezes well. I've done it before.

Kroger Salad Dressing
cost 1.34
-.75 cell fire e-coupon
=.59 cents

Huggies:
10.49 (these were .50 cents cheaper last week, but we had the fiasco)
-3.00 cellfire e-coupon for two
-1.50 two coupons times two
= 7.49 each (would have been 6.99 last week, but still a good deal)

Chex mix- retail $2
-.60 cell fire coupon
.50 coupon doubled to equal -1.00
total= .40 cents

Ragu gave me a dollar off for no good reason. My receipt says I got a dollar off for buying a pouch. Funny, I didn't buy one. Surprises are nice. I think I just learned to upload all the e-coupons whether or not I plan to use them. You just never know.

My coupon savings alone (not counting Kroger Savings) was 45 bucks this trip. This ***may*** be worth it until I get something else going on.

Kroger Can Kiss My Grits

I went to Kroger today. I go every week, sometimes twice a week, and spend around 125-175 bucks. Today's trips was an out of the ordinary trip. I needed to stock up on some special deals and really do this coupon thing.

I did a few experimental coupon runs for several weeks in a row to make sure I really understood the lay of the whole coupon process at Kroger. I was informed that the Kroger policy was to double coupons up to .99 cents. Awesome. I used this doubling in conjunction with the coupons I find on Cellfire and Shortcuts and made some great deals. I did this successfully several times for several weeks. My coupons were doubled beautifully up to a dollar.

So, today, I figured, I know how to do this now, let's go and stock up on what I need. I piled my grocery cart full of great deals. Well, then, I roll into the cashier lane and I get what had to be the nastiest cashier on the face of the earth who hated her life and her job and felt the need to pull all those around her down. She had the raspy voice of someone who smoked a good 2 packs of cigarettes a day. She refused to double my .75 coupons. This hadn't been a problem before. OK, she's crazy, I ask her to bring the manager. I think they brought the cashier foremen. Well, she said they don't double to .99 cents as I was told originally. They only double to .50 cents. But sometimes they do double up to a dollar, but that is only occasionally during special events. So they change the amounts willy nilly.

I was fed up so I left the 100 bucks of groceries I had. I have never done that in my life. They clearly don't need my business.

The cashiers can double at their discretion. If you get a good cashier, they will happily double what they can. What does it matter to them?

Further, the coupon policy is set up locally and is based on the manager's discretion as to what the amount of doubling is. I guess in Charlottesville, we are not worthy of the doubling to .99 cents like in the big cities. Our choices are limited.

Well, the only control I have in this matter is where I spend my money and I won't be going to Kroger anymore. They can kiss my money goodbye. Thankfully, competition is coming. I'm going to Super Walmart come Spring. At least their deals are worth the horrible service.

Boring Coupon Talk and Rust Mobiles

I just got back from Kroger. I REALLY miss my old circulars. For some reason we don't get grocery store circulars in the mail here. NONE!! I used to get at least 5 ever Wednesday in Albuquerque. I'm not even sure my old Walmart ways would even work here if we had a Walmart because I've got no circulars to demand competitive prices with. Are we not important out here in the sticks? I mean, I still have to go to the city to shop!! Hello?! I'm here! Doesn't your marketing research show you that?

It's sort of killing me that our cost of living as gone up because I can use my old tricks. Thanks to a link from E4H (Engineer-4-Hire), I've been dabbling in new ways to save. So, I started doing the coupon thing a couple of weeks ago. I've been playing the game and it's been fun snagging some deals. Today I bought two things of crest pro-health toothpaste for 50 cents each, pantene shampoo and hair product for 25 cents each, charmin for free, and Iams dog food for half of what we normally pay for it (only 10.99/regularly 19.99) and THEN on top of all that I got another 5 bucks off my grocery bill. I just LOVE doing the e-coupons in conjunction with the doubled manufactured coupons and using other people's research to do it. That said, it is somewhat labor intensive. As prepared as I think I am when I enter the store, it took me twice as long... and there are some deals I just don't know are deals until I get to the store because they aren't advertised or they aren't on these blog lists. Then, I'm left calculating in my head doing my best to avoid impulsively buying something I really don't need just because it's a bargain. Ugh. My circular scam was sooooo much better.

We have a very exciting new years planned. We're going to have go get Nick's old mustang out of my grandpa's storage sometime this weekend because he's moving. Getting it into storage was a pain in the a** so you can imagine how we are feeling about the idea of getting it out. When we released the car off the trailer it flew down the ramp and slammed into the ground screwing up the clutch. It was at least running prior to that incident. Now, it's just going to be me and Nick pushing that thing together. Pray for us.

Not much else going on here. It's been such a mild winter here. A few days ago we topped out at 70. I'm not sure what the actual temperature was today but I'm guessing it was around 60. Wild.

Love Me Some Acorn Squash

As a stay at home mom, my job is to save us money. I'm a complete and utter cheap skate even in good times. It comes easy to me because my parents lived paycheck to paycheck and barely got by sometimes. I wouldn't say we were poor, but we weren't well off. I learned the value of a dollar and how to make it stretch from my mother.

Butternut and acorn squash has been on sale at Kroger for several weeks in a row now for a whopping 69 cents a pound! As such, it's been on our weekly rotation since it's been in season (I believe the sale began in October.) It is a tradition at our house every year around this time. It has become a wonderful comfort food in our house that reminds us of the season. We simply bake it with a little smart balance, splenda and a touch of cinnamon.
Our main course today was broiled parmesan tilapia. I can't say that it was the best paring with the acorn squash but I don't mix eat. I eat one thing and move to the next. I think it's a very left brain thing to do. I'm whole brained so I have both creative and logical tendencies. I like math as much as like art.

Anyway, the tilapia is an absolutely delicious dish that I discovered on SparkPeople. We get frozen tilapia when it's on sale and stock up. A nice size freezer is an essential component in saving money. Nick bought me a beautiful freezer in Albuquerque. He knows that the key to my heart is saving our money.

We never pay more then 3 bucks a pound for tilapia. If I'm lucky, I can get it for $2 a pound. That said, this meal cost us about 5 bucks total. I'm guessing we ate about a pound of tilapia, a couple pounds of squash, some lettuce, etc.

I generally don't clip coupons to save money, I shop circulars. Coupons generally make you buy the brand names on things and I find that even with the coupon AND it being on sale it is not less than the store brand. I know this may cause some of you to cringe, but I take ALL of those circulars that come in the mail each week and I go to super walmart. I use those circulars to get ALL the sales in one place. That's right, I stand at the cashier's desk and tell them all the prices I want from all the different circulars. Sometimes I have to show them the circular, sometimes I don't. It does take some time and I don't enjoy the fact that it leaves a larger carbon footprint than I would like, but I can tell you that my grocery bill went from $125 bucks to about $85 bucks a week, no kidding. Right now, we don't have that opportunity (they are building a super walmart), so I just shop one store and I pay close attention to the circulars. I do use my coupons but I'm paying around $125 a week again. :)

-M