We’re excited to announce the three winners of the $100 gift card from Sam’s Club. Each winner gave us a great food shopping cost-saving tip. Here they are:
Katrina in Wisconsin recently traded in her coupon expandable file for a zip-up binder with clear pockets. Each coupon is filed alphabetically by brand (Duracell and Energizer under D and E rather than B for batteries). That way, when she sees a sales circular, she can quickly flip to the right page to not only get the cost savings from the sale but from the coupon as well. She stores her calculator and pens in the binder too.
She keeps the binder even more organized by saving three places for shopping trips: “This Trip” (where coupons she’d like to use go, “Refile” (for the coupons that aren’t used because she found a better deal or the item wasn’t there) and “Checkout” (for the coupons she’ll soon be handing over to the checkout person). Using this method, Katrina recently bought eight boxes of cereal and crackers for $6.
Tina from Arizona has found a way to save even more on boneless cuts of meat that are on sale. She’ll take the meat to the store butcher, and ask him to either grind it, cut it into stew meat, or slices. She says it’s a free service at groceries few people take advantage of, and well worth the few minutes it takes because pre-cut meat is more expensive. She also buys beef and chicken in bulk, takes it home and separates it into 1-pound freezer bags to cook later.
Karen in Colorado plans her meals before shopping and shops seasonally, which gives her the best fruits and vegetables, and also the most economical ones. But her big cost-savings tip is to create an Excel spreadsheet that tracks and compares the costs of regularly bought items from store to store. She’s found that some items differ from 10 cents up to several dollars in different stores.
Thanks to the winners for the great tips and we hope you enjoy your shopping sprees from Sam’s Club! Make sure you check out the Sam’s Club cooking club online for more cost-saving advice at Sam’s Club.
Alison & Shannon