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Here are some basic tips and tricks to get you started.

Know your store coupon policies. The policies for our local stores are listed here on CMC.
It’s a good idea to carry a copy of the policy with you on your shopping trips. This way, if there’s a question at the checkout, you can refer to the policy.
Get the weekly ad for all of your stores. Grocery store ads come out on Wednesday, and drug store ads come out on Sunday.

Your goal is to match the sale items in the ads to the coupons that you have. By combining a sale with a coupon, you can easily save more than 50% off the regular price of the item. It’s not uncommon to find several things that will be completely free!!

The first key to saving money with coupons is to get multiples of each coupon.

Where to get coupons:

Newspapers
Websites
Online printable coupons
Blinkie coupons — the coupons in the little red box on the shelf at the grocery store

The second key to saving money with coupons is STOCKPILING.

Now that you’ve found a great deal on an item, you need to buy a lot of it. Not just one for now and one for later, but 5, 10, even 20.

This is why you need multiples of each coupon, and it’s also why you’ll see lots of 10 or 20 coupons for sale on Ebay.

A one to two year stock of non-perishable items is best. To stockpile perishables, determine how much your family will use in that time period, and buy that much.
When you are out of an item, you just go to your stockpile and get another one instead of paying full price at the store. This way, you pay what YOU want to pay, not what the store wants you to pay.

Thirdly, buy the smallest size possible.

Many times, when using a coupon combined with a sale, the smaller item will end up being free or being much cheaper per unit. This is the logic behind multiple coupons.

For example — you may normally buy Tide 100 oz for $14. There’s a coupon out for $1 off. You use it and pay $13. Your Tide costs you $.13/oz. However, the 1.6 oz trial size pkg at Target is $1. Using your coupon = $0.00. If you have lots of coupons, you can get your Tide free.

Below you’ll find in-depth information on each of our local stores to help you get started: