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COUPON ETIQUETTEArea women describe how to use couponsThe Dominion Post_You’ve got your shopping list. You’ve got your scissors for the newspaper inserts and online coupons.Now what?Man, this is a lot of work.Not really a group of serious coupon-shoppers sayNot if you’re diligent and organized.Christina Piper, of Morgantown, always has three file folders with her when she pilots a cart through a grocery aisle: One is exclusively for groceries.The second is devoted to cosmetics and other health and beauty purchases.The third is general household products, like light bulbs or cleaning supplies.“It doesn’t really take a whole lot of time to do this,”she says. “By Sunday night, I always have all my coupons lined up for the week. I’ve actually walked out of the store not paying anything. People always ask me, ‘How do you do that?”’Clarissa Eggers, also of Morgantown, makes like a rubber band with her coupon-shopping: She stre-e-e-tches her dollars by using coupons to buy toothpaste, toilet paper and disposable razors.Jennifer Short, of Terra Alta, advises shoppers to heed the timeless consumer caveat: Don’t always believe what you see TV“Just watch the sales,” she says. “The ‘average’ coupon-er isn’t going to get $2,000 worth of groceries for $10.”COUPONINGFROM PAGE 1-A■ Do follow the rules. Period.■ Do buy enough to last you 12 weeks if the price is right. That’s\ typically the length of PQthe sales cycle.J ■ Do have realistic expectations about your savings. Shoot for half off, not 90 percent.■ Don't purchase coupons. Some coupon advisers say the industry is trying to shut down coupon-clipping services and eBay sellers. The fine print says it voids the coupon.■ Don’t photocopy coupons. Internet coupon sites deliberately set limits on the number of copies of a coupon a user can print from each computer. Respect that.■ Don't steal coupons. Believe it or not, stories of stolen coupons have been reported around the country. If the coupon is that valuable to you, buy another newspaper.■ Do organize a coupon swap. That way you can get a larger quantity of a particular coupon a legitimate way.■ Do read the coupon closely. Make sure you’re using it properly.■ Do ask for rain checks on items cleared from the shelves. Many stores will let you buy them later at the sale price.■ Don't hold up the checkout line. Have your coupons organized.■ Do plan ahead. If you plan to buy a bulk number of sale items, ask the store manager how to do so in a way that doesn’t wipe out the product for other shoppers.■ Do ask. If you have a question about coupon usage, get permission from the store manager,” Carrie Rocha suggests.■ Don’t take the saying, The customer is always right” to the extreme. Be courteous to store employees.■ Do donate any unneeded items.SOURCE: Jill Cataldo, Carrie Rocha, The Coupon Snippers of MN (MCT)ran at Walmart.All the way back to 1888 it goes, when, as shopper lore has it, the first coupon in the country was issued by America’s venerable soft drink maker, Coca-Cola.Today, the practice, in the slightly clinical, 21st century marketing-parl-ance we so love to toss out there on the blog, is known as “couponing” — or, “Extreme Couponing,” after the TLC cable television show of the same name.“Extreme” is the word for the show, which chronicles the shopping cart adventures and excesses of consumers across the country for whom scissors, coupons and unwavering shopping cart resolve are holy implements in the religion of Commerce on High.“I don’t even like mustard,” glumly grouses one man to the camera, while his spouse gloats over the 62 jars of the stuff she just scored for mere dollars. Sans coupons, it would have been one costly condiment purchase.Another gleefully takes leave to her pantry and cupboards to make room for 1,000 tubes of toothpaste, garnered at a gleaming, coupon-induced steal: The Mother of All Manager’s Specials for the Molars (and other teeth too), as it were.Chidester doesn’t see herself in that neighborhood. “Extreme,” she said, she’s not.“Enthused,” however, she is. For her, couponing in this economy just makes fiscal common sense.Amen to that, Clarissa Eggers said.‘Now I have to buy toilet paper’Eggers is an unabashed, extreme coupon commando from way back. For that, she thanks her extremely frugal mom.“I was a dork who would organize her coupon-holder for her,” said Eggers, who works in medical records at Morgantown Surgical Associates and lives just over the state line in Dilliner, Pa.She does all of her shopping in the UniversityCity, and, during a memorable coupon-fueled run a few years ago, rode the Charmin wave all the way to Two-Ply Nirvana: For just a few pieces of green paper, she acquired a two-year supply of toilet paper — one that’s only just now beginning to dwindle.“I use coupons for basically everything,” she said, “except veggies and milk.”Toothpaste and razors for free are big staples of her coupon efforts.“Last year, I know I saved $3,000 at the checkout aisle,” she said — and that was even better than the $2,000 in savings she clipped her way to in ’09.It helps, she said, especially since she and her husband have had to ride out periods of unemployment over the years.“It’s nice having a stockpile,” she said. “I’m kind of bummed that I’m going to have to go out and buy toilet paper, though.”Trolling for the ‘trophy’ receiptCall it the Holy Grail of Grocery shopping — the pulse-quickening, eye-moistening, “trophy” receipt. You know: The one with, say, $600 worth of items for only $10, because of the coupons.“I haven’t hit mine yet,” F.D. McCormick said, “but I’m working on it.”McCormick, a classified staff employee at WVU, sees it as a mix of commerce and maybe even a (for fan) contact sport.Like most couponers, he doesn’t mind investing time in the enterprise.During a recent shopping excursion, he handed $370 over to the cashier, but saved $100, courtesy of a pass el of careftdly clipped coupons. It was worth it, he said, even if it did almost take five hours.“Groceries have gone up 17percent,”he said. “I want to know how to do this.”‘Shelf-clearing is just rude’So do a lot of other shoppers, according to numbers culled by Coupons.com Inc., a company in Mountain View, Calif., that is the online equivalent of the Sunday newspaper coupon insert.A total of 3.3 billion coupons were redeemed in 2010, the company said, and 332 billion coupons—the shopping cart equivalent of $485 billion—were distributed that same year, by way of newspapers, direct mail and the Internet.Those are already extreme numbers, veteran coupon-clipper Jennifer Short, of Terra Alta, said.Now that show on TLC is making the whole deal even more extreme, she said.Short’s coupon-clipping started 20 years ago as a teenager. Her parents divorced. She lived with her mother, and money was tight.The mother-daughter duo hit the Sunday newspaper and had at it.She’s not a fan of theshow, she said, because she thinks it turns the people it displays into caricatures of commerce — wild-eyed hoarders who are snappish with cashiers while displaying an unredeemable rudeness to everyone else.“Shelf-dearing is rude,” she said. Plus, she said, retail psychology always gets the last word, anywayThat is, if you use your coupons to pay mere cents or a few bucks for 500 of something, then throw 490 of it out because it went bad, you didn’t really save anything at all.“I’ll never use a hundred jars of mustard in my lifetime,” she said, referring to the infamous bulk-buying incident of “Extreme Couponing.”Couponing with careIf you want to reallysave, Short said, simplify. Use your coupons to buy what you use and what you need. No more, no less.“The easiest thing is to watch for the sales,” she said, “and to remember that things do go on sale in cycles. The ‘average’ — not ‘extreme’ but average — couponer isn’t going to get $2,000 worth of groceries for $10.”Know that coupons never apply to meat and vegetables, she said.Also know that you may have to (politely) dig in occasionally in the checkout aisle over whether a coupon can be applied to the purchase.“Yelling at the cashier doesn’t do anyone any good,” she said. “Ask to speak to the manager, if you have to. And if that doesn’t work, call corporate.”Clarissa Eggers pushes her cart toward the front of the SuncrestTowne Centre Kroger.SOURCES: Coupons.com Inc. and The Dominion PostCOUPONING GLOSSARYNew to coupon shopping? Here’s a look into the lingo to getl you started:KqSS: Refers toj the Smart-Source coupon insert in your paper.RP: Refers to the RedPlum coupon insert in your paper. Formerly known as Valassis.PG: Refers to the Proctor Gamble insert in your paper. Normally found only once a month.ECB (EXTRACARE BUCKS): CVS cash” earned on certain purchases. Prints out at the bottom of your receipt.RR (REGISTER REWARDS): Walgreens cash” earned on certain purchases. Prints out separately from receipt.CAT OR CATALINA: Coupons printed out from the Catalina machine next to the receipt printer at your stores. Sometimes found with red borders.PEELIE: Coupons found on packages at the store.BLINKIE: Coupons found from the blinking” Smart-Source machines in the store aisles. Red machines attached to the shelves.MIR (MAIL-IN REBATE): Rebates sent in the mail, usually accompanied by a CRT (Cash register tape) and POP (proof of purchase).QUALIFIER: Items required to submit a rebate (i.e. CRT and POP).ENVIE: Envelope.SASE: Self-addressed stamped envelope.SCR: Single Check Rebate, Rite-Aid’s rebate program.ESR: Easy Saver Rebate, Walgreen’s rebate program.OOP: Out of Pocket. The actual amount of cash you pay.WYB: When You Buy. Term found on some coupon offer. BOGO OR B1G1: Buy One, Get One (usually) Free.YMMV: Your Mileage May Vary. Coupon and rebate policies vary from store to store.SOURCE: QponCutie.comJason DeProspero/The Dominion PostClarissa Eggers looks through her large binder of coupons before entering the Sun-crest Towne Centre Kroger recently.NEWSfMnmantnw/n Hnmininn Poet Aiiniict07 901 1 Pn A D/lnrnan
Newspaper Details
Morgantown Dominion Post
Morgantown, West Virginia, US
Sun, Aug 07, 2011
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
USA 04 Jan 2024
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