Adventures in Couponing

At the advice of the totally rude Lysol company who stingily refused to send me a single coupon when I took the time to write to them, I got the Sunday paper and clipped some coupons of my own. The first thing that I looked for was a coupon for a Lysol product, since advertising in the Sunday paper was the reason they refused to send me a coupon in the first place. I will confidently tell you that there were NONE. No manufacturers coupon from Lysol, and no store ad containing a Lysol product. So take that!

I did clip $10.50 worth of usable coupons from the paper. That was nothing compared to the over $300.00 in savings that was advertised on the front page, but I am being careful to only clip coupons for things that I might want or need before the expiration date. There is no point in spending money to save a portion on it while buying something that I don't need or won't use.

The first shopping trip after the clipping saved me $5.50. I (very smartly) planned my weekly meals around the coupons that I had clipped to maximize their value. The next shopping trip I save the remaining $5.00. Not bad for a $2.00 investment.

One thing that I noticed, and this might be coincidental, but it seemed as though the Oregonian had better Coupons than the Columbian. The next week, I bought the Columbian newspaper to check out the coupons and there was ONLY ONE for $.50 that was anything I might remotely need. I'm not sure if the two papers run the same coupon ads or not, but there was a definite lack of manufacturers coupons - the kind you can use in any store.

I also noticed that most supermarkets have coupons that work exclusively for their store, but that the ad for Rite Aid usually contains at least one manufacturers coupon. They have the Rite Aid logo on them, but they do say "Manufacturers Coupon" which means that almost any place which accepts coupons will take them.

Another thing I learned is that not every store has to accept coupons. Some just don't! I had no idea! I haven't run into this problem yet, but it's good to be aware that some businesses do not accept coupons, manufacturer or otherwise.