by Elaine M. Doxie

Created on: September 17, 2010

We all live to hear the stories about people who walk into a grocery store and cut a hundred dollar grocery bill down to about five dollars by using their coupons.  Whie this is possible, it is not practical for the average individual.  However, with a little pit of planning and research, you can still save significant amounts of money by using coupons.  It takes practice to save more, but it can be done.  Here are just a few tips to make your coupon shopping more effective.

Go through the coupons in the Sunday paper every week, and cut out any coupon that you even think you might use.  You're not going to use every coupon that you cut out, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't take the time to clip them.  Sometimes, the things that you have coupons for will go on sale, and give you a better deal, but not always.  However, you'd rather have those coupons in your arsenal in case they do go on sale.  Don't forget about online coupon sites like redplum.com, smartsource.com and coupons.com, to find coupons as well.

Go through the grocery store flyers that you get in the mail every week to look for the best deals.  Looking through them every week helps you to know when you really are getting the best sales.  For example, Dreyer's Ice cream may be on sale one week for $2.99 a carton, then the following month, it will be on sale for $2.50 a tub.  If you hadn't seen both ads, you wouldn't know when you were getting the best deal, and may continue to buy it at $2.99 a tub, even though it goes on sale cheaper.  If you have a coupon for 50 cents off of one tub, you can now get your ice cream at $2 a tub, thereby saving even more money than you would buying the generic brand.  Match up the coupons with the flyers for maximum savings.   Don't forget to make a list to take with you to the grocery store.  Use a paper clip to attach the coupons you are using to your list.

Even when you get to the store, armed with your coupons and the best deals, be flexible.  If you see that another brand is cheaper than the coupons make the brand you are thinking about buying, buy the other brand instead as long as it's a brand that's acceptable to you.

Using these tricks will help you save the maximum amount at the grocery store.  It may not slash your bill down to $5 a week for a family of five, but it will likely cut it by anywhere from 25 to 50%.  Do remember not to get frustrated, as sometimes you willsave more than other times, but overall, you willsave a lot. 

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