I admit that I’m not the smartest shopper when it comes to groceries and other household items. Sure, if I happen to catch a sale, I might stock up slightly. But note the words: “happen to catch.” That’s right, I very rarely look for sales. It’s just not something I do. But it’s something I need to start doing.
For the first time in a long time, I clipped coupons last weekend. I made a point to go to the store, pick up a paper (for $1.50 – but I plan to subscribe in the upcoming weeks), clip the coupons, and then, because I’m a bit obsessive, I started a spreadsheet with the coupon data. The theory there is that I can watch for expiring coupons, and I can have all my coupons listed on one page rather than just stuck in my coupon organizer. Having already done the major grocery shop for the week, I decided to look at the CVS circular to see what was on sale and if anything matched up with my coupons.
Lo and behold, I found a number of deals! Items already on sale that I also had coupons for! Items that I use all the time with ECBs offered this week! I’m trying to do my best and only buy things that I would normally buy – because otherwise, am I really saving any money at all? I realize that’s not always the way to play the drugstore game, but I think that’s how I’m going to play my version for now. Realizing how productive this trip was, I decided that I also needed to start looking at the grocery store circular every week.
I tend to do my shopping early in the morning on Saturdays or Sundays, and my store’s circular goes online on Fridays. Perfect! I can browse through the circular, figure out what’s on sale that I use and compare that to my coupon list. This should also help my plan to have more of a stock of food around the house, in case of emergencies (and let’s be honest, also in case of “too lazy to go to the store”).
I’m not sure why I haven’t done this before. It didn’t take long to go through the paper on Sunday morning, and I did it while catching up on some tv. I know some people spend hours planning their shopping, but for me, that just doesn’t make sense. I shop at one particular grocery store (plus Whole Foods on occasion) and I go to CVS. That’s what’s within walking distance for me – anything else requires getting in my car, and that’s when it becomes too much of a hassle in my mind. So I just need to block out a little bit of time every week for couponing. Shouldn’t be hard at all.
Yet another money saving plan to implement when I get home from vacation.
Megan is a 30-something government employee in the Washington, DC area. She got interested in Personal Finance when she got out of college and realized that her paycheck wasn’t going to go as far as she had hoped. Since starting this blog, she has managed to buy a house and make a solid start on her retirement goals, and hopes to help others do the same. Here is her story:
In 2007, I was a gainfully employed 20-something with no debt but not a lot of knowledge about personal finance. It was a co-worker’s comment about Roth IRAs that sent me to the internet, searching for information. It was then that I realized that I really didn’t know a whole lot about personal finance and that my current financial situation was due a lot to inherent frugal tendencies, generous family members, a fear of debt, and good luck. While that was working for me, clearly I needed a better plan.
While I had no debt, I was also pretty much living paycheck to paycheck and not worrying about going over budget (I say this as if I had a real budget) because I had an emergency fund set aside to cover any overages.
Except that’s not what an emergency fund is for.
So I did a lot of research, read a lot of blogs, and decided that I needed a plan. I needed to budget. I needed to know what I was spending my money on. I needed to prepare for the future.
I decided to create a blog not only to make myself accountable to others but also to share the knowledge that I gained along the way. I’ve learned so much from my fellow bloggers, and I hope that my readers can find something useful in what I have to share as well.
