Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Extreme vs. Centsible Couponing: Where to find your coupons

centsible couponing button

So if you haven’t already figured out from the previous posts in this series, you need to have as many coupons as as you can get your hands on.  That way when something that you use/want goes on sale, you can buy more than one item and stockpile it for future use!

But where are you going to find all of these coupons and then how are you going to keep them organized in your house and in the store?

There are THREE main places you will find coupons:

1. Newspaper coupons (this is going to be the large majority of coupons you will use.)
  • The Sunday paper is going to be your #1 main source! 
You will want to subscribe to home delivery for the largest cities paper in your area or pick up a copy at the store on Monday.  Notice I said the largest city near you.  I live in a suburb of Atlanta that has it’s own city paper that does have coupons on Sunday, but that local paper only carries the Smartsource (SS) insert, NO Redplum (RP), NO Proctor + Gamble (PG).  But the Atlanta paper (Atlanta Journal + Constitution) carries all the inserts and one of the best (most) coupon inserts available nationwide.  So I subscribe to the Atlanta paper! I also have a family member that works for our local paper, so I am able to get the unsold Sunday and pull the SS inserts out of them.  There is also a FREE Hispanic newspaper that comes out in our area that contains the same coupon inserts (although some are in Spanish!), so I make sure to pick up some of those too!

If you don’t have any other way of getting your coupons from a Sunday paper for FREE, I have seen and recommend that you buy 1 paper/set coupon inserts per person in your family.  So family of 2 = 2 sets of coupon inserts, family of 5 = 5 sets of coupon inserts. 

Ask friends, people at church, family members to save their coupon inserts for you if they don’t use them.  Check coffee shops, your local library, and post office for extra coupon inserts.
  • Check newspaper recycle bins. 
The ones on your street if you have local pickup or the ones at the transfer stations/landfill.  In other words, dumpster dive! :)  (I have done it before, it is really not all that gross since it is just newspapers in the bin :)
  • Buy extra single coupons from a coupon clipping service or on Ebay.

  • Buy whole inserts online.
2. Coupons in the store.
  • “Peelies, tear pads, blinkies'” – Finding these is like a scavenger hunt in the store.  If you take your kids shopping with you and they are old enough, teach them what these three types of coupons are and make it their job to find them while you are shopping! :)  “Peelies” are the coupons attached to the product that you peel off (usually when you actually buy that product.)  “Tear pads” are just that – a pad of coupons that you tear off the coupons.  And “blinkies” are the little red coupon dispenser boxes that you sometimes see throughout the store.

  • Store coupons.  Another reason why I LOVE Publix is they literally throw coupons at you when you walk in the store! :)   All throughout the store their will be display racks with coupon booklets or sheets.  Pick a few up, use any of you want right then, and SAVE for later when their might even be a better sale!
3. Printable coupons!
Printable coupons are becoming more and more popular.  Many companies host printable coupons on their website or on their companies facebook page.  I post links to lots of these coupons especially when they are high value or for a product that is on sale right now.  Sometimes you can just google - “printable coupon for ____________” and if there is a printable coupon it will come up as one of the options.

Then there are 3 major websites where you can print coupons:

This post has already gotten long enough so I think I will share "How to organize your coupons" in part 2 tomorrow!

If you have any other places where you find coupons, tell us in the comments!

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