Saving Money by Shopping Around

I'll be the first to admit that I don't do a lot of shopping around when it comes to grocery purchases. I live in an area where there just aren't many choices. I can buy groceries at the commissary, a tiny local store that charges A LOT (which I still use occasionally because I like supporting our local economy), the four or five stores in Minot that are owned by the same people, or the Super Walmart. There are a few groceries available at Target, CVS, and KMart, and that's pretty much the extent of my options. I DO look through the ads of every local store on Sundays or Mondays to see what the best deals are, and if it's a really good deal, I try to stop by whichever store when I'm in the area. Or I send my husband to the store with a specific list (there's something he thinks he needs at Menards almost every week anyway, so he's already in Minot regularly).

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My First FREE Trip!

On Wednesday morning I got a call that the special order my husband had placed was ready to be picked up at the commissary. I had already spent a bunch of time the week before planning my trip and sorting coupons, so I was ready to shop! I asked on the phone if it would be a problem to break up my special order into two different shops, and they assured me it would be very easy. I LOVE my commissary!

My husband had taken the van to work on Wednesday since he's having trouble with the windshield wipers on his truck, so I spent even more time checking prices and printing coupons. By the time he got home from work, my son and I were ready to shop! I have a coupon binder, but haven't bought the inserts yet to put it together, so I'm still working with an expandable file folder. So I sorted out coupons I knew we would use for sure in one envelope, sorted another of ones I wasn't sure about, and left the others right where they belonged, so I could use them on an unadvertised deal if I found one.

Big Coupon Savings

Friday I had to meet my husband after he got off work so we could run a few errands. We wanted to hit the 75% off clearance toy sale at Target, and since I already had to go on base, I decided I should run to the commissary for a few things we needed. My four year old son was hungry anyway, so off we went. When I got there I was surprised (and happy!) to find that one of the things that was on my list for Target was actually on sale much cheaper at the commissary. I had 14 $.75 off Snuggle coupons that I was planning on splitting up between the commissary, Target and Walmart, since the commissary had the best price on the dryer sheets, Walmart had the best price on the big bottles, and Target carried my favorite scent. Well, this weekend the commissary had a huge display of the 32 load Creme Jojoba scent bottles marked down to $.99 each and a bunch of the peach blossom and sunshine dryer sheets marked down to $.89 each! I couldn't pass that deal up, so I ended up using ten coupons on the liquid and the other 4 for the dryer sheets.

Extreme Couponing

So, I've always used coupons, at least casually, since I first moved out of my parents' house. I haven't always done as well as I should with them, though. Last year my husband was deployed for several months, and during that time we ended up accumulating some extra debt due to poor communication, overspending, etc. So one of our biggest goals this year is to use more coupons, and watch sales more closely. I've managed to keep our grocery budget under $300 a month for quite a while anyway (we're a family of 3 with two dogs), so now my new goal for the first half of the year is under $200. If I can attain that, I'm hoping to drop it to around $150 for the second half of the year, and leave it there.