Welcome, ABC Nightline viewers!
If you watched the recent Nightline segment on coupon shopping, you might be wondering, "Is it worth becoming a coupon shopper?"
The real question is... why wouldn't you coupon shop?
In life, we continually insist on the best prices for major purchases. We seek out the lowest price when buying a new car, booking the cheapest airfare, or finding the best deal on a new television. And yet, where groceries are concerned, most people don't even give a second thought to what they're paying for them. They go to the store and accept $150-$200 weekly grocery bills as part of life.
But groceries comprise one of the largest parts of our entire household budgets! If you knew you could easily cut that grocery bill by half or better, still buying the groceries and products you want and need, why wouldn't you? With my system, coupon shoppers are happily spending a small amount of time each week, about a half-hour to an hour, to reduce their grocery bills by 30%, 50%, 75% or more.
I'm Jill Cataldo. Welcome to Super-Couponing®. With the tools you'll find here, you're about to completely change the way you shop.
Many people have written to ask what was included in my ABC Nightline shopping trip. Here's the list!
3lbs. apples
2lbs. Earthbound Farm organic broccoli
3lbs. onions
5lbs. potatoes
1lb. carrots
2 jars Del Monte refrigerated pears & pineapples
Case of bottled water
8 filet mignon steaks
3lb. beef roast
2 packages Oscar Mayer salami
4pk. toilet paper
2 rolls Scott paper towels
2 boxes Kashi cereal
5 boxes Honey Bunches of Oats cereal
8 Old Orchard 100% cranberry juice
2 frozen New York garlic bread sticks
1 Culinary Circle rising-crust pizza
1 half-gallon organic milk
2 Suave women's deodorants
1 Kotex pantiliners
1 4lb. bag Iams dog food
1 case of Baby Basics diapers (80 ct)
Pre-coupon total: $118.84
Post-coupon total: $50.61
And, I got $20 in Catalinas back. These are coupons that state "$10 off your next order," which are like gift certificates to the store -- they're just like cash and can be used on whatever you want.
So essentially, I spent $30.61! :)
______________________________________
Many people who watched the piece have commented at length on the differences between what I chose to buy and what the other shopper, Nathan, did. Certainly, when you're approached about doing a national television piece, you can go one of two ways with your shopping trip. I chose to shop not only in a way that's representative of how I would normally shop, but also how I think -most- people shop. And, one of the coupon myths I constantly hear is that "you need coupon doubling to save big with coupons." Here in Chicagoland, we don't have doubles, and we still enjoy great savings. Another myth? "There are no coupons for healthy foods or organics." Busted! :)
I wanted to show a national audience what my longtime readers already know -- we CAN save big on healthy, good, not over-processed foods. Hope you enjoyed the segment!
comparing websites
I just went to Nathan's website to check it out. OUCH! My brain hurts. Jill your website is much easier to use & follow. Those who follow your principles share more useful hints & information. Those on Nathan's site seem to be the ones who clear the shelves off that frustrate the rest of us. Thank you Jill & my fellow shoppers who share here. I appreciate all you (all of you) do!
THANK YOU JILL!!!!
Jill just a quick note to thank you. I have only been following you for about 4 weeks now. I am already saving 57% on my grocery bills. I can't believe it. And I actually like to shop now. It is so much fun.
Thank you for everything that you do.
You are awesome!
What I appreciate about you is that I would have the same shopping list minus dog food. Though the other guy is amazing, I would have to open a food closet with all those jello boxes and cereals. Thank you for sharing how to coupon shop the healthy way! I appreciate it! I look forward to learning more from you!
They picked a slow week, even!
Imagine what you could have done in the weeks with the P&G/Kraft and Conagra running together and the GM the day before! Their heads might really have exploded then :)
awesome!
You did an awesome job Jill! I've been couponing since early Feb when I took your class, and I just am so grateful to your willingness to share all your great tips & info with everyone. You're so enthusiastic and REAL! I might have to give you a big hug when I go to my next class LOL
Your passion for educating others is truly appreciated, and I try to pass that along to those who are willing to listen, recommending your blog & classes. Amazing how I have encountered so many people who just don't seem to care about their grocery bills. Even people who are struggling financially. I want to smack them in the face with my receipts!!
Thank you!!
Great Job!
I've been following Jill for 6 months now and am amazed! Jill you did great! Wish we had double coupons here in Chicago somewhere other than Kmart but alas, we will have to suffer through Catalinas(JK) and wait for the cash to start pouring out of the "little machine" by the register. I also wish I had a bumper sticker that says, "I follow Jill...follow me to the grocery store"
Bumper Sticker
Oh Jill should start making those! I'd buy one too ;-)
Business cards too
I can't tell you how many times I've written down supercouponing.com for everyone, mostly the cashiers at Jewel!! Many times I've wished for a little card I could just hand them! :D
Though I'm almost sorry I taught my neighbor ;) She snagged the only two small hams that our Jewel had. I had to buy a bigger one at $8 and she paid .67 for each of hers!
I've mentioned to several people...
two of whom want to pay you to come give a Super Couponing class at their church!
Would be great to have something I could print to give them.
Here you go:
Super-Couponing Flyer (4 to a page)
Super-Couponing Flyer (full page)
I'll add these to the side menu too under "Spread The Word!" Thanks, everyone!
Wow...
That was fast. They look great!
Confession
I didn't make them within the last 5 minutes... though that would have been an impressive display of time management. These are the flyers I use when I present at business expos. But again, if you want to share them, please feel free :)
Printables
Maybe I will add a printable business card (or mini-flyer) PDF for people if you guys want to print and hand out. :) I had no idea this was going on so much. You guys are so kind to pass this around for everyone.
Just saw this
How funny...I just ran across this when I was on The Frugal Find. 50 business/mommy cards for $1. You can choose one of their designs or upload your own logo
http://thefrugalfind.com/and-theyre-back-50-businessmommy-cards-for-1-sh...
That would be great!!
Jill, you've changed our lives with your Supercouponing! I'm hoping that by sharing your information with someone else they can improve theirs as well!
A little flyer or something would be great too, I'd love to have something to give to the food pantry when I drop stuff off. I don't know if they know about it or not, but I can only imagine how much further they can make their monetary donations go if they knew how to do it. I'd love to volunteer to shop for them!
me too!!
That's an ADORABLE idea!! (and I'm not big on bumper stickers...)
me too!
me too!
Jill Rocks
Way to go Jill!
The segment turned out great. Of course I'm biased, but I would have liked a little more Jill than Nate. I definately prefer your style. Although kudos to Nate for his ABC Jello logo - that's COOL!
Where does Nate live? I would never store all those groceries in our garage with the weather changes and critters...he must be somehwere more temperate....
I loved this segment on ABC
Though I wish they had not cut Nate's trip to the local charity where he made a HUGE donation of goods. I think Nate forgot in his enthusiasm that most folks might not understand that sometimes in super couponing you DO buy things you don't need or want to be able to get the things YOU DO need or want. I super coupon, and in fact use Jewel several times a year for it. Some of what I buy sometimesis JUNK. But in getting the junk, I get the catalinas to buy the healthier foods. I like that I am almost literally PAID to buy healthy food! WHAT FUN!! There are different approaches to super couponing and as long as what you are doing is legal IE like Jill or Nate,you are fine. He does sell things in garage sales! SO? there is NOTHING wrong with that. and posts concerning that have NOT been removed from his site. He and Jill showed different ways, different styles but neither were WRONG.
Jill I loved what you showed, what you had to say, and what you bought! Nate just has a different approach, but he is younger and enthusiastic! LOL time will temper that and he will learn about presentation for the masses.
It is illegal
In the state of Kentucky it is illegal to sell or in this case re-sell the food at a garage sale, or flea market or farmers market etc. without a license. Specifically:
"All vendors selling commercially produced items must have a prepackaged retail food store permit from the local health department."
and don't most store sales
state no sales to dealers. As in, if you run a local sales outlet (Mom and Pop store, etc.) and can get it cheaper from us than your normal supplier, don't plan on it.
If you have a stockpile that's so big you have to resell the stuff whether on your lawn or at your 7-11, you have too big of a stockpile. Donate it and take the tax deduction.
tax deduction
If he got his items for free, he wouldn't be able to get a tax deduction for donating. Right?
I do think that excessiveness like what Nate does is a mental health issue. It does seem a form of addiction (like gambling) and a form of hoarding.
My 2 pence.
Not sure
From mentions in past posts I think the math works like this. Coupons aren't held against you. I think the preferred price is used as the deduction since that's what you spent. Coupons, yourBucks and the like aren't held against you even if the bill total would be tax only if you do it right, they're looked at as cash used to pay the bill.
Deduction
Groceries you buy "for free" with coupons are still tax deductible at their pre-coupon price. Think of your coupons like cash - whether you paid $1 for an item or got the $1 item free with a $1 coupon, it still has "value." It costs a dollar to buy.
Regular or preferred
Jill, which item price is used, the non-card/regular price or after scanning the preferred card?
Sale price
Sale price after card. If Coffee-Mate is $1.99 regular price, but on sale for $1, the $1 is what's deductible. And SAVE your receipts if you are taking tax credits on food donations.
cool!
which I am sure those living in Kentucky are fully aware of if they are a person who does stockpile sales.
it would be illegal to do it WITHOUT the permit if what you are saying is true and for the whole state of Kentucky
Multiple newspapers?
Do you regularly purchase multiple newspapers in case there is a really good deal? I've ordered your DVD, so I'm hoping the answer is in there. I'm just so confused as to how you can score so many 'free' cereals, personal products and other packaged goods without multiples of the same coupon. Please advise.
thanks!!!
New to couponing and loving it!!! :)
Some deals so good you can be light on coupons
Like cereal deals when they're on sale and you buy so many boxes you get a Catalina back, even with only one coupon it's free or close to it, with multiple coupons you can have overage. Rebates are another thing, like cleaning products was a recent one that was free or a money maker even when you didn't have a coupon for each item when you bought three, got a cat back as well as a rebate.
Number of inserts
Certainly, the more inserts we have, the better -- but as a beginner, I'd never say "oh, you have to buy 4-6 papers a week." You can do this with as many papers as you have, whether that's one or more. What you will see on the DVD is that you want to be receiving the -largest- newspaper serving your market area, as it has the most coupons in it. This is true all over the country and is just something advertisers do -- dropping their best, highest-value coupons in the largest newspaper.
Many people do like to buy more than one paper a week to speed up the stockpiling process. Obviously, with any good sale, if, say, pasta's on sale for $1 and you have a $1 coupon, it's free -- if you have 4 $1 coupons, four will be free. But there are plenty of other ways to get multiple coupons. I know many people who have made "deals" with their newspaper carriers to drop off their extra inserts on Sundays - or to pick up extra papers at a local store or gas station on Monday morning... free :)
Consider too that a lot of popular coupons repeat every few weeks. General Mills cereals, frozen vegetables, many others repeat fairly often, and the first set is usually not expired when the second set comes around, and so on. When you watch the DVD and see my big cereal stock-up, that's partially how I did it - many manufacturer coupons from several weeks' worth of inserts that were all unexpired, stacked with great store coupons for bigger savings. Don't forget printables too -- there are often many printables out for the same products each week too.
I personally get two Chicago Tribunes (our largest paper) delivered each week and my smaller, local paper, the Herald too. The Herald's coupons are nowhere near as good as the Trib's, but I like my local newspaper & get it every day, so I end up with those too. So I mainly do this with two inserts, plus the extra one in the Herald.
Now, if there's a super-crazy coupon week (New Years is always one of those that typically has 5 inserts) then yes, I may buy more papers. In our area, many dollar stores and hardware stores sell the Tribune for $1, so that's a small price to pay for more good coupons. New Year's week 2010, the paper had coupons in it that resulted in free toilet paper, free light bulbs, free dishwasher detergent tablets, free bars of soap, and one other thing I can't remember... so for every $1 I spent on an extra paper, I gained all of those things.
Does that make sense? Some people will use clipping services to buy many multiples of the same coupon, etc - I don't get into that as I'm really only shopping for myself and our food pantry.
I would have thought you'd
I would have thought you'd get more. I also get two tribs and our local paper...thanks to your advice to support the local paper. Plus it comes on Saturday and you can see all the sale fliers early! Gotta run out to my front lawn to get mine right now ;-)
Store coupons
that was pretty good, 8 of those took off $26.70. I don't run into many Jewel store coupons, could you post what they were for and where we can get them? :)
Her store coupons are "Your
Her store coupons are "Your Bucks" coupons she got from using other items...at least that's my guess. That's how my recipts print out when I uses my pevious coupons from the store.
Also Jewel has Avenu, which is a online resource. You load coupons right to your card. Check her side bar for the link!
HTH
meat coupon
or it could be a buy three get one free steak coupon? not sure
Yes
I absolutely did use the "Buy 3 steaks, get the 4th free" coupon - and the "Buy 3lb. roast, get potatoes, onions and carrots free" was also a Jewel store coupon. Lots of good coupon use all around :)
No
No YourBucks (or "cash" Catalinas of any kind) used - YourBucks are manufacturer coupons.
Many of the Jewel store coupons came from the Preferred Card book (which you could get in the store for updating your shopper's card - that promo ended in December 09 but the coupons in the book are good through 4/30/10.) One that was nice was the $1 off 2 Kashi - I used that in conjunction with both a free box of Kashi coupon and a $1.50 off Kashi coupon - stacked together, that was $3.50 (plus a free box) off 2 boxes. Fun to do! :)
After I posted that comment I
After I posted that comment I looked at my reciept..I was like hum..i think I was wrong. Then i wondered if it was the steak coupon...You are the MASTER ;-) I am just a pee-on ;-)
Did you do the roast & veggie?
I keep meaning to ask if the buy the roast get the potatoes, carrots and onions free with in store coupon was part of that? I did that deal this week, and made it yesterday. It was soooo good! Big roast with all the trimmings, for $9.53 and lots of onions left over!
Yes!
Yes, that was one of the deals I did on camera, and we had the roast & veggies last night. Delicious & a great deal!
I made Homemade Italian Beef
with almost free shredded cheese - delicious!!
Ditto
I too had my delicious roast last night!
And now I am off to go re-heat the leftovers!
WOW a roast night!
We had ours yesterday too!!! YUM!
roast too
But my DH marinated it and smoked it. It was like candy.
Woo hoo!
Jill, you were fantastic!!!
You were great!
I used to think it was all too good to be true, that I didn't have time to do it, that I didn't have room in my house for all that stuff, then I started reading your website. You are amazing.
Congratulations on the recognition! Thanks for representing us couponers with class and concern for eating well.
class
"What a tool, did you see how many glucose monitors he had piled up in his garage?He's just a neat hoarder."
could be wrong , but maybe he's more about making a buck, Jill came across showing class / certain standards - not selling items in a garage sale ect. !
You make me proud!!
Jill,
I was like..oh she's getting your bucks for that...there's her steaks...have the HBO...;-) Loved it!
You are just amazing!
Yesterday at Jewel, price pre PP: $100, price pre coupon: $63, price after coupons $41 with $12 to spend again. I posted all I got on my blog (www.xanga.com/patenaude)
$31 of that was for a dinner at church, so just $10 for my weekly bill. Yes, I got apples, potatoes, salad, creamer, carrots, peanuts, olives, celery...also ragu, cheese, noodles for my church dinner.
So $10 for my family, -$5 catalina. net cost $5..well under $5..but that's just change!
Can't wait for SC2 at the end of April!
Great Job Jill!
I taped the show to show my husband, so he could see who had taught me to supercoupon! We loved it!!! Half way through I paused the show to explain to him about how Kroger "doubles" coupons & what that means. You did a great job :)
BRAVO JILL !!!
My husband called me into the room to watch you, he heard coupon & your name. What a thrill to see you shop like I do (organics, etc.) & your ability to educate people on a way to save without building warehouse storage in their home. The other shopper had great stuff too, however my husband has been afraid I could become someone who just bought everything. Upon seeing your shopping savvy demonstrated he hugged me and said he was proud that I have been investing in taking your free classes and learning from a "mommy like myself". My most sincere gratitude to you Jill, I hope & pray that tenfold of your unending generosity is blessings back to you! PS- have gotten many friends and family into educating themselves with your helpful blog as well.
Great Job!
I watched with my husband
last night and he said "gee, who's house would you want to go to for dinner?"