There are three golden rules to consistently get groceries free or close to it. Follow these and you will save hundreds of dollars every month, starting the first month you put these into practice.
Buy items at their rock bottom price
“Rock bottom” means the lowest sale price for an item. Every item has a rock bottom price and most large grocers cycle through their rock bottom prices. That means some items are at a rock bottom price each week, but that each week different items are at rock bottom. Each item’s “cycle length” or time between rock bottom prices varies, but is usually between 3 and 12 weeks. Over time rock bottom prices change and often for the worse. A quick reference for rock bottom prices in the Minneapolis/St Paul area is here.
Match coupons to rock bottom prices
The shopping lists provided at Pocket Your Dollars do this work for you. The lists highlight key sale items with coupon match-ups so you pay only a fraction of the everyday price.
Buy enough to last
Instead of only buying what you need for the week ahead, buy enough of a rock-bottom-priced item to last until the next rock bottom sale. This keeps you from ever paying full price and from ever paying a mediocre sale price for items you routinely use. Of course spending more than you’ve budgeted just to buy ahead is silly. Instead find a few dollars in your weekly grocery budget and use that to buy ahead. An extra $5 goes a long ways when you put these principles into practice.
Your turn: What lessons did you learn as a newbie couponer?