That's what I get . . .

I am a procrastinator, it is rooted deep in my blood I am sure to be a procrastinator and therefore because I am such a huge procrastinator I missed out on some great deals at Albertsons. Now I am not blaming my procrastination for this shopping trip solely on what is rooted in my personality, I actually had a really good reason for procrastinating going shopping. It was my girlfriends birthday this past week and her sister and I decided to throw her a surprise party. I also decided it would be fun to play games with her and her husband on thursday, then go to lunch with them on Friday, then take her to breakfast and shopping for New Moon t-shirts on saturday and throw her a surprise party on Saturday night. Which was very time consuming and so I didn't even have time to sit down and make my list until yesterday morning.

Fortunately for me I am super stocked up on pretty much everything which is why I was totally o.k. with waiting until yesterday to decide what I wanted to spend. I had my list ready and my coupons clipped and headed out to Albertson's yesterday afternoon and unfortunately almost everything on my list was sold out!!! But I still got a pretty great deal on what I did buy. I spent 41.50 and saved $41.64 which equals about a 50% savings, plus I have $15.00 off my next shopping trip in catalina's)

I was pretty bummed on the way home (yes even seasoned couponers like myself get bummed) until I got home and my husband put it into perspective for me. Had I not had any coupons then just for the two boxes of diapers I would have spent $41.05 which is about .45 short of what I spent so it is like I paid full price for the two boxes of diapers and then bought everything else (4 bags of chex mix, paper towels, veggies, onion soup mixes, cheerios and frosting) for only .45!! K I feel better now.

70% Saved at Albertsons!!

As many of you know Friday is my shopping day and today was a very successful shopping trip!! After looking at both the Smith's list and the Albertson's list I decided that I was only going to go to Albertsons today and I SCORED!!! My goal was to spend less than 100.00 and I succeeded. As you can see on my receipt I spent 99.81 and saved 229.23 for a total of 70% saved, NOT BAD!!! Luckily you have 4 days left to take advantage of these amazing deals!

$45.00 at Albertsons - not too shabby!

So I totally scored at Albertson's this week and bought 10 boxes of poptarts (the 12 ct size) 10 boxes of nutrigrain bars, 10 packages of Keebler cookies (my guilty pleasure) and 10 boxes of Rice Krispie treats for a grand total of $45.00!! I saved 122.00 just by shopping the sale and using coupons. Plus for those of you who received the Kellog's insert there is a rebate form where if you purchase 10 kellogg's products then you can recieve a $10 rebate so I will be mailing that in and it will be like I bought all of those delicious treats for $35.00 - can't complain about that!

I scored at Albertsons!!!

I am back Ladies and Gents! I have a teething infant and a potty training 3 yr old right now so I apologize for the lack of posts this week. My goal is to post at least every other day and that was my intention on Sunday but teething babies make it hard to get anything accomplished. But I am back and what a great way to update the blog than with an AWESOME trip to my favorite store . . . Albertsons!!
I bought about 75 items (not counting each individual diaper but the pack as a whole) for 86.30 today, which averages out to be $1.15 per item. Now you tell me where you can buy a big box of pull-ups for $1.15??? I saved about 154.10 for a total of 64% savings!!

How did I do this transaction? I went on the grocerysmarts website last night and made my list. I then printed out and clipped any coupons I was going to use (which I had a ton of!!) then this morning I loaded up the teething infant with my list in my purse and went shopping. From the time I walked into the store till I walked out was about 45 minutes so not bad for all the great items I bought. I also tried the self checkout since I did 4 different transactions and rolled my rewards into the next transaction. If you have never tried the self checkout I highly recommend it. I received awesome customer service by three different employees - they even helped ring up all of my soups so I didn't have to do each one individually! They were so impressed with my savings I handed over my information so they could start saving as well! I love great shopping trips and what a way to start the weekend!

How did you do at Albertsons this week? Leave a comment with your spent/saved and other great tidbits you discovered while shopping this week!

Yesterday I went to Albertson's and used my coupon doublers to pick up some much needed chicken nuggets and yogurt. They also had hamburger on sale for a pretty good price and a coupon for 4 cokes for $9.00. My goal was to spend no more than $30.00 and I did! I bought all of this for 25.41 and saved 50.96 for a total of 67% saved!! I love saving more than I spend!!!

It works!!

I had my very first coupon class on August 8th and one of the ladies that came to my class and ordered her 5 papers and followed what I taught her emailed me this today:

I did it! I did it! I did it!!!

Albertsons. I did a total of 3 transactions.

First Transaction: Spent $31.57, saved $42.19…. BUT I had a $5 coupon that printed out, plus the $20.00 mail in rebate (so really I only spent $11.57 on this transaction) (I also had a $4 coupon, among other coupons that I used, which was earned purchasing some ice cream last week.)

Second Transaction: Spent $3.64, saved $13.72 (I had a $4 coupon that had printed out from some ice cream I bought last week, so I used that on this transaction)

Third Transaction: Spent $1.57, saved $7.43 (I used my $5.00 coupon that printed out of my first transaction.)

Total after all of my coupons/rebates/sale items? Value of items: $100.12, spent (after my mail in rebate) $16.78

THANKS FOR SHOWING ME HOW TO DO THIS!!!!

FREE GROCERIES FROM ALBERTSONS!!

Yesterday I hopped onto the Grocery Smarts website and checked out the sales at Albertsons. I didn't need a ton of stuff because we are pretty well stocked. Right now they have a promotion where if you buy $25.00 worth of purchases then you get $5.00 off your next shopping trip and a $20.00 rebate - essentially making all those items free. Now here are some tricks you need to know when there are these types of promotions . . .

1. The $25.00 that you have to spend is BEFORE you use any manufacturer coupons!
2. The $5.00 of your next shopping order can be used immediately, you don't have to leave and then come back!
3. If you are going to receive a Catalina (the 5 off coupon) you can either do multiple transactions called Rolling or you can do one big transaction and save the Catalina's for your next shopping trip

Knowing these two tricks here is what I did to get these groceries for dirt cheap:
Transaction #1

I bought 10 California Pizza Flatbread Melts on sale for $2.50 bringing the value to $25.00
I clipped 10 $1/1 any California Pizza products making each item only $1.50 making my Out of Pocket only $11.50
I then purchased these pizzas on Friday where Albertson's gives you 20% of any pizza purchase which made each pizza onle $1.00 instead of $2.50
So for $10.00 I got 10 delicious flatbread melts (we had them for dinner - so good!) and I received a $5.00 off catalina

Transaction #2
This transaction didn't have any promotions attached just a few items that I was running low on or was completely out of.
I bought 4 Ken's salad dressings on sale for $1.69
I clipped 4 $1/1 Ken's dressings from the Smart Source making them .69 a piece
I bought 2 3 lb boxes of corn dogs on sale for 3.99 this item had no coupon
I bought 1 Albertson's ranch dip packet on sale for .73
My order rang up to $11.47 after the Albertson's rewards were applied.
I then used my $5.00 catalina which is used like a coupon and it dropped my price down to $6.47 essentially making the dressings and the dip packet and a portion of 1 box of corn dogs free!

So for all of these items I spent out of pocket 16.47 BUT I also received a $20.00 rebate form from the pizza's so after mailing that in and recieving the $20.00 it is like I received all of these groceries FREE PLUS 3.60 BACK!!!

Have questions? Email me and I will be happy to answer any questions you have about couponing or using the grocery smarts website

Smith's is where I go for my staples!

For those of you who do not know this about me . . . I have been using Grocery Smarts since March of 2009 and I started doing Weight Watchers at about the same time. I have lost 25 lbs by following the Weight Watchers and by making sure that every week I find the best deals on my meats, dairies and produce so I have healthy staples on hand! I have found that I love both Albertsons and Smith's produce, I believe they are equal in taste and freshness but Smith's typically has the lowest priced produce and milk and more sales on cheese, sour cream and butter than Albertson's. So every week I stop by Smith's and buy my milk, veggies, and sour cream then whatever fruit is on sale I buy as well. I wasn't going to buy any treats at smith's until I saw that cookies and Rice Krispies were $1.00 after the promo and coupons I had . . . and well I couldn't pass that up!!!

As a side note your savings percentages are never high when buying meat, dairy and produce because it is based on market value.

My savings this week.

I usually only go to one store but this weekend I had time and both Smith's and Albertson's had things I needed so I went to both. I was very happy with both shopping trips as I got things I was running low on. I was completely out of macaroni and cheese - this is my kids favorite thing next to chicken nuggets, so I got a pack of 5. I could have saved even more if I had paid better attention because on the box of macaroni it has a coupon where you can get one free capri sunrise with the purchase of a 5 pack of macaroni - oh well. To put the Albertson's savings into perspective: the max pack of steaks without being on sale was priced at 20.05. So it's like I bought the steak full price and got everything else for .84!

Smith's was my pick this week

Every week I look at both the Albertsons and the Smith's lists to see who has what I want most for the week and this week Smith's had the upper hand - I got all of this yummy food (I know there is a lot of junk in there but hey there is also some healthy stuff too) for guess how much . . . go on keep guessing . . . o.k. I'll tell you . . . I SPENT $132.75 and SAVED $179.25 for a total of 58% SAVINGS. The cashier told me that I broke his record for the most saved that day! Want to know how I did it? I used the grocery smarts website and had the right number of coupons and that equaled lots of food for a little amount of money!