Does coupon mom really work

My strategy is based on simple principles that work in every area of the country, not only in the big cities. And don't worry -- you won't have to compromise your quality standards to save money on groceries. Here's the key: saving money on groceries is not about changing the way you eat, it's about changing the way you buy the foods you like. You will learn new, easy shopping strategies, but you won't sacrifice healthy choices for the sake of saving money.

This is not another grocery savings book recommending a complicated coupon organization system that takes hours each month to maintain. And it is not necessary for you to go to several stores each week to find the best grocery prices. The typical shopper is much too busy to invest that kind of time in grocery shopping. Instead, Greatest Secrets of the Coupon Mom is for busy people like you and me who want to save money but need to do it efficiently.

The key to saving money on groceries is to understand the three basic principles of strategic shopping:. Once you understand how these three principles work and how to combine them to save even more, you will cut your grocery spending dramatically no matter where you buy groceries. Plus, you'll get a bonus. I'll also show you how to become a strategic giver! In my quest to save my family money, I discovered needs in my own community.

I didn't realize it, but the cupboards of my local food pantry were bare. I decided then and there that on my next shopping trip I would use my coupon strategies to add a few extra bargains to my cart. Delivering those items to the food pantry changed my life. I began teaching my friends and family how to purchase food for charity by combining grocery coupons and low prices. The remarkable success of these efforts led me to create Cut Out Hunger, and my website makes it easy for people to save dramatically not only on their own groceries, but also for items to donate to charity -- all for just pennies.

I am reminded of the saying that if you give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, but if you teach a man to fish, he'll eat for the rest of his life. And in our case, at a very low price. I don't have a fish to give you, but if you're ready to learn how to buy high-quality food at a low cost for the rest of your life, get in the boat! Before we go further, we need to talk about something.

You don't like using coupons. Maybe you even hate using coupons. Unless you are part of the 15 percent of shoppers who use coupons religiously, you likely have a logical reason for not shopping with coupons. I've used coupons for over a decade, and for the past five years I've spoken to thousands of people about using coupons to save money and donate food to charity.

I have learned what people don't like about coupons, and in some cases, I agree with their objections. Invariably shoppers across the country object to the same challenges and share common misconceptions about coupons. When checking out at the grocery store, other shoppers frequently look at me incredulously and ask, "You really like coupons, don't you? Using coupons is one way to have more of it. In spite of massive advertising and promotion by the grocery and coupon industries, fewer than 2 percent of coupons are converted into real money.

In my opinion, coupon redemption is low because clipping and using coupons is time-consuming for people who are already busy. So what's the solution? I believe the answer to helping more people save money is to make it easier for people to use grocery coupons.

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Organizing coupon information and identifying good coupon deals for people is the key. My website has successfully helped thousands of people save millions of dollars since its inception in March I started CouponMom. I even tested it using eight-year-olds. It is not impossible. But first, let's examine the most common challenges of using coupons and how my program can help you save real money. My family doesn't use the products that have grocery coupons.

We don't eat processed foods. It's not true that coupons are only for processed, unhealthy foods. In fact, many coupons are available for fresh items like cheese, yogurt, cottage cheese, eggs, milk, and occasionally fresh produce. There are many coupons for common frozen foods -- vegetables, ice cream is this processed? Most households eat it!

I wouldn't buy dry cereal without a coupon; and peanut butter, condiments, baking mixes, coffee, tea, crackers, cookies, snacks, pasta sauces, pasta, rice, and fruit juices commonly have coupons. Coupons also follow food trends, so now companies issue more coupons for organic foods and products designed for special dietary needs. Finally, a high percentage of grocery coupons fall into the categories of household cleaning products, paper products, and personal-care products such as shampoo and toothpaste. In fact, 47 percent of coupons issued are for nonfood items. There are more coupons issued for household cleaning products than any other type of coupon2.

It takes too much time to clip and organize coupons. I hear you! I also hate cutting out and organizing hundreds of coupons, so I don't. But I do save thousands of dollars a year on groceries. My system eliminates 90 percent of the manual labor, frustration, and drudgery of coupon organization, while still allowing you to save big money. I came up with a searchable, sortable online database of all the coupons issued in the Sunday newspaper.

Think of it as the Dewey decimal system of grocery coupons. To maximize your coupon savings you really need to save all the grocery coupons each week.

You never know what will be on sale in the future, making the item free or practically free with a coupon. However, there can be up to two hundred coupons a week in the Sunday paper, which would take hours each month to cut out, organize, and search through every time you need a coupon. One of her best turitorials is how to successfully use the Coupon Organizer Database offered on the site. Once you join you can then view deals by national stores and by state. Once you choose your preferred store, you can sort the deals by that date a coupon was released, the description of product, the sale price, final price or the percentage saved.

Not all stores are listed on this site but there are most of the main stores in an area including national stores like, CVS, WalMart, Target, etc. Do you have any coupon sites you like to use? Leave a comment for a possible future Fresh Look segment! CouponMom is great. Are you a Canadian deal shopper? Do you have any tips to add?

Here are 6 reasons why extreme couponing may not work for you:

Leave them in the comments! Sign up for our brand new Hot Deals email list! Sign Up Here. Coupons for Canadians Add to my favorites. Since my knowledge on the subject is pretty limited, one of my favorite Canadian bloggers, Stephanie, from Keeper of the Home , offered these tips: Unfortunately, coupons with a U.