That is very impressive to be sure, but oddly stress-inducing for me.

I'll take "The Most Hated Shopper" for $600 please Alex...

I bet the cashiers hate her, and I'd bet double the people stuck in line behind her hate her.

It's perfectly legal, but she's abusing the system. If everyone (or even a significant fraction of everyone) does that, then say goodbye to coupons.

Also, with the rebates, she can't shop like that every trip.

My wife just started using coupons, I'll have to show her this. Sure would be nice.

Alas, this does not work for me b/c I don't really eat a whole lot of processed/packaged foods. I do eat them but not a whole lot.

Apple sauce, cereal, yogurt, oatmeal, and peanut butter are my exceptions that I cannot live without.

As more and more newspapers go the way of the dodo, where will the coupons go? I want to use coupons more, but I don't get the paper and I don't find many online for products I actually use.

Yeah. I have a life, so I can't devote that much time to some damn coupons.

@valsharess1: Online coupons are actually pretty common, though I can't recall the legit sites right off hand. Anyone know?

@TCinIowa: Why would cashiers hate her? They take coupon, scan it, and put in a pile. It's what they do all day already...it's no different.

I get annoyed when people argue and haggle with the cashier about the price of an item (who has no ability to change it), but not when people use coupons. More power to them.

The biggest problem is that I can hardly find coupons for items that I want or use.

Most people won't do this, however, I do see stores limiting coupons on items at some point, as per the manufactures request.

Something like cannot exceed more than 30% off in coupons to your order something like that. I mean I hope this never happens.

Also where does one get coupons for items like meat/vegetables/fruit/milk(non dairy)

where can i get said coupons for those items? I mean that is 50% of my bill there.

Suggestions?

Unfortunately my time is worth more than what I would save using her method.

@nakedscience: Feel obliged to point out that the fact that you've taken the time to comment disparagingly on a blog post about coupon clipping does not speak well to your claim of "life-having." What what.

id hate to be stuck behind her in line...

@MmeSosostris: i can't believe i'm actually typing this but - pwned!

...did i spell it right?

Diningbadger: The biggest problem is that I can hardly find coupons for items that I want or use.

That's my issue. I would use coupons for things I buy, but I rarely find them and I'm not going to spend time looking for them to save 20 cents.

I think a lot of these stories are kind of bogus because these people would not normally buy this stuff. You can go through the paper and find all kinds of coupons and deals and end up with a bunch of almost-free groceries, but are they groceries you actually want, need, and buy on a regular basis? If not, all you've done spent your time getting a bunch of cheap stuff you didn't really want.

@Diningbadger: Same here. Coupons are usually for high margin processed foods, and the majority of what I buy is meats, vegetables and fruits. I could certainly save a lot of money on everything else I buy, but something like 97% is entirely impossible with the way we eat.

She probably spends several hrs doing all this each time and goes to several grocery stores. Who has time for all that?

@rpm773: There are plenty of cashiers out there that seem to think the amount you save with a coupon is coming directly out of their own pocket judging by their attitude.

Nevermind that the store gets the full face value plus a handling fee for each one they, in turn, redeen through the manufacturer. But it's still like, "Oh noes, you can't use that--that item is already on sale!" To which my response is "Like, duh!"

@TCinIowa: I'll assume, for your sake, you haven't been here long. Blaming the consumer is generally frowned upon here (except when it's obvious fraud / stupidity).

I really bet the cashiers could care less. Having cashiered many moons ago, I really didn't give a damn- if I was cashiering for an hour and had 3 customers or 40. Why would they care?

I don't think she's abusing anything. If there are no limits to a system, people are free to use the system however they want. It's up to the store / manufacturers to expressly limit this stuff. What would be considered "acceptable"? 10 coupons per visit? 5?

Couponers aren't abusing the system, they are out there for your use. If you choose not to use them, then it is you who'll be out the extra money.

All the people that complain about it don't realize the amount of time it takes to do it all either.

@nakedscience:

My wife said less and less stores are taking online coupons because they can be photoshopped, altered, etc, or simply aren't legitimate.

@lpranal: "I really bet the cashiers could care less."

Or perhaps they couldn't care less?

Anyway, I think it's a ridiculous thing to do (like I have the time!) but she's not "abusing the system", I do agree.

@MmeSosostris: That is just a lot of damn effort to put in to some coupons.

@SonaliHamlegs: Not really. She must put a LOOOOOOOOT of time into this. She clearly has that kind of time on her hands. That's fine. I, however, and most people, do not. Can you imagine the hours she puts in to save 97%?

I'd have to give up a lot of important crap just to save a few bucks, which in the end would cost me more...

@chipslave: Hey, now! Don't comment disparagingly on coupons!

@valsharess1: I don't know how it is in your area, but I get several bushels full of them in my mail every week. Usually on Tuesdays.

More power to those who can utilize coupons, but most of the ones I see are the "Get $1.00 Off if you buy 4" variety. I don't feel like buying 4 of anything. I know I can store the stuff until I need it, but I don't like the idea of spending 3 times as much just to save a dollar.

@Diningbadger: Same here.

I used to do this until I looked at what I was eating. Most of the food you can get cheap or free from coupons is crap. So throw most of it into the food bank bin.

Do all places just accept coupons like that? On top of promotions? To this extreme point?

I look at coupons cursory, but don't see any for the stuff we purchase. I look at the grocery ads, and will buy stuff that is on sale in a larger quantity sometimes because of that, but 95% of advertised items is stuff we don't buy either. I can't imagine the time it would take to find the coupons for products that we buy.

By the way: they forgot the cost of postage to mail in for these coupons and time & gas to drive to various grocery stores to buy stuff on special in order to get these combined super savings.

I would love to do this, and I actually love to see people gaming the system and getting stuff *that they would normally buy anyway* for free or dang near close to it.
For me, it would entail purchasing stuff I don't eat, don't need or don't use that often.
As a veggie, I shop around the circumference of the store, with few trips down the aisles.
Good for her!

@TCinIowa: Uh oh, it's a slippery slope! If too many people use coupons, coupons will cease to exist, people will have less disposable cash due to higher grocery prices and eventually the economy could collapse. If one very coupon-aware person can do it, the end of coupons is near! We should charge her with a crime to prevent the collapse of the whole system.

Ridiculous statements like that make me wonder how many people have such a loose grip on reality as you do.

@laserjobs: yep, that's the downside. I can't imagine there'd be a lot of coupons for fresh / unprocessed stuff, which is definitely the way to go if you're particularly concerned about your diet. This would definitely rock for college students, though.

you save, but at what cost? most of the coupons are for products who's nutritional values are questionable at best.

I find it interesting how many people are speculating on how much time this "probably" takes her. My g/f uses a lot of coupons, and regularly saves about 50% on grocery bills with coupons + store card. She spends maybe 30 minutes every sunday clipping them out of the newspaper and putting them in her organizer, and I'd really say that's about all the additional time it takes since we look at store ads anyway. At her lousy wage, I'd say she's making a lot more money clipping coupons than she would working the equivalent amount of time. Hell, I don't use coupons since I mostly buy unpackaged, unprocessed fresh foods, and I probably end up going to the grocery store 2x as often as she does.

If you broke it down to hours/savings I don't know if it would be worth the hassle considering this can't be every trip.

@Diningbadger: Yep. Furthermore, I just don't need the 2 - 10 of whatever half of those coupons would require you to buy.

If I was a cashier, I would be watching what she buys with what coupons and doing the same thing.
D*mn the customers behind me.

@Saboth:

Your wife needs to be a bit more competitive in her shopping then. I've never been denied a coupon I got from online. Anyone that says "no", I take my business to another store and get it someplace else.

If it's a legit coupon, SOMEONE will take it.

I have been couponing for a few months now, and have gotten a lot of stuff cheap or free. The trick is to combine manufacturer coupons with store coupons or really good store sales or clearances.

It's true that most food coupons are for processed foods. But you can find lunch meat and sausage-type meat coupons often and for basics like pasta, canned or frozen veggies and fruits, broth, bread, peanut butter, cereal, etc. It's not ALL overly processed junk food.

If you can't find food coupons to your liking, there are plenty of coupons for toothpaste, soap, deodorant, paper goods, cleaning supplies, etc. Use those and put the money you save into buying the fresh foods you have a hard time saving money on.

@nakedscience: But how long would it actually take to cut out coupons? There can't be that many of them.

@Skankingmike:

Read your mail. The junk mail in my area usually has fliers from local stores on in-store coupons and meat specials. Loyalty programs/cards are also a good way to go. I stocked up on frozen pre-packed meat on several occasions this way.

Another good thing to look out for... Stores usually have two varieties of ground meat, in the styrofoam trays, and in rolls. Avoid the foam trays as you're usually paying a good $2 or more per pound for the convenience of having it in a pretty stackable tray with plastic on it. I buy my meat in pre-packed rolls (like how one buys breakfast sausage meat) where a 1lb roll will run me $2.97 per pound for 93/7 beef, vs the foam tray meat will be about 18-20oz of the same beef for $4.50 or more. It's a ripoff.

The big reason we've grown accustomed to this is because the foam trays are usually cut in-store, but many big box stores do not have butchers, or don't pack the meat in store, so this convenience charge has all but become a visual one. If I take the time to thaw my beef out either way, the cost becomes the only factor.

If you shop at Wal-Mart, Target, or any store that doesn't have an in store butcher, you're wasting money to buy your ground beef/turkey in foam trays.

She lives in my town, I'm going to keep an eye out for her

They had an episode of WifeSwap with a family that clipped coupons. Their whole basement was filled with lots of junk it looked like.

@chipslave:

Retired people like her.

@Vanilla5: Good point. I'm squinting at those pictures thinking, No, I don't want any Pillsbury rolls, cake mix, tub frosting, Hamburger Helper or canned soup...that's pretty much all you'll see coupons for.

I want coupons for bakery-fresh sourdough bread, Trappist jam, and sesame seed butter -- not Wonder Bread, Smuckers and Skippy.

@ludwigk: Yep. It's all boxes and cans of processed food stuffs, none of the whole foods on the outside ring of the supermarket. So they're giving away Hamburger Helper and frozen biscuits. Who cares? Did you see the size of her ass?

It is very misleading to present this as if you are actually saving 97%. She freely admits that she had to send away for many of the "rebates" or "coupons" which means previously she had to most likely purchase one or more of each item at regular price.

For instance, you can collect "points" from some packages and when you get enough mail them in for a free coupon, but if takes you five regular purchases to get one for free, and if you add up your postage for all of these "free" items, plus your time, plus the subscriptions to the newspapers required to get many of the coupons in the first place... well it doesn't take long to see the true savings are much less than presented here.

We could all do this little trick if we saved coupons and rebates for a year and then went out and just bought items that we had coupons for the one time the cameras were watching, but that doesn't mean it can be done on a regular shopping trip.

I also notice she was buying all brand names from Era detergent to Bounty paper towels. If Consumer Reports has taught us anything it is that the name brands aren't always better... but they are always more expensive.

A wiser long term strategy is to buy generic brands which can often be half the price or less - no coupon or rebate required. Paper goods like paper towels and napkins can be purchased at a dollar store or you can save your extra napkins during your visits to fast food joints and you will soon find youself with more than enough... for free.

@redskull: Yeah, we're in a rural area so I don't get any coupons in the mail.

@Rectilinear Propagation: for someone to save 97%, you have to put a LOT of time and effort. I use coupons sometimes, if I find any I *can* use, but to go to the lengths she does, I would have to give up half my life.