We all love great deals but are you guilty of overspending on these 3 items when you can get the exact same for less at a local dollar store?
1. Greeting Cards
Why spend $4 or $5 on greeting cards when you can pick some up at the dollar store for as low as 50¢.
2. Gift Bags/ Decorative Party Supplies
Whether your giving presents or decorating a kids party, dollar stores offer great supplies for only $1. Save your money and buy these supplies here since they’ll end up in the garbage after the party anyway. Small gift bags are as low as 10 cents each in a multipack.
3. Hair Accessories
Hair ties to bobby pins, we lose these like its our job so don’t spend $2 or $3 on them just to ‘misplace’ it in a week.
Stephanie Nelson is the Coupon Mom. With more than 7 million members, Coupon Mom gives members access to thousands of printable coupons for groceries, restaurants and more. As the nation’s top expert in couponing across the country, Stephanie has been on every major national television talk show and taught millions how to save money for the past 16 years. She has been called ‘”the rock star of the recession” by the Washington Post and her book, The Coupon Mom’s Guide to Cutting Your Grocery Bills in Half, is a New York Times best seller.
Coupon Mom Stephanie Nelson shares how you can save over 50% on your Thanksgiving meal by following some of her smart savings tips. Take a look at these before you head out to do your holiday food shopping.
Shopping and Saving for Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving dinner can be one of the best bargain meals. By shopping the sales and using coupons, you’ll save big while your family and friends rave about your delicious meal.
Just follow these tips for saving:
It is less expensive to bake a pumpkin pie than an apple pie, and much easier.
Buying a frozen apple pie on sale with a coupon may cost less than making it from scratch and it’s certainly easier.
Frozen dinner rolls on sale with a coupon, may cost the same as scratch but are easier (and they taste much better than the cheap brown-n-serve dinner rolls that everyone over bakes and nobody likes)
Canned cranberry sauce on sale with a coupon is much cheaper and easier than homemade, as compared to making your own cranberry sauce.
Frozen turkey is half the cost of fresh turkey, and if you allow 3-4 days to thaw in the refrigerator no one will know the difference.
The Strategy
Have a Plan: The key to saving on groceries is taking time to plan your list and shopping strategy. Believe me, the savings will be worth a little extra planning time. The traditional dishes are the most popular with my family and their ingredients are always the featured sale items at the stores. Sit down and list the dishes you plan to make and the ingredients you will need to buy. Inventory your kitchen to see what you already have on hand and make your list accordingly. Be thorough–you don’t want to have to dash to the store on Thanksgiving morning for a forgotten item!
Shop Prices From Home: Review the weekly advertising circulars for all nearby grocery stores to see which stores have the best prices for your items. Each store will feature a few of your items as rock-bottom sale items. It may make sense to spread your shopping between two stores so that you can “cherry-pick” the best deals at each store. Or you can ask your stores if they have a price-matching policy. If one does, you can take the ads from all the stores to the price-matching store to get the lowest available price on every item from one store. Here are this week’s best Thanksgiving meal bargains at stores across the country.
Be Coupon Crazed: Thanksgiving is a grocery coupon bonanza. The coupon circulars in the newspaper have more coupons than usual in this Sunday’s issue prior to Thanksgiving. Coupons for common Thanksgiving ingredients abound, such as stuffing mix, baking ingredients, frozen vegetables, gravy, dinner rolls, turkeys and more. You can also print many good grocery coupons online from sites like CouponMom.com.
Save by Substituting: You can also save by avoiding expensive ingredients. For example, instead of using $4 of pecans for our sweet potato casserole topping, I use a crumble topping with oatmeal, butter and brown sugar (from an apple crisp recipe) that costs pennies to make. And I find it is less expensive to bake a pumpkin pie than an apple pie, and much easier for me. Most years I’ve been able to buy a frozen apple pie on sale with a coupon for less than it would have cost me to make, and my family prefers them to mine!
Stock up on Savings: Take advantage of ultra-bargains right after Thanksgiving and stock up for future meals. If you have the freezer space, buy an extra turkey or two. One year I bought a couple dozen cans of pumpkin for 10 cents each after Thanksgiving and made pumpkin bread, muffins and even pumpkin soup all year.
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!
Stephanie Nelson, the CouponMom.com, has over 7.5 million members, and she is established as the nation’s top expert in couponing across the country.
This Texas woman is helping Hurricane Survivors by giving them free supplies she purchased using coupons. Kimberley Gager of San Antonio, Texas, says she “has a bit of a coupon addiction” but now that addiction has proven itself to be very helpful to those in need!
“I just really want people to know, ‘Hey I’m here, I’m real. This isn’t a joke. If you need supplies, let me know,’” Gager, 39, told ABC News
She has an enormous stockpile of items in her garage that she is ready to give to those in need.
People have been contacting Gager through social media, sending her Facebook messages explaining their situation after the storms. She has been a huge help to many families who could not find assistance elsewhere.
Couponing can be a great way to save money – but it’s stories like these that remind us that couponing can also be a great way to give back!
Four South Carolina residents were arrested for stealing and selling coupons on social media. According to the article from couponsinthenews.com – two males were seen walking into a store UNDETECTED and stealing coupon inserts out of the Sunday paper! They would then shove the coupons into large black plastic trash bags and get in their “getaway car” driven by a husband and wife. They were stopped by the police after about 4 months.
This brazen scheme landed the two male thieves with two counts each of second degree burglary and larceny. When the investigators searched the home of the husband and wife – they found rooms full of coupons. The couple had been selling coupons on social media, and giving a percentage of the profits to the two males. The couple was charged with two counts of receiving stolen goods and three counts of accessory after the fact of the felony.
SmartSource was involved in the investigation of these four individuals, and in a statement said: “This is exactly the result we hoped for when we began our coupon theft awareness campaign last fall,” The company told couponsinthenews.com that “Coupon security is a critical priority and we’re thrilled to see newspapers taking action to combat crime on their watch.”
The best and safest way to ensure that you are not purchasing stolen coupon inserts is by purchasing them yourself through the Sunday paper, Magazines, etc. While selling coupons isn’t a crime, it is smart to be cautious when purchasing inserts online.
Image sources: Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office and Couponsinthenews.com
