Another Shopping Victory at Walgreens

I guess you could say that I am addicted to getting good deals. I just can't stay away if I can get things for practically nothing. I had a couple great trips to Walgreens this week and walked away with $153.82 of merchandise for only $16.44. I just kept rolling over my register rewards from one purchase to another. Combining those with coupons that I clipped from the Sunday papers or got online, I was able to get most things for next to nothing and have $2.50 in register rewards left over for my next purchase. Thank you Money Saving Mom for posting the deals and links to printable coupons.

Here is a list of all the items I was able to get:

• 3 Got 2 B Spiking Glue gels
• 1 Got 2 B flat iron smoother spray
• 2 TRESemme Shampoos and 2 Tres Semme Conditioners
• 2 boxes of Bandaids
• 1 box Neosporin
• 1 Nivea body wash
• 2 Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower Cleaner kits (each a $20 value!)
• 2 boxes Bayer Quick Release
• 7 boxes Ecotrin 45 count asprin pills (thats 315 of the 500 I need for our long term food storage/emergency prepardness stash and they were a money-maker item for me!)
• 3 1lb boxes of salt (thats 3 of the 12 lbs we need for our long term food storage)
• 1 roll scotch tape
• 3 packages wrapping paper
• 10 packages instant pudding
• 4 packages jello
• ...and 2 carmels, not pictured (I needed something to keep me going! They got eaten before the picture was taken :)

Just a couple of notes on Walgreens--You have to have at least the same number of items or more than manufacturer coupons you are using, and Register Rewards count as a manufacturer coupon instead of a store coupon. Therefore, if you have a coupon for each item in your cart and register rewards to use as well, you need some filler items. I have found that the little packages of pudding work great--they are cheap and I can use them for our food storage. Also, register rewards can not be used to cover tax, so you may need some little items to get the price up enough to use register rewards (ex. your subtotal is $4.59 but with tax it is $5.15, you can not use a $5 register reward until the subtotal is over $5).

The actual pre-tax total for my purchases was $8.92. The other $7.52 was actually tax. That is one of the annoying things about Walgreens--they calculate tax based off of the price of the item before you use coupons, while some other stores do it on the price after you use coupons. I could have saved almost $8 more if they did it the other way. Sigh. It was still a very good week. We are now well stocked up on Chris' hair gel, my shampoo and conditioner, bandaids for our emergency kits, and many other things.

3 great shopping trips

It has been awhile since I posted anything. That's what happens when you go on spring break. I have a few deals that I've gotten in the past couple of weeks that I wanted to post. I'm not going to do the break down since these deals have past, but they are still worth noting.

I made a quick run to Target between our trips to San Diego and Utah during spring break. It was a very productive little shopping trip. I only needed to do 2 transactions, and I got everything in the picture for $0.88. Retail value for everything was $17.28 making it a 95% savings.

This past week I had two very good shopping runs. The first was to Walgreens on Earth day. I got the extra bonus of getting everything 15% off plus my coupons because of the Earth day celebration. I only spent $8.32 for my purchases here, plus I have a $2 register reward left over for my shopping trip tomorrow to Walgreens (and let me tell you, it should be an awesome trip with some of the deals that I've found). The retail value of everything was $45.76 making it an 82% savings.
This last trip was to Smiths this week. I took my husband along with me, which was fun showing him all the deals I was getting (it's so much fun sharing my shopping excitement with someone else). I thought that I did pretty well getting everything for $21.86. It was a 60% savings over the retail price of $56.04. Considering I had 27 items, I paid on average $0.81 for each item. That helped stock up our food storage a little bit more. We are getting on our way to our 3 month supply of things we commonly eat, and slowly working on the year supply of basics. It's never too soon to start preparing for challenges that life may throw at us.

Cheap Diapers and More at Walgreens

It's been a good week for me at Walgreens. I got these packages of diapers for $2.50 each. Combining those with register rewards on other purchases, this trip cost me hardly anything. FYI on Walgreens couponing--you cannot use more coupons in a transaction than number of items you buy, so if you are planning on using register rewards and have coupons on all your items, you must get an additional item to use the register rewards (it acts like a coupon). Hence the reason I had to get the little pieces of candy in Transactions 2 and 4. Here is the breakdown (for simplicity's sake, I'm leaving out sales tax):

Transaction 1:

1. Colgate Total Advanced Toothpaste $3.49 - $0.75 MFG (SS 3/15) = $2.74

2. Get 3.49 register rewards on toothpaste purchase towards

my next transaction (essentially I made 0.75 on this purchase!)

Transaction 2:

1. Walgreens Diapers on sale for $4.50 - $2.00 Walgreens coupon* = $2.50

2. Oust Surface and Air Sanitizer for $2.99 - $2.00 MFG (SS 3/29) = $0.99
3. Carmel square for $0.35

4. Use $3.50 register rewards from transaction 1 on this purchase:

Total: 2.50 + 0.99 + 0.35 -3.50 = $0.34

Transaction 3:

1. Colgate Total Advanced Toothpaste $3.49 - $0.75 MFG (SS 3/15) = $2.74
2. Get 3.49 register rewards on toothpaste purchase towards
my next transaction (essentially I made 0.75 on this purchase!)

Transaction 4:

1. Walgreens Diapers on sale for $4.50 - $2.00 Walgreens coupon* = $2.50

2. Glade Lasting Impressions Kit $5.99 - $4.00 MFG (SS 3/29) = $1.99

3. Easter cream egg candy $0.39

4. Use $3.50 register rewards from transaction 1 on this purchase:

Total: 2.50 + 1.99 + 0.39 - 3.50 = 1.38

Grand total spent for the day = 2.74 + 0.34 + 2.74 + 1.38 = $7.20

But that's not all ... there is a $2 Walgreens rebate on the Glade and a $1 rebate on the Oust. Figuring that in, I essentially only spent $4.20 plus tax on all this stuff. I love days like this!

*To get the $2 Walgreens coupon on their diapers you need to go to the pharmacy counter and ask them for their "$50 in great savings book." The coupon is inside, and they usually don't take these ones from you when you use them, so you can use them again and again :)

Mmmmmm...Ice Cream

Okay, I simply cannot pass up a good offer for ice cream. It just makes life a little bit better. Mark your calendars now for Free Cone Day at Ben and Jerry's on Tuesday April 21 from noon until 8pm (http://www.benjerry.com/scoop-shops/feature/free-cone-day/). And if that wasn't enough, Baskin Robbins is having 31 cent Scoop Night on Wednesday April 29 from 5-10pm (http://www.baskinrobbins.com/Spotlight/31CentScoopNight.aspx). That's 2 cheap date nights or outings for the entire family. Enjoy! I know that I will.

Boston Contact Solution

For my fellow gas-permeable contacts wearers out there, Target is having a great deal this week. Their Bausch & Lomb Boston Simplus® Multi-Action Solution is on sale for 2 for $13 ($6.50 each). Combine that with a printable coupon here http://print.coupons.com/couponweb/Offers.aspx?bid=alk090331100350vnottvuw&pid=13306&nid=10&zid=iq37 and each bottle is only $5.50. They are normally priced at $7.96-$8.14 at Target and Walmart, so this is a 30% savings. You should be able to print the coupon twice (I've been saving these for a couple of months, so I had four to use). Depending on the Target you go to and the sales associate you end up with you might have to do separate transactions per coupon used, or you may luck out with one that actually understands printable coupons and lets you use them in the same transaction. This is a great stock-up deal for an item that, if you are like me, you have to have (my opthamologist made me promise NEVER to use the no-name brand of contact solution -- it builds up really bad on the contacts and caused me lots of problems a couple of years ago)

Bolt DVD

This is a last minute deal that I wanted to let you know about. I found this on the Shop Smart in Vegas blog on Saturday (I check it often; she finds great deals--here's her link: http://www.shopsmartinvegas.blogspot.com/). It is for the Bolt DVD. There is a $5 printable coupon here: http://recp.mkt41.net/servlet/MailView?m=32103131&r=MjE0MDIyNzA2OAS2&j=NDY2ODI3MzcgS0&mt=1 and a $4 rebate here: http://ronzonismarttaste.newworldpasta.com/bolt/bolt_rebate.cfm. For the rebate you just need to purchase a thing of pasta from one of the participating brands, which you might have already done a couple of weeks ago if you hit the awesome sale at Smiths. The DVD was on sale at Target last week for $15.99, which essentially left me with a pricetag of $6.99 when I get my rebate back! I don't know if it is still on sale there, but it might be somewhere else, and $9 off in addition to a sale price is great. You'll have to hurry, though, because the printable coupon expires tomorrow 3/31/09

Hasbro card games

I sometimes bypass some of the different inserts in the Sunday paper, so I can go directly to the coupon booklets and ads that I have been anxiously waiting for all week, but this morning I took some time to flip through other parts of the paper. Low and behold as I opened up the first page of the USA Weekend booklet (the cover article on Secrets to a healthier family--9 money saving tips caught my attention) there was a coupon for B1G1F on Hasbro card games. Sweet! It's never too early to start stocking up on stocking stuffers (try saying that fast 5 times) or have a present or two on hand for birthdays. Hurry. This coupon expires on April 12th.