Coupons

Now that you've signed up for this amazing service and started getting the newspaper, what do you do with all the coupons? There are a few different ways people file their coupons.

First of all, The Grocery Game makes finding the correct coupon easy. They provide you with the product name, the amount of the coupon, which insert it came in, and the date of the newspaper in came in.

One way to deal with coupons, is to file the entire insert in a hanging file system by date. The nice thing about this method is that you don't have to cut or file your coupons. Before shopping, all you need to do is pull the listed insert, find the coupon you need, and cut THAT coupon. The bad part is that you cannot easily find individual coupons you may need when buying things off the list. Say you need to buy garbage bags this week because, for some reason, you did not stock up on enough to last you until the next sale. How do you find a coupon for your garbage bags? You don't. Nor can you bring your coupons to the store with you in case you find an incredible deal that would be made sweeter with a coupon.

Another way is to cut and file them. There are a couple different ways to do this. One is to file them into categories. This has never worked for me because I have a hard time deciding which categories to use and I can never remember which category I put a coupon under. What's worse is that each category may have tons of coupons in it! It takes FOREVER to find each coupon so I end up giving up on them altogether. Another filing method is to file by brand name. I like this one because it is very easy to find the coupons you need with or without the list. This method takes a bit of time to cut and file but I think the easy of use is worth it. To use this method, pick up a large zippered three-ring binder, a set of alphabetical divider tabs, and baseball card holders. The baseball card holders allows you to file nine brands per page. You'll need quite a few of them. The zippered binder holds your baseball card holders and keeps any coupons from accidentally falling out.

Whichever method you chose, don't be afraid to change if you find it not working for you.

So, get filing and start saving money!