Get Sunday coupon inserts through a super cheap subscription!
I’m part of a program to get valuable Sunday coupon inserts by subscribing to one of 20 papers in California or Utah. Many of these deals are valid for renewals, too. One perk is that you can buy additional Sunday papers to get tons of extra coupon inserts!
The Orange County Register is a particularly good deal.
Don't you love scoring FREE coupons? elycefeliz /Flickr
Reader Lisa has a couple questions about getting coupons. Leave your advice in the comments for her.
How do the people on “Extreme Couponing” receive coupons for free products? I clip every Sunday, but I have never seen free coupons.
Binuri Ranasinghe / Flickr
This is a post by BargainBabe.com writer Yazmin Cruz.
Stacks of newspapers have gone missing lately, but it’s not print making a comeback. Thieves are going after coupons. According to a story in USA Today, newspaper theft is tied to extreme couponing. (It’s also caused many retailers to tighten their coupon policies.) Getting multiples of valuable coupons is essential to stockpiling during a sale and saving money on groceries. Here are 10 ideas – legal ones – to get extra coupons.
Veronica is not the only one! I saw this sign in Long Island.
Reader Veronica wrote in with a real problem – she is limited to what coupons she can use. She writes:
No store where I live accepts coupons from internet, only newspaper or from retailer. By the way, I live in Port St. Lucie, fl.
There are five things Veronica can do.
1. Start a coupon train to get more coupons from newspapers. In a nutshell, a coupon train is when 5-10 clippers mail each other the coupons they cannot use. The packet goes from one person or “station” to the next person in the group. You take out what coupons you want, and add what you cannot use.
2. Buy coupons from (more…)
The blue envelope coupon giant Valpak just released the results of a consumer survey on coupon use and frugality. They talked to 1,000 American consumers in May. Here are the most interesting findings:
Digital coupons are the next big thing. 91% said they have used an Internet coupon, compared to 65% two years ago. 77% have used the Internet to look for coupons in the past 6 months, up from 62 percent a year ago. Redemption of mobile coupons increased by 250% in one year (although I’m guessing mobile redemption was basically nonexistent a few years ago).
Coupon use is still growing. 46% said they search for coupons and discounts more often than in the past. “Couponing is expected to increase more than 150 percent between 2009 and 2014,” the survey says. Saving money extends to other areas of life, with consumers across all demographics searching for ways to save, comparing prices, and reading reviews.
Forget staycation, the new buzz word is valucation. People are tired of vacationing at home. 65% said they plan to spend money on travel, including trips abroad, in other American cities, and on cruises. But nearly everyone is watching their budget: 79 % plan to spend about the same or less this summer compared to last summer.Valpak is an authority on consumer savings.
Savings habits are sticky. 75% said they will keep looking for coupons and ways to save after the recession blows over.
About the survey. It was conducted by e-Rewards Market Research. Results are within 3.1 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level. ValPak delivers coupons to almost 40 million households each month.
The results of this survey ring true for me. Most everyone I know is eager to find good coupons and is learning the basics of where to find coupons. Times certainly have changed from when us frugal folks were the only ones using coupons and waiting for sales!
What interests me is how Internet coupons are developing in response to demand and fraud. With newspaper circulation declining, fewer people are getting coupons through the mail so it makes sense that online coupons will fill the void. The Internet has dramatically altered many aspects of our economy. Do you think coupons will be effected, too?
Cathy at Chief Family Officer shared four hot grocery deals this week at Ralphs, which faces $256,000 in fines after an undercover investigation found the chain was overcharging customers. The chain was slapped with similar fines in 2008 and 2009. Does that make you want to shop elsewhere?
Tropicana Pure Premium Orange Juice on sale for $2
Use $1 off 2 Tropicana Pure Premium or Trop 50 from 4/25 Red Plum coupon insert
Or use $1 off 1 Trop 50 from 3/14 Red Plum
Final price: as low as $1
Oscar Mayer Lunchables on sale for $1.25
Use $1 off 1 Oscar Mayer Lunchables Lunch combinations from 3/21 Smart Source (expires 5/16)
Final price: 25 cents (the sub varieties may be producing $1 catalinas)
French’s Mustard on sale for $1.49
Use 50 cents off 1 from 3/21 or 5/9 Smart Source
Final price: 49 cents
Kingsford Match Light Charcoal on sale for $9.99
Use $2 off meat when you buy Kingsford Match Light Briquets 12.5lbs
Final price: Get $2 off meat
Check out the rest of Cathy’s deals at Ralphs. Do you use these weekly coupon matches at Ralphs? Please let me know in a comment so I can decide whether to continue featuring Ralphs deals. Thanks!
I talked to Lisa Reynolds, the “resident mom saver in chief” at RedPlum, which distributes coupons to 40 million people in the Sunday newspaper, about how likely a manufacturer is to send you a coupon upon request, secrets to making the most of RedPlum.com, and how coupons will distributed in the future.
Why aren’t there more grocery coupons online? I think we’re seeing an increase in that. More manufacturers have started placing coupons online. People are going to look for savings wherever they can find them. Coupon distribution for consumer packaged goods is up 11 percent from 2009 to 2008.
Do the coupons at RedPlum.com match the ones in Sunday newspaper? There is not 100 percent overlap, so you want to check both places. The coupons online change more rapidly.
Are they restocked on the first of the month like other sites? Not necessarily. We ask people to sign up for our emails, which tell you when they are restocked.
Why are the coupons limited to a certain number of printings online? It is based on what the manufacturer wants to distribute.
How many printings do you typically see? Tens of thousands for most coupons.
How can people sign up for RedPlum coupons? The best way to figure out where they can receive coupons is to go to RedPlum.com [and click on] where is my coupon book?
What if I’m not eligible to receive them? We suggest people contact the manufacturers directly through [the manufacturer] 800-number. Most manufacturers list it on the back of their products. Thirty percent of the time manufacturers will send you coupons.
How are coupon distributers coping with decreasing newspaper circulation? It is a challenge and one of the things that we are able to offer them is a blended solution. [Through newspapers, direct mail in some markets, and online distribution.]
How will coupons be distributed in the future? We’re continuing to see a lot of experimentation with mobile phones and texting. That will continue to proliferate. The key is to make it easy and convenient.
