Family Circle Magazine
I have a confession to make: I rarely see the inside of a grocery store. I'm lucky, I guess, because my husband actually enjoys weekly excursions to the supermarket. For him, it's a challenge to buy as much food as he can for as little as possible. For me, it's a chore. I don't like spending more time in the grocery store than I absolutely have to.
Even so, I couldn't help but wonder what all this excitement for penny-pinching was about. I knew it was profitable, but was it actually fun too?
To find out, I called the only person I knew who could show me how to spend less at the supermarket and love every minute of it: Family CIRCLE contributing editor Susan Samtur, the queen of couponing. "I spend less than 20 minutes each week preparing to shop," says Samtur. "That's not a big investment of time considering how much I save each year."
The next thing I knew Samtur was leading me into a Grand Union just outside New York City. She carried only two tools of the trade: a well-organized grocery list with food arranged in categories (all the produce together, all the frozen foods together and so on) and a bundle of coupons. 117 in all (I kid you not). I followed in her thrifty wake, humble but eager to learn her secrets.
On the day of our visit, Grand Union was doubling the value of coupons. We were off to a good start. As we pushed the cart up and down the aisles. I watched Samtur take advantage of every opportunity to save.
The best way to save with coupons, my frugal friend told me, is to apply them to sale items. "Every week hundreds of products are marked down." she said, pointing to a dozen sale-priced items in the dairy aisle alone. "Look here, Breyer's yogurt is discounted this week. Now, I have a coupon good for 20 cents off each container. Once the coupon is doubled to 40 cents, I'll pay just 10 cents per container instead of 89 cents, which was the original retail price." She picked four containers (our limit) and tossed them into the shopping cart. We rolled on.
As we made our way down another aisle, Samtur warned about coupon pitfalls. "You have to pay attention," she said. "If you have a coupon that is good for an 8-ounce size, don't accidentally pick up a 12-ounce." Samtur avoids this mistake altogether by writing brand names and sizes right on her shopping list. She refers to the list whenever she forgets. She has even develped a habit of comparing coupon to product the minute she pulls something from the shelf. Near the end of a different aisle, Samtur spotted another great buy. "I have a 75-cent coupon for Ragu spaghetti sauce. Today the store doubles that value, so it is now worth $1.50." Samtur calculates quickly and in her head. Boy, she knows her stuff. "I'll pay only 49 cents for the 32-ounce jar." she says, pointing to the tomato sauce in question. "Or I could pay $1.48 for the 48-ounce jar." Which did she choose? The smaller jar because it turned out to cost less per ounce - by a penny and a half - than the larger size.
We rounded the corner to the meat department, where Samtur made the most impressive buys of the day. Using a $3 coupon she had picked up through a rebate offer. Samtur managed to lower the price on a package of ground turkey to only 6 cents. Next, she grabbed a package of hot dogs that had been marked down from its original price of $2.79. Once a 99-cent manufacturer's coupon was factored in (and remember, the value was doubled by the supermarket), the hot dogs ended up costing nothing. Yes, the hot dogs were free.
In the end, Samtur went home with $148 worth of groceries and paid only $5.49 for them. She turned in so many coupons, the cash register jammed. "We've got some real penny-pinchers in this store, but I must say I've never seen anything like this before!" said cashier Stacey Anderson, as she fumbled with a register tape that measured more than 5 feet long. It was even longer than the frugal shopper herself, who stands at 4 feet 9½ inches. Samtur smiled at her accomplishment.
As for me, the experience has changed my attitude entirely. Never again will I ignore a coupon. And now I even seek out rebate offers. (The other day I sent away for a free ice-tea scoop from Upton.) But my new adventures in penny-pinching are all done in utter secrecy. I don't want my husband to know. Having someone else do the weekly shopping still seems like the best deal in town.
HOW YOU CAN SPEND LESS
These highlights from my guided tour of the supermarket might save you some money too. Good luck!
- Look for products that have coupons attached to the package itself. Teel them off and cash them in at the checkout counter on that day.
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- Sign up for a preferred shopper program at your supermarket. As a member, you get additional discounts on your total at the checkout counter, as well as a variety of coupons for future purchases.
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- Shop at coupon-friendly stores. Plan to shop on days when the face value of your coupons is doubled or, better yet, tripled.
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- Apply more than one coupon to an item. You can do this when one is a store coupon and the other comes from the manufacturer.
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- Use coupons in conjunction with in-store promotions. Samtur explains: "On a buy-one, get-one-free offer for Cilentano frozen ravioli, I'll apply a manufacturer's coupon for an additional free package and take home two bags for nothing."
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- Don't assume that generic brands are always the cheapest. Because the average value of a national-brand coupon is 62 cents, it's surprisingly common to bring the price of brand-name foods down below generics.
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- Collect coupons from a broad range of sources. Check your Sunday newspaper for coupon inserts. Look through the newspaper's food section, which usually comes out midweek. While you shop, scan grocery store shelves for coupon pads.
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- Take the time to send in for rebates. Susan Samtur claims to save about $1,000 every year through rebate offers. She also appreciates the freebies: T-shirts, mugs, stuffed animals, sports bags, jackets, calculators, beach towels, basketballs and more. (Samtur's favorite take to date is a pound of apples she got free from a breakfast cereal company.) Check with your store manager for rebate offers available in the store.
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- Be sure to ask a store manager for a rain check on sold-out items you have coupons for.
- Buy small and save big. "You'll get more mileage from coupons if you apply them to the size with the lowest per-pound price." Samtur says.
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- Call a manufacturer and share your feelings about their products. (You'll find a toll-free number on the package.) Samtur says gestures like this almost always result in the company thanking you with coupons or a free sample product. Ambitious coupon hunters will simply ask for coupons.
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- If you really want the inside scoop on rebates and other supermarket savings secrets, read Susan Samtur's monthly newsletter. To subscribe, send $19.87 to: Refundle Bundle, P.O. Box 140FC. Yonkers, NY 10710. FAMILY CIRCLE readers will also receive a free copy of her paperback Cashing In at the Checkout (a $6.95 value).
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