1. Clip Coupons for Items You Already Use and Are Interested in Trying
You should mentally divide coupons you clip or print into two main categories: those for products you already use and those for products you might like to try. Let’s take the Procter & Gamble coupon insert for an illustration. Most people use at least one of their products. Say for a razor, you appreciate the quality the Gillette Fusion provides. In nearly every P&G insert, you will find one of those coupons, so you can bank a few dollars in savings. Then there are the products you’re familiar with but seldom use. Let’s say for paper towels, you usually wind up with Scott, but usually within a few pages of the Gillette razor you’ll find Bounty towels coupons. Clip those, and the next time you see them on sale in the store, try them. Your adventurous choice will give you a double discount.
2. Organize Coupons in Category Envelopes
What do you do with these little slips of paper between clipping and buying your product? Most department stores now have miniature folding files with a pocket for every category you can devise, but a simpler (and more economical) method is to grab six No. 10 envelopes. One way to “address” them would be “Non-Food,” “Meats,” “Snacks,” “Cereals, Veggies & Butter,” “Beverages,” and “Restaurants.” The fourth one is obviously a catch-all, and if you don’t use cereal but do use yogurt, for example, you can make that change in the envelope’s name. As you clip new coupons, add them to the back of the envelope so that the older coupons stay near the front. Although the time you have to use each coupon varies (30 days is par for the course), you should wind up with the first-to-expire ones in the front.
3. Where to Find Coupons Online
Coupon sites have multiplied over the last few years, and some charge user fees. However, as you might guess from the name, the simplest and perhaps original site is coupons.com. There, in September 2026, you could find about 200 coupons, and the site showed them to you 10 at a time on a total of 20 pages. You can click on as many or as few as you’d like, and then click to print them when you’re done. They print three to a page, so that, if you wind up selecting four coupons, you wind up cutting some slips of scrap notepaper you can keep by your computer when you’re done clipping those coupons.
Some sites have their own coupon sections and offer you bonus points for printing and redeeming them. MyPoints.com, for example, awards 10 points to your account for each one you redeem. Combine those with points you earn for buying from merchants that work with their site and taking surveys, and the totals can eventually become gift cards or PayPal deposits.
4. Find Out Which Grocery Stores in Your Town Offer Double Savings
Most shoppers have one favorite grocery store they use and one or two others they visit for certain specials or just for a change of pace. If you don’t know already, find out which of your roster of stores will double coupons. Many will double the face value up to $1.00. Also ask whether your store will honor Internet coupons or only the glossy style that comes in newspaper inserts. Often the smaller, hometown grocer doesn’t have the advanced scanner to read the validity mark of an Internet coupon, so the store doesn’t allow them. Larger, chain stores almost always allow them.
5. Watch for Drug Store Freebies
Before the last year or two, you could sort of “surprise” the drug store that offered toothpaste or deodorant for free after you applied its instant rebate. More accurately, CVS, for example, might offer the product on sale for $1.99 and pair that with $1.99 in ExtraBucks, which you can spend there on your next visit, so the net cost is zero. Free is still good, of course, but coupon clippers used to occasionally earn a dollar when they applied a manufacturer’s coupon on top of this deal. These days, though, the corporate folks who design the weekly circulars seem to stay in touch with the available coupons, so they usually mention that deduction in their ad before letting you recoup the rest of the price in their instant rebate program. Every once in a while, though, the smart shopper can still “earn” some coin.
Money Saving Questions and Answers
What is the easiest way to start couponing without getting overwhelmed?
Start with coupons for products you already buy, then add a few coupons for items you are genuinely interested in trying. Keeping your coupon list simple helps you save money without turning couponing into a time-consuming project.
How should I organize coupons so I actually use them before they expire?
Sort coupons into practical categories, such as non-food, meats, snacks, beverages, and restaurants, and place the newest coupons behind the older ones. This keeps coupons that expire sooner near the front so they are easier to find during shopping trips.
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