Coupon Queen: How does one start couponing?

After living in another country for many years, I recently moved to Florida. Here, I receive two newspapers every week.

In both of them, there are always a lot of groceries and other products’ coupons. After reading your column in my newspaper, I felt intrigued and curious about how coupons work. That’s why I decided to write to you with my questions.

First, where can I use those coupons from the newspaper inserts?

Are they valid in every store (big box stores, own-brand discount grocers, dollar stores?)

How can I know which stores will accept the coupons?

I haven’t found the answers to my beginner’s questions.

Would you help me to start, please?”

Eikon K.

Welcome to couponing!

While other countries around the world do have various forms of coupons, couponing is definitely a different kind of phenomenon in the U.S.

Here, we have numerous brands competing for your shopping dollars, and these brands offer a steady stream of coupons to consumers, hoping you’ll try their product, and then continue to buy it regularly.

For the sake of this column, let’s focus on manufacturer coupons, which encompass the majority of the coupons in your newspaper inserts.

Each coupon that appears in your newspaper inserts was placed there by a brand that hopes you’ll see the coupon and consider purchasing their product.

When you use a manufacturer coupon at a store, the store does not lose any money. The manufacturer actually reimburses the store for the value of the coupon you’ve used!

Take a look at the fine print sometime, and you’ll see a physical mailing address that your store submits your coupon to in order to receive the value of that coupon.

When you use a $1 coupon in your supermarket, the store does not lose that dollar.

The manufacturer pays the value of the coupon to your store, giving you a discount on the item, but also making sure your store doesn’t take a loss on the same item for accepting that same coupon.

The vast majority of stores accept manufacturer coupons.

Big-box stores do, chain supermarkets do and many dollar stores do, too! Specialty grocers, including smaller stores featuring own-brand or house-branded items, typically do not accept manufacturer coupons.

If you’d like to know for certain whether or not a specific store accepts coupons, visit the store’s website and look for a link to the store’s coupon policy.

In order to get the best deals with your coupons, it’s important to use them in conjunction with the lowest sale prices to get the best deals possible.

For example, we recently had a $1 coupon for name-brand laundry detergent in the newspaper inserts. A 50-ounce bottle of this detergent usually sells for $4.99 when not on sale.

While my $1 coupon would drop the price of the detergent to $4.99, my goal as a coupon shopper is to cut the price in half or better by pairing my coupon with a low sale price.

While my coupon is four weeks old, it hasn’t passed its expiration date yet, and guess what? This week, the laundry detergent is now on sale for $2.99. By pairing the same $1 coupon with this better sale price, I’m able to take the detergent home for just $1.99!

I know this is a great price, because it is less than half the regular, non-sale price.

As a bonus, my supermarket is also running a “Buy laundry detergent, get fabric softener free” promotion this week. So, I’m not only taking the detergent home at less than half price, but I’m also gaining a free bottle of softener.

If you’d like even more information on getting started with coupons, I’ve got a page on my blog that will teach you how to organize your coupon inserts for maximum efficiency, ensuring that you only have to clip the coupons you plan to use in the store this week.

Visit jillcataldo.com/welcometocouponing to learn more.