Sisterly Savings

Here are a few of my favorite sites/tips that offer some great information on Saving at the Supermarket that can help you as you start on your moneysaving journey.


1. Be sure to plan ahead before going to the grocery market:

Check your local sales ads and favorite sales blogs before making your grocery lists out to see what’s on sale.

2. Gather/Clip your coupons:

Match up your coupons with the sales. There are plenty of sites that do the matching up for you:

Coupon Mom
Becentsable
The Grocery Game

Or print coupons online:

Coupons.com
Smartsource.com
Coolsavings.com
Boodle.com

(Try and go to markets that double the manufacturer coupons to double the savings! )

3.Try the store brand instead of the name brand items.
Believe it or not, sometimes there really isn’t a difference other than the price. For instance, I actually prefer the Pathmark brand of loaf bread to stroehmann bread as it is so soft and fresh!

4. Check unit prices per size vs cost.
This can sometimes make a really big difference in derterming whether the price is good for the value! More doesn’t alway mean better savings. Stay informed and you’ll save more.Do you know the difference between an item price and a unit price? If not, you can get more details here.

5. Buy your meats in bulk family packs and separate into smaller packs for freezer storage.

6.If an item is on on sale for example 3/$5, you don’t always have buy the full 3 items unless stated “You Must Buy 3″.
Example: That pasta that is advertised at 3/$5 is really only $1.66 wyb buy just 1.

7.If an advertised item is out of stock, get a raincheck! Most stores will issue you a raincheck for the sale price so that you can the item for that price.

A few more tools to help guide you as well!

Newbies can start here with HCW’s Couponing 101 article.

Track all of your rebates with an Online Rebate Tracker .

Start a Grocery Price Book .You can download and print your own. ( I actually have this spreadsheet!)

Download a Grocery Savings Tracker and a Stockpile Calculator here to help keep you aware of your savings and needs.

Do you have any ideas or tools that you use?

Each Thursday I will post a small tip and/or trick (such as the small banner above that I made in about 5 minutes!) that you can implement into your blog to spruce it up or make it better. I will do the research and then lay it all out for you to be able to understand. Just remember, I am NOT a Web Designer by any means (its tough work!!) and I am learning along just as you are! I am only a novice taking it 1 step at a time and I encourage you to make sure that you fully understand the instructions before taking it on:)

We’ll talk about Blog Templates, Widgets , Helpful Generators as well as learning How to make Banners , Headers & Avatars . If there is anything that you would like to learn to do, please send an email my way and I’ll try my best to implement it for you. Again, please note that I am teaching myself as we go along with this series so any helpful advice would be greatly appreciated as well!!

Any tips that deem necessary to present to you the final look, I will post on a Test Blog for you to view.

If you have any questions or don’t understand my instructions for any of the Blog tips, please feel free to ask. I’m sure you may not be the only one with the same question and I may not have explained something in its entirety or clearly:)

Blogger Sisters, get your toolbelts ready!! The 1st post to this series will begin next Thursday which gives me time to do some research!!

Cinemark Summer Movie Clubhouse

Get 10 Weeks Of Fun Films For the Kids for only $5 with a different movie every week! All 10 movies can be purchased in advance for $5, or can be purchased separately at the box office for $1.00 per show. For more details or to see participating Theatres near you click here.

With our financially economy at the present moment, needless to say that buying high priced DVDs, video games and CDs are a careful expenditure to say the least. My one daughter loves CD’s and the other one loves video games but we really don’t have “budgeting money” put aside for their hobbies which can range from $20 for a single CD or $30 for a new game which in about a month they are already tired of and a new artist has come out by or the newest game craze!

Which is why I’m glad we’ve discovered Swaptree which actually helps you save money! At Swaptree you can trade the books, DVDs, video games and CDs you have for the ones you want, for free. You simply list the items that you have to trade and the items that you want and Swaptree’s two and three-way trade algorithms instantly shows you all of the items you can receive in trade.

With Swaptree, parents/kids can just list what they are no longer interested in and trade them for the items they want now.

Swaptree even makes the mailing process simple, by providing you with a postage label that can be printed right from your computer, so you never have to go to the post office.

Swapptree, not only saves you money and allows you to discover new authors and artists, it is also environmentally friendly by reducing consumption and promoting sharing and recycling (good for going green!).

I just recently came across a great free website with a unique idea on coupons. Shortcuts.com (a service of AOL) is a totally paperless and free online coupon service that links coupons electronically to your grocery store loyalty cards.

At this time there are only selected participating stores such as Kroger ( which owns Ralph’s, Fry’s, King Soopers, etc).

The concept is to go and choose the coupons you want and they get linked onto your store savings card so you don’t have to clip them or forget about a coupon! I wish they had ShopRite on their list!!

You can also view the online store circulars to match the coupons with the sales as well as a on line shopping list for you to create all in one place! Talk about convenient! I can’t wait till they get to my area!

Since none of the stores listed are in my area, I’d love to know if anyone has tried this service before? If so, let us know how you like it or if it has helped you!