Couponing Part 2 of 4: File the Coupons

This one took some trial and error for me, but I finally settled on a method that is working perfectly, & I’m excited to share it with you!

I picked up a plastic tub, with a handle, made to store hanging files, at an office supply store (I had a cardboard accordion style one a while back, but it wasn’t sturdy enough and the clasp wasn’t strong enough, so trust me and spend the extra money for a plastic one). I got 4 different colors of hanging folders so I could color code the months, but you don’t have to be that OCD if you don’t want to. Label each folder with the date, make one folder for each Sunday for a 4 month period. So, if you started last Sunday when I gave you the homework of buying 2 Sunday papers, you’ll label your first folder 7/11 and make a folder for every Sunday through 10/31. Make one last folder labeled “Old”. Here’s how your new filing system will work. Every Sunday you’ll take out the inserts from your newspaper, write the date on them, and put them in the folder for that day. The end. Nope you didn't miss the part about clipping the coupons... why spend time clipping coupons you may never use, and what if you don't remember what heading you filed them under, and how much time do you want to spend pulling expired coupons out of your filing system?! No clipping at this stage of the game, just file by date. Could it be easier than that?!


The vast majority of coupons printed in the flyers will expire within a couple of months of when they were issued, which is why I only put the effort into organizing 4 months worth, but just to be safe I hang on to them via the “old” folder through the 6 month mark. So here’s how you’ll rotate your flyers out: If you’re starting now, in November you’ll move all of the inserts from your July folders into the “old” folder and then re-label the July folders to 11/7, 11/14 etc. Then in December you’ll pitch the July flyers and move August to the “Old” folder & re-lable the August folders to 12/5, 12/12 etc. A little tip: If you use a labeling system to label the plastic tabs on your hanging files, like I do, not only does it look nice & neat, the labels peel off easily when it’s time to re-label the folder

In addition to your hanging files, you’ll want to get a 3 ring binder, some dividers with a pocket in them, and some baseball card holders. My dividers are labeled: refrigerated, pantry, deli, baby/health, cleaning, & frozen. I recommend the dividers with pockets because if you don’t have the time to file the coupons away in the baseball card holders, you can just stick the coupons in the appropriate divider and at least that level of sorting is done when you have a minute to put them in the holders. You’ll use the binder to store the coupons you get randomly (you’ll be surprised once you start watching for them all the places you’ll find them) like in the mail, inside packages of products you buy, or from friends who find out you coupon, as well as for the coupons you clip and don’t end up using for whatever reason, and rain checks.

Now that you have some coupons & filed them in a way you can actually find them, tomorrow we’ll get into the nitty gritty of this whole couponing thing with part 3: Finding the deals

Couponing Part 1 of 4: Find the Coupons

Before we get into today’s post I want to preface this series by pointing out that my way of doing this whole couponing thing is certainly not the only way to do it. There are lots of methods, which is partly what contributed to my confusion and the total time suck this thing became when I first got started. What I’m going to show you with this series is the method I devised with the following objectives in mind:


1) The ability to take advantage of the deals that can be had
2) To not spend an exorbitant amount of time on this process… it can take over your life… or at least your Sundays
3) Create a small stockpile of the products we use on a regular basis
4) Save some money

Please notice: saving as much money as possible, getting as many free things as possible, and taking up a new hobby, are not on the list. If those are your objectives, my method will help you get started, but this is sort of the “in moderation” approach, so you’ll miss the mark.

Alright, first things first, find the coupons -

Newspaper: I buy 2 newspapers every Sunday. If you go to wherever you buy your newspapers first thing Sunday morning and find that they’re all out, it’s probably because there’s a die hard couponer who has already gotten to them… lots of (probably most) people who coupon buy more than 2 papers a week. I don’t though for a few reasons 1) I live in a small house and I don’t have the space or desire to store 18 packages of toilet paper & 25 boxes of cereal even if I got them for free 2) to determine how many papers you should buy each week, ideally you would check out which flyers and coupons are going to be in that paper and decide if those particular coupons would be worth the cost of the paper and storing the flyers and frankly, I just don’t have that kind of time in my life, 3) when you’re ready to use the coupons you’ll have to cut out 15 (or how many ever papers you bought) of them… ugh and 4) depending on the store you use them at, there could be a limit to how many of the item you can purchase at a time, in which case you would have to make multiple trips to the store (see objective 2 above). My last little tip about newspapers is that I buy two, not just one, because some of the very best deals to be had are at stores that take 2 coupons on buy one get one free promos (more about that in part 4 of the series) so you have to have at least two coupons for those.

Online: There are lots of places to find coupons online. Redplum.com coupons.com smartsource.com just to name a few. However, to avoid having to store the printed coupons, spend money on ink for my printer (objective 4), and using my time visiting all these sites, I only print out online coupons when I have a specific deal I need them for (finding the deal is part 3 of this series) and am about to head out to pick it up. I will warn you though, sometimes the online coupons aren’t available for very long, so using my method could mean you loose out on some coupons. Also, the vast majority of the time, online sites only allow you to print 2 of each coupon. If you want more than two and have multiple computers in your house, you can print your 2 from each computer though.

Other: You can also find coupons in the stores you shop; most of them will have flyers near the front of the store in a rack. Some stores also have “blinkies”, the coupons in the little machines with the blinking light attached to the shelf in front of the products. “Peelies” are the coupons attached to the outside of the product. CVS has a coupon machine where you scan your CVS card and it spits out coupons. There are magazines with coupons; “All You” is a popular one available at Wal Mart. Lots of places have coupons that print from the register when you check out.

I focus mostly on the newspaper and online for coupons just because it’s easier for me to keep track of what’s available via those sources, but if I’m going into a store to pick something up that I wasn’t planning ahead of time to buy (read: I don’t have a coupon for it *gasp* I can hardly bring myself to do that anymore) then I definitely check the flyers in the front of the store and look for blinkies to try to save at least a few pennies.

Next up: File the Coupons.