Words of the Week Wednesday

I came across a wonderful blog recently = Frugal Dad. He is very insightful and the content is always really well written. Today he posted a collection of 122 ways to trim your budget. This is an awesome collection of different tips from readers and also from him. There are some on there that I haven't even heard of before!

I thought I would share with you the ones pertaining to food shopping and couponing and then you can go read the rest of the list yourself. You can read the rest of the list here.

Some of the tips include:

• Using two coupons when you buy something Buy One Get One Free
• Sign up with various manufacturers and stores to get coupons and special offers
• Spend about 10 minutes a week cleaning out your coupons and getting rid of ones that are expired. I usually do this on Saturday before I get a new messload of coupons on Sunday.
  
• Don't just rely on coupons from the newspaper. Other good sources include the internet and magazines.
• Don't forget that places like Family Dollar take coupons also. They usually have really good prices on cleaning products and when combined with coupon it's even better.
• Keep your coupons in your car, or better yet, your purse. This way you always have them with you if you come across a great deal.
  
• Knowing each store's coupon policy will save you a lot of headache and help make planning your shopping trip more efficient.
• Know your prices. Knowing what you usually pay on the things you buy the most, will help you know if that sale price is really a good deal or not. Just because it is on sale doesn't mean that it is a good deal. Make it a point to know what the normal price for commonly bought products is at either Walmart or Target. Using a price book (just get a small notebook) might help you find the cheapest. What I did was I kept track of everything on my receipts in a spreadsheet for a while. This told me not only how much I was spending on certain things, but also where I was getting the best prices.
  
• Use couponmom.com or afullcup.com to find out what coupons match which sales at what store.
  
• Don't buy things unless they are on sale. To be able to do this, you need to have a stockpile. When you get a good deal on things, stock up so you can last until the next time they go on sale.
  
• If your store doubles coupons up to 99 cents, you can make out pretty well with those 75 cent coupons. These become $1.50 off and can make your product cheap or even free.
  

**Hints in purple are the ones I added.

I hope you liked this list. Go check out Frugal Dad's blog for even more tips on saving bunches of money. Do you have any couponing or other frugal tips you would like to add to the list. Leave me a comment letting me know.