We love Walgreens!
Those of you who are avid coupon shoppers probably know that Walgreens is running some sweet deals this week on Novartis and Proctor and Gamble products. Since a person like me can rarely pass up a good deal, we headed there last night during our evening Family Time. (Every evening from 6-8 p.m. is family time at our house. This means we do nothing besides spend time together as a family. We usually are at home and eat dinner together and then talk, read together, sing, play our instruments, and so forth. However, since the deals at Walgreens were so good and many of my coupons were expiring yesterday or today, we made an exception to the rule last night and headed out the door as soon as dinner was over with.)
I'm blessed to have a husband who doesn't mind shopping with me one bit. He even is quite the bargain shopper himself and helped me pull off our five transactions last night. And he is always so excited when I get good deals. I love to bless him by stretching his hard-earned money as far as I can. Here's some of what we purchased:
What did we spend? $0.00. Yes, that's right. We spent zero money out of pocket to buy all of the above, plus a few items not pictured that I already gave away. Each transaction, after subtracting manufacturer's coupons and store coupons, we ended up owing tax and maybe a dollar or so for. We used our Walgreens gift card to pay the overage. The money on the card has accumulated from rolling it over on the free after rebate items month after month after month. And we still have some left on the card to start accumulating again.
Not bad, I say, for an hour or so worth of time, especially considering a lot of this - in particular the deodorant, toothbrushes, razors, shampoo and conditioner - are items we needed to buy soon anyway. Now we'll be stocked up for a good little while.
Can't you see why I enjoy couponing so much? Not only do I buy groceries and household products that we need and use at bargain prices, but I have a great time doing so and, like last night, sometimes the whole family gets involved in the process making it even more enjoyable!
By the way, if you could use some help in reducing your grocery bill, don't forget that the pilot Supermarket Savings 101 online class begins in two weeks. It is rapidly filling up and we'd love to have you join us! More details are here.
I'm blessed to have a husband who doesn't mind shopping with me one bit. He even is quite the bargain shopper himself and helped me pull off our five transactions last night. And he is always so excited when I get good deals. I love to bless him by stretching his hard-earned money as far as I can. Here's some of what we purchased:
What did we spend? $0.00. Yes, that's right. We spent zero money out of pocket to buy all of the above, plus a few items not pictured that I already gave away. Each transaction, after subtracting manufacturer's coupons and store coupons, we ended up owing tax and maybe a dollar or so for. We used our Walgreens gift card to pay the overage. The money on the card has accumulated from rolling it over on the free after rebate items month after month after month. And we still have some left on the card to start accumulating again.Not bad, I say, for an hour or so worth of time, especially considering a lot of this - in particular the deodorant, toothbrushes, razors, shampoo and conditioner - are items we needed to buy soon anyway. Now we'll be stocked up for a good little while.
Can't you see why I enjoy couponing so much? Not only do I buy groceries and household products that we need and use at bargain prices, but I have a great time doing so and, like last night, sometimes the whole family gets involved in the process making it even more enjoyable!
By the way, if you could use some help in reducing your grocery bill, don't forget that the pilot Supermarket Savings 101 online class begins in two weeks. It is rapidly filling up and we'd love to have you join us! More details are here.
posted by Crystal Paine at 2:36 PM
19 Comments:
I wish we had the same coupon opportunities here in Canada! If any Canadian readers have found something I haven't, please share. When we first married, I was an avid coupon collector but there doesn't seem to be any coupons to clip these days. I've searched for on-line sources, but don't find ones for regular, every day products.
I just got home from Walgreens and thought I did pretty good with a savings of $28.18 (I'm just learning to do the coupon thing) but $0.00, I don't know how you do it! I'm hoping to get better with more practice but I don't think I'll ever be that good! But you definitely give me something to aspire to :)
How did you get all that for no money?! Please help! I wish I knew what you know!! :)
Seven,
I am also Canadian and would agree with you that these kind of savings just are not possible here. I occasionally get coupons that I can use, but end up saving maybe a dollar at the most. If you have Extra Foods or the Great Canadian Superstore nearby you can sign up on their website and get a weekly "freebie" coupon. You have to spend a certain amount of money to get the freebie, which for us is not a problem if the freebie is something we will use.
Ann
AMAZING!! I am signing up for your class as SOON as I get 18 bucks.LOL. See? If I had saved all that money shopping today I would have the 18 dollars! Quick question. I am a full time working mom. Would I still be able to take your class?
You did a great job with this - I'd say 0.00 is pretty amazing (minus the taxes). :)
It's like winning the lottery without the sin of gambling!! = )
Wow!!! That is amazing :-)
Great haul, Crystal!!
Not only the Canadians don't have such coupon opportunities, in the Netherlands we also do not such generous actions.
Indeed an intruiging question about the store's policy.
Great haul Crystal!
St_ignatious: The course is designed with busy women and moms in mind so you should definitely be able to participate! If you can carve out 15-20 minutes sometime during most days of the two weeks it's going on, you should be able to pick up on a whole lot. And all of the course materials, audios, message board, will be accessible after the course is over, too, so if you want to go back and re-read or re-listen to something, you'll have that available, too. We'd love to have you join us!
i am just now starting to shop at walgreens. i finally live near one so it'll be worth my effort. tahnks for all the tips!
p.s your girls are beautiful!!
Crystal,
As much as I think you have many good things to say on your blog, I think this is a little misleading.
In order to have rollover points, You had to spend money at some point in your Walgreen's shopping history. It is like claiming you found a free air line ticket because you bought it with frequent flyer miles.
Caroline: Actually, I was very careful to be clear here because I wanted to make sure I wasn't misleading. However, I think I failed to fully explain *how* I accumulated the money on my Walgreens card. It is by rolling it over and over and over month after month after month. I use coupons whenever I can to add extra $$ to the card and then they give you 10% back on all the rebate purchases in addition to the purchased price. So, no, adding in all that extra money, I didn't spend any money out of pocket for these items - at least in how I view it. I've not spent any money out of pocket at Walgreens for months. I just always use my card and then it gets refilled and then some every month with the rebates. Make sense? Sorry if that was not clear the first time around!
Crystal,
Did you go to more than one Walgreens? I ask this because I am assuming you used Register Rewards (got some at one then redeemed them at another)? The link to download this month's rebate catalog on the Walgreens website is not working, so I am curious if you used some coupons from the catalog as well as manufacturer ones? I guess I am not seeing how you got so much for free!
Thanks for any additional info you can provide!
-Kristen
Well that link for the Rebate catalog finally worked for me. I do see some coupons that you must have used.
Thank you for the post and inspiration to find great deals!
-Kristen
Kristen: I only went to one Walgreens - one that's about two blocks from our house. It's not worth it to me to have to spend time and money driving all over and that's not very feasible at this point in my life anyway!
I combined store coupons, manufacturer's coupons, the the register rewards to get the deals I did. They were out of some things otherwise I actually would have done better than I did.
A few things to look for:
The P&G inserts recently had B1G1 coupons for some of these products - those really help sweeten the deals. And you get credit in register rewards for the free items in B1G1.
Also, the Crest toothpaste and Oral-B toothbrushes are $2.39. You can stack a $1/1 manu coupon and a $1/1 store coupon (in the Easysaver booklets) to pay $.39 per toothpaste/toothbrush. If you have enough coupons, this is another great way to work the deal.
On the Novartis, look for Lamisil $5 off coupons and then stack them with the $3 off in the booklet. And you can also stack manu/store coupons on the Maalox.
You can't roll the P&G rewards to buy more P&G so I did one P&G then one Novartis, then one P&G, etc.
Oh and the Aleve Liquid Gels print $2 in rewards (separate deal) and there are $2 off coupons out there. It is on sale for $3.99 = free. :)
For those of you who are new to couponing, this deal is one of the more complex to work (at least if you want to pull it down to the least OOP spending). There are a lot of nuances to learn when stacking coupons and if you don't know what you are doing, the register will beep or not accept your coupons.
I regularly use Walgreens and can usually get items next to nothing or free. I find their rebate program a bit cumbersome though and dont use it as much any more. I have to put in a call every month to correct it. But they do have great deals! I dont have a CVS nearby so Walgreens is it for me. Although Rite Aid just came in nearby and I was able to get 2 bottles of Herbal Essence for free using their rebate program and B1G1 coupon!
Is there a way to get these coupons other then my Sunday paper? I got the paper and I have a TON of coupons...they double up on Sunday...but for crying out loud I can't use all of these coupons. Every one of them says that only one coupon can be used. How does this help?
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