Back to Basics--Couponing 101--How I Organize My Coupons

• She is like merchant's ships, she bringeth her food (and other things!) from afar


• She looketh well to the ways of her family

(coming up this week--reposts of where I get my coupons, part 1 & 2)

I admitted it, I haven't been couponing much lately. Last week I bought some groceries and used one measly little $.50 coupon--and it wasn't even doubled!

Why have I been so lax? Since I moved back to our small, rural hometown, the opportunties for savings are definitely lessened.

• Fewer stores, and with less competition, so prices are higher.
• None of the stores doubles coupons
• Since I'm home alone much of the time, I haven't been cooking much, and I'm using less of the things that generally have coupons.
• I've been using out of my stockpile of some items--which was plentiful when I lived in Georgia, most of which I brought with me.
• Better stores with more savings opportunities are in a city at least 50 miles away, and increasing gas prices make shopping there a less attractive option.
• Coupons have been fewer with much smaller denominations--and with no doubling, sometimes it hardly seems worth the trouble.

BUT---Sunday afternoon after a nice family dinner at my mother's house, all of us girls-my mom, my sister, my niece, and I--were sitting around the table looking at the sale papers. My niece was excited about a buy-one-get-one-50%-off sale on a make-up product she likes, and mentioned that she had a $2 coupon she could use. So when I told her that since she was buying two products she could use two coupons if she had them, and save even more---she was really excited! I ran home and grabbed my *envelope stuffed with coupons so she could look for the make-up coupon she needed, and it turned into a quick coupon lesson/intervention as we proceeded to go through the circulars, showing her how and when she could combine coupons with sales, stack store coupons with manufacturer's coupons, and use register rewards and extra care bucks to help even more. She was so excited, she compared me to one of the folks on the Exteme Couponing show--though I am far from that dedicated and/or obsessed!

*Yes, I admit it, my binder sits, empty and forlorn. Even my wallet sized coupon organizer is mostly empty, with only a few long term coupons left in it. I recently gave myself an intervention, throwing away expired coupons, and having a marathon clipping session to work through the stack of coupon inserts that I had left--unclipped and unused. However, I have a big stack of unsorted coupons, stuffed in a large envelope, because that's as far as I got.

And so, one of my tasks for this week, as a virtuous woman, is to re-organize my coupons.

1. Step one--Clip. Whether they're printed from the internet, in a newspaper insert, or received in the mail, they have to be clipped to be used.


2. Step two--Divide. Ideally, I stack as I clip, loosely into little piles all around me on the table, food categories on one side, non-food on the other. This can be as simple or as complicated as you make it. Food, non-food is obvious, but you still want like things together--cereal, frozen foods, etc.


3. Step three--Conquer. Even when all I had was an envelope, I had a little filing system to help me find the coupons I needed. If you have wallet style organizer, pull one section at a time, discarding expired coupons, adding in your new ones. With my binder, I take one page at a time, pulling the expired coupons (oh the shame of it--so many coupons that I let slip away until it was too late!) and filing the new ones.

And then--look out stores, here we come!

Meanwhile, here is my previous post about how I organize my coupons. (later this week I'll repost where I get my coupons, part 1 and 2, with some updates.)

When I first started couponing, I eased into it gradually. I started off printing a few internet coupons and sticking them in my wallet or checkbook; then I started using an envelope sorted loosely by category. I thought I had graduated to the big time when I got a real coupon organizer...



I paid $5.00 for it, it had about 12 little dividers that I used for my different categories. I really liked the convenience of this one because it fit in my purse; and because I always had it with me, it was easy to pull out when I found unexpected bargains and clearanced items. Unfortunately, it was just a little too small when I got into full swing couponing mode--it was hard to find coupons as I needed them, it was just stuffed too full and the elastic thingy it closed with kept breaking and stretching out.


So I finally broke down and and bought some baseball card collectors sheets and some photo sheets. I picked out my binder on Amazon (Case-it Large Capacity Blue Zipper Binder (D-145))and then I did what I do best--procrastinated about switching over until I just couldn't stand it any more--then I bit the bullet and drug everything out and worked on it off and on for two days straight!


I started off with some flexible plastic dividers, but I didn't like the way they stuck out, so right now I have no dividers, but I do still group everything by pages and general sections.

I have a couple of photo pages in the front for what I call "unusual" coupons--restaurants, or combination coupons--get $2 off produce if you also buy these two products, that kind of thing. Then I move to fresh foods--meat, produce, and bread--I don't usually have a lot of coupons for these products, so they're usually grouped together. I have a page for canned fruits and vegetables and related products; one for sauces, dressings, and condiments; packaged foods--rice mixes, hamburger helper, etc; cereal; baking goods; snacks; dairy; cold non-dairy --like rolls and biscuits; frozen. Within some sections I also group like products together--frozen foods may have meat and dinners, frozen breads, vegetables, and ice cream, for instance. Maybe not a separate page, but at least grouped together on the page. For non-foods, I have pages for shampoo, deodorant, lotion, bodywash, dental, etc, as well as paper products, cleaning, and laundry.


There are two main drawbacks to the binder system for me:

First, you do have to trim the coupons very closely, and some just will not fit without being folded. The photo pages are good for some larger coupons, I just don't have a lot of those, so I try to fold so that I can see the product and the expiration date.

And second is the bulk--right at first I was very self-conscious walking into a store with this huge binder--I usually have a large purse, too, so sometimes I wondered if it looked like I was moving in! I tried pulling out only the ones I knew I was going to use and leaving the binder at home or in my truck, but I constantly saw things that I thought "Oh, I have a coupon for that--out in the truck" And it's just too hot where I live and I am too old (!) to make multiple trips in and out just to retrieve coupons. I even tried leaving my purse in the truck and just taking in the binder and my debit card, thinking it looked less obtrusive to be carrying only one big old thing on my shoulder. That doesn't work, though, because I need that purse in the buggy to prop my binder on!

So I finally decided to just get over it and lug them both in.

And you know what? No one notices but me.

And the people who do, do a double take when they see me walking calmly down the aisle with my binder propped open on top of my purse.

Then they comment---"Where did you get that? I need one of those!" One older gentlemen even comment "You're one of those money-saving women, aren't you? I wish I had time for that!"

I have given many a quick lesson in baseball card sheets and zipper binders, standing in the aisle of the grocery store or drugstore.

Is it still a bit bulky? Yes. And sometimes when I'm making a quick trip, I do pull my coupons and leave it in the truck. But most of the time I take it with me. I put my purse in the buggy, open my binder and prop it on top, get my list in my hand, and away I go. I pull the coupons as I go, so I can make sure I'm getting the right product or whatever, and I slip them into a little pocket on the inside of the front cover of my binder. Sometimes I slip them into the fold on my list. When I'm ready to check out, I pull out my coupons and go ahead and zip up my binder and turn it with the strap up, ready to grab with my purse when I leave the store.

The good points for me far outweigh the bad--my coupons are organized, I can see at a glance what I have and what I may be short of, and it's ready at a moment's notice to zip up, sling over my shoulder, and go!
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Be sure to check the next two posts in this series:

Back to Basics--Where I Get My Coupons, Part 1

Back to Basics--Where I Get My Coupons, Part 2

Until next time...

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