Copps Shopping Trip 1

Due to my recent traveling, I haven't really been buying a lot of groceries; however, this week I am planning to spend right around $50. Usually I would be okay with missing a week, but with the upcoming wedding there are a few items we still need and planning this far ahead allows me to find great deals on most of the products. With a majority of my kraft coupons expiring today, I knew it was a use them or lose them situation, so I decided this month it was worth going over the weekly allowance. I know I won't have time for deal hunting during the weeks surrounding the wedding, so to prevent a store run where I end up paying full price for a meal to serve a large group of people, my fiancee and I sat down and planned out a rough menu (I'll post more about that later). Overall, this week is filled with a lot of staples for ourselves and party hosting, along with a few items pegged for donation.

Transaction 1:

(2) Fiber One 4-pack Yogurts 2/$4.00 minus a B1G1F coupon so $2/2

(2) Land O' Lake Butter $2.50 each (No coupons)

(1) Ritz Cracker $2.75 minus a $1/1 coupon doubled so .75 cents

(1) Wheat Thin $2.50 Free after purchasing the Ritz

(4) Colgate Toothpastes .99 cents minus (4) $1/1 coupons doubled so -$4.04

(9) Tuna Helper Box Meals $9.00 minus (3) .75/3 coupons so $6.75

My total came out to $10.60 and I used a $7 gift card from a previous promotion

Paid out: $3.60

Transaction 2:

(1) Ritz Cracker $2.75 minus a $1/1 coupon doubled so .75 cents

(1) Wheat Thin $2.50 Free after purchasing the Ritz

(1) Puffs Plus Tissue $1.25

(9) Dawn Pure Dish Soaps $2.50ea minus (9) $1.50/1 coupons so $9.00

(8) Pringles $12 minus (4) $1/2 coupons doubled so $4.00

The last 3 lines were a part of the P&G promotion, which gave me $10.00 back for a future meat purchase. I plan to use this during next weeks sales.

Total came to: $16.33

Transaction 3:

(9) Tuna Helper Box Meals $9.00 minus (3) .75/3 coupons so $6.75

(6) Colgate Toothpastes .99 ea minus (1) $1/1 coupon doubled and (5) .75 ea so $0.19

(12) Clif/Luna Bars .88 ea minus (4) $1/3 coupon doubled so $2.56

Total: $9.77

My total out of pocket for these 3 transactions: $29.70

And I got back a coupon for $10.00 off for a future meat department purchase (I'm planning on chicken breasts)

**I also got .40/gal off of my next fill up, which saves me about $5.60 (I need to do fill up before I go in for more deals tonight, so I can rack up more savings for the next time)**

A picture will come later, I just wanted to take some time out to post this deal.

Best of luck with your own deal hunting too!

How far can $50 go?

This week there was a great sale on Kelloggs cereal, and I thought it would be a great chance to use up the various $1/1 Kelloggs coupons I had. We had a lot of coupons, so my fiancee and I decided we would go all out. We set a budget of $50, and worked out a series of 8 transactions. We couldn't believe our eyes at the results:

That's what 54 boxes of cereal look like.

Most of the cereals were on sale 4/$10, some were on clearance for only $1.89. With doubled $1/1 coupons, and some $1.50/1 coupons (Mini Wheats on box coupon), plus $5 off next purchase for every $20 of qualifying items (Kellogs Cereals (52), Huggies (2), Hellmanns Mayo (2)), resulted in final costs of $0.25 - $0.50 per box.

On top of the cereal we also got:

(16) Smuckers Toppings (10 Free, and 6 for $0.50 each)
(6) Colgate Toothpaste ($0.11 Money Maker: 89 cents - $1 coupon)
(2) Cascade Rinse (Free after coupon)
(2) Hellmanns Mayonaise ($2 after $1 off coupon)
(2) Ritz Crackers ($1.75)
(2) Wheat Thins (Free w/ purchase of Ritz)
(2) Huggies Bath Products ($1.50 with $1 off coupon)

Not Pictured:
(12) Steamfresh Frozen Vegetables ($1 each, plus $1/3 coupon)
(1) Bagelfuls ($2.19 plus $1 coupon)
(1) 3 lb bag Fuji Apples (99 cents w/ rain check)
(1) bunch Bananas ($0.49 / lb)
(2) Digiorno Flatbread Melts ($3.19 each, plus $1.50/1 coupon)
(2) gallons Milk ($2.69)

and:

The coke was on sale 4/$8.88, we picked them up for my soon-to-be in-laws, as well as a few other items (the Hellmanns and half of the Smuckers).

Our total out of pocket was = $49.76
The items for my in-laws = $25

Our Personal Total = $24.76

In case you are wondering how 2 people could ever eat this much cereal, or where we could even store it, we actually are only keeping 10 boxes of cereal for ourselves. We are giving the other 44 to a local food pantry, along with the Huggies baby products and the 6 toothpastes. It amazes me that giving to others can come from such a low final cost, with time being the real investment in taking advantage of these deals.

I know a lot of other couponers out there are very giving, and I would like to hear other ways that you are giving in your community. Please share your stories by leaving a comment below, so I can gain inspiration from your ideas.

- Mister Deals

Copps 5/13 Double Days!

My Copps trip this week really did not turn out as planned... but it was awesome!
As you can see, I didn't get any cereal. It turned out that I didn't have enough coupons for the cereals that were actually on the 4/$10 deal. So, I scrapped that plan, and just got some free BBQ Sauce and Kraft Dressing in the morning. Later, my fiancee and I came up with 2 new transactions for Wednesday night. Here are the results...

Items Purchased:

(13) Kraft BBQ Sauce (Free, plus some were -$0.16)
(13) Kraft Salad Dressing (Free)
(11) Creamette Pasta ($1 each)
(2) Dreamfields Low Carb Pasta (-$1.51)
(2) Edy's Ice Cream (2/$5)
(2) Windex Antibacterial Sprays (-$0.80 each after M.I.R.)
(4) V-8 Tomato Juice ($0.80 each)
2 lbs Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast ($3.69)
(1) Strawberries ($1.50)
(2) Dawn Dish Soap (Small size $0.25 each)

This was the total haul from all 3 transactions (including my morning trip on the way to work, which is when we discovered the secret money making flavor of Kraft BBQ Sauce.

My totals were:

Transaction One was: $0.00!! (was briefly Negative 16 cents)

Transaction Two was: $15.19

Transaction Three was: $8.45

The great thing about these deals are the extremely low out of pocket when I take into account $10 of the cost are items for my soon-to-be mother-in-law (I'll deliver her groceries to her this weekend) which makes my out of pocket $13.64.

Tomorrow I will be sending in two mail-in-rebates for the Windex, which will be a savings of $6.58.

When this is accounted for my final cost is: $7.06!!

The coupons I used are as follows: (Doubled Coupons marked with *)

*(2) $0.40 Windex
*(4) $1 V-8 Tomato Juice
*(2) $1 Dreamfields Pasta
*(2) $0.50 Dawn Dish Soap
(13) $1 Kraft BBQ Sauce
(13) $1 Kraft Salad Dressing
(2) $2 Catalina Coupon (from Kraft)

Copps Wednesday Double-Day Deal Plan

It's that time of the week again.  The grocery store I shop at, Copps, has double coupon day every Wednesday, so naturally I only shop there on Wednesdays (except for the occasional gallon milk on a Sunday morning).  If you are not a Copps shopper, let me explain their rules for double day:

• You have to ring up at least $25 (before coupons, tax, etc)
• Only your first 5 coupons are doubled
• They only double coupons up to $1, and only up to the full amount of the item.

Now that you know that, here are the deals I have planned out for tomorrow

Transcation 1

(8) General Mills Cereals (on sale for $2.50)

+ 8 GM Cereal coupons (5 of them will double) for a total of $11.25 in coupon savings

+ plus you get a $4 off next order coupon when you buy 8

(3) Kraft BBQ Sauce (on sale for $1, free after $1 printable coupon from KraftFoods.com) 

(2) Kraft Salad Dressing (on sale for $1, free after $1 printable coupon from KraftFoods.com)

OOP = ~$9 + tax

Receive = $4 off next check out

Final Cost = $5 + tax

Transaction 2

(2) Post TrailMix Crunch Cereals (on sale for $2.25)

+ $2 off 1 internet printable from SS

+ Doubled $1 off 1 clipped from previous sunday paper

= only 50 cents plus tax for 2 boxes of cereal!!

(10) Creamette Pasta (on sale $1 each)

(2) Kraft BBQ Sauce (on sale for $1, free after $1 printable coupon from KraftFoods.com) 

(3) Kraft Salad Dressing (on sale for $1, free after $1 printable coupon from KraftFoods.com) 

(1) Windex Antibacterial Spray 

+ free with MIB rebate from 5/10 SS

+ $0.80 money maker with doubled 40 cents off 1 coupon in same ad (5/10 SS)

(2) Dawn Dishsoap (on sale for $1, plus 2x $0.50/1 from P&G "Home Made Simple" booklet)

Total: $13.49 + tax

Use $4 from first transaction, now

OOP = $9.49 + tax

Mail in Rebate = $3.29

Final Cost = $6.20 + tax

Transaction 3

(1) Gallon of Milk

(1) Strawberries (on sale $1.50 per carton)

(1) 3 lb bag of Apples ($0.99 with coupon clipped from this week's Copps ad)

(1) bunch of Bananas

(2) Edy's Ice Cream (on sale 2/$5)

(1) 2 lbs boneless, skinless Chicken Breast (on sale $1.89/lb)

(2) Dreamfields Low Carb Pasta (BOGO plus doubled $1 off internet printable coupon)

(1) Windex Antibacterial Spray 

+ free with MIB rebate from 5/10 SS

+ $0.80 money maker with doubled 40 cents off 1 coupon in same ad (5/10 SS)

I am leaving this last transaction open ended, as I may or may not work in a few more items:

• more Kraft BBQ Sauce & Salad Dressing (Free with printable coupons)
• 4 Sally Hansen Nail Polish - I want to get these for my fiancee (because I have a bunch of $1 off coupons from the K-mart Spring Savings booklets), but I will have to see if they are a good deal or not when I get to the store.

My plan is to do the first 2 transactions in the morning before work (I'm glad Copps opens at 6am!) and then do the 3rd one on my way home.  I'll be sure to update my blog tomorrow night so you know how things turned out :)

- Mister Deals