I thought I would explain to you how I clip and organize my coupons! I have a way of doing it that I feel is fast, easy, and organized. I use to save each insert and not clip them until I needed a coupon out of them. I have found an easier way. I found that not clipping them would just leave me a messy pile of inserts later as more and more coupns were individually clipped from them.
Here is my Sunday ritual:
1- I usually get my newspapers every Sunday, depending on your area try to get them early in the morning!
2- Go home and pull out all of the inserts from each newspaper. There will be a Red Plum, Smart Source, and some weeks an extra insert or two such as General Mills. (Keep a look out for those). I recycle the newspapers. I sometimes will keep some of it for my kiddos to do their art projects on them as well as carving pumpkins.
3- Start out with one type of insert. So let’s say Smart Source first. Take your pile of Smart Source and find the “center” or somewhere near it. Open it up and lay it in an open area (you will need a lot of space).
4-Now do this with the rest of the Smart Source pile. Make sure each insert is opened to the exact same page.
5- Take one page from each of the opened inserts (make sure they are the same pages) and staple the coupons on them. Make sure you staple every coupon front and back and staple over the PICTURE, NOT on the barcode.
6- Now you cut out each of the stapled coupons. I use a scrapbooking blade and a cutting board, this is what I found to be the easiest for me. You can just use scissors.
7- This will leave you with a stack of the same coupons stapled together. Continue to do this with every single page and then do the same with the Red Plum, but make sure you separate all of the Red Plum clipped coupon stacks from the Smart Source coupons. This is so that if I refer to something such as 9/11 RP you need to know where to find it and if you have all the coupons together you won’t know what coupons were from which insert.
8- So now you have all your inserts coupons clipped. I leave them stapled together. This makes it so much easier when at the store so I don’t lose random coupons. Let’s say you have 8 newspapers. Then say you want to use 2 out of the 8 coupons you can just pull them off slowly, it’s really easy. Or say you want to use all 8, then you can just hand the stapled stack to the cashier and yes, they will accept them stapled together.
8- I use a regular Binder no zipper nothing fancy! I use dividers that have the date and page protectors for the inserts. Each page protector says which insert the coupons are from. When I refer to something saying 9/12 RP you know exactly where to find it!!
9-I have crates in my garage that I store the coupon filled ziplock bags in. On the front of the crate I put a label with the month. So that means in each crate you will have 4 weeks of coupon inserts so if there were two inserts in every paper that month then you will have 8 ziplock bags filled with coupons.
I have found that this is the easiest way to organize the coupons because you can easily find the coupons if you are using my lists. It is more organized and a LOT less messy then having stacks of cut out inserts. If you’ve been doing it this way you know how messy those inserts get after clipping a few coupons out of them!
BTW- I pull out my FAVORITE coupons, the ones I know I am going to use or need to use and add those to my coupon binder so I can have them at the store.
am staring to coupon but am having a hard time finding cupons i only have the few i get by mail… where can i find more free coupns?
Finilaly some one who I can ask some questions. I am a beginning couponer. I have some questions that I wish I could find answers to.
Such as,1/ If I have to different coupons that say BIGI can I use both coupons and end up gettng the item free?
2/ One coupon per purchase, Can I use one from on merchant and another coupon from another merchant . I know these questions probaly sound stupid but I am not getting this couponing very well. I do not understand how people can get so much on so little.
Thank you
Hope to hear from you
Julie Jurgensen
Julie,
I’m glad you found us!!! You can use 2 BOGO coupons only if they are different kinds. For example: a manufacturer BOGO with a, in store BOGO, keep in mind not all stores allow this stack. Make sure you read the coupon policies for the stores you shop at and always take a copy with you to avoid problems. You can also do this at stores like Walgreens and CVS when they have a BOGO sale so you will only use one coupon.
Usually that small print “one coupon per purchase” mean one coupon per item purchased, so if you are buying 10 and have 10 coupons you can use one coupon per item. Again, make sure your store allows this and that the coupon doesn’t have other limitations, like most P&G coupons do (limit 4 like coupons per transaction) You don’t sound stupid at all, we are all newbies once and it’s great to have someone to ask questions to 🙂 Keep in mind that couponing needs a little time and patience and you need to get used to cycles. Everything is not on sale at the same time that’s why stockpiling is a good idea. Also, if you are referring to people on a certain tv show, don’t forget that is “reality tv” and scenarios are usually crazy, exaggerated and unrealistic. I save lots of money with coupons and spotting sales so don’t get discouraged! It is worth it!
Hope this helps, let me know if you need anymore help!