Do I use coupons? HA!!! I use them on the regular to purchase items on sale (AKA loss leaders) at a grocery store that doubles coupons up to 50 cents. Some items I get for free and some I pay very little. I buy my meat at the same store and I bring my own bags which gets me points toward 10 cents off a gallon of gas on my next fill-up. My husband always tells the cashier "Watch this" when I hand over the coupons. I save at least 65 to 70%. I LOVE coupons!

Not me, but my wife does it all the time. She saves around $25 per month by using coupons, and all it takes is about an hour of her time once a month clipping and organizing. $25/mo (often higher) doesn't seem like a lot, but it's $300 in a year, without having to leave the house.

Very few of the items I buy have coupons as I usually only get fruits/veggies/staples. I do try to use coupons for cat food/litter but usually the store brand is less expensive then the name brand with coupon. I do have a few items that if i see a dollar off c oupon for I will clip but I don't go out of my way much to do it.

I clip coupons only for things that I need or use frequently. I often use them in conjunction with a sale. While I am not as fanatical about it as some, it's only me in the house, so I don't buy as much as a person with a spouse and/or kids, but it definitely saves me a lot of money over the course of a year.

We clipped and stockpiled and saved for months and months.. then life got busy. Now, nearly a year later we are running low on a lot of the stockpiled items that we had, so we decided that we needed to start again.

We are again clipping and again getting some great deals. It's all a game to us.. where we can get the best deal... and our stockpile is enjoying getting full again.

I don't get a Sunday paper or many coupons in the mail, but if I did, I would definitely use them more. My printer is also very tempermental, so printing them is hard too. But I do love coupons! =)

But I don't seek them out, generally. I'll skim store fliers for stuff I already buy, but most of my coupon use comes from the ones printed out at the grocery store counter.

yes! i clip coupons like crazy. i don't even buy newspapers, i just head out to the recycling center on sunday and get tons of free coupons.

recently i broke my foot, and my boyfriend and i have spent about TWICE what we usually spend, since i can't get out there and shop the grocery sales like i used to.

I love clipping coupons.

I find the whole sorting, recycling ones I don't want, clipping, filing, weeding, using, process very soothing. It tickles that "organization" need and "pitch" need without a ton of stuff. And it comes with my paper every week.

Granted, I don't actually use many of my coupons, but I do make a point to always use a few (cat litter, dishwashing detergent), and so while the return may not be huge monetarily, it is huge in terms of expense per enjoyment hour. :-)

I'd love to be one of those who saves $100+ on their grocery bills by clipping coupons...but I'm not. Maybe someday, but I haven't yet taken the time to create a system that is practical and will work for my current situation.

I'm not a very avid couponer. I try to use them when I can, but I buy a lot of store brand products, which are often cheaper than name brand + coupon.

For items where I refuse to buy store brand, like facial and bath tissue, I look for sales and/or coupons online.

Though I don't do much coupon-clipping now, I know that it's something extra I can do when times are tight.

Because I don't have kids, pets, or eat much packaged food, I find that most coupons are for products I don't use.

If run across a coupon for something I use anyway, I'll grab it but I don't seek out or spend any time clipping. I shop at Costco and the saving on most all items they stock is better than going to my local grocery with coupons.

When coupons come to my house, I flip through them to see if there is anything that we regularly use, or any fantastic deals on stuff we don't use as often.

As a result, we don't use many coupons. Besides, the amount of savings on name-brand things compared to the store-brand things we buy is minimal if it exists at all.

I struggle with this too- often I find that items bought with coupons combined with a sale still cost more than the off brand. other times that isn't the case. so do I spend time, clipping and hoping to be able to use the deal? sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. More often I don't. Plus, I find that most coupons are for high sugar, high processed food and I am trying to avoid those things. There are very few coupons for produce.

And she is a extreme couponer. Just this weekend she went to CVS, spent over $29.00 and after all the coupons were entered the bill came to 84 cents. Which she paid with the store gift card from the previous weekend shopping trip there getting those deals. She routinely gets products where they are paying us take it. She can sometimes make anywhere from .01 to 2 bucks per item depending on the deal. Sometimes if an item is a little too junk foodie for us we drop that in the Food Shelf box on our way out. And with school supplies being offered for free with deals lately, whatever our kid dosn't need or use we have donated that stuff as well. I remeber a few years ago a grocery store in our area foolishly offered a double coupon day. We went in there spent well over $90.00 and I think at the end the bill was like $3.21. We still have that reciept, it's longer than my arm! Now they only offer double coupons on Wednesdays, and only the first 5 coupons, and you have to spend a minimum of $25.00. To this day I still think she's to blame for that!

To me coupons is another tool for impulsive shoppers. I know in the past I've thought to myself "oh this is on sale with this coupon, I'll buy it." It's actually not a great deal as stores already know in advance what coupons are coming out in circulation and price it in. A lot of times I'll clip the coupons I may need and just wait on using them. If I end up using them great, if not then it's not a big deal because a lot of these manufacture coupons will come around again. I know people get great deals like 20 free boxes of cereal, but I ask myself if I really need 20 boxes of free cereal.

I vary between times of avid couponing to build the stockpile and taking a breather to use what we have. Currently, I'm not going gung-ho for every deay (we're pretty well stocked!), but am focusing on items that we really need and will use or are just too good to pass up (like the $25 in free Kraft groceries at Albertson's!).

From spending hours in front of I Love Lucy licking green stamps for my mom (that dates me, I know) to being a young, broke bride to working 60 hour weeks running a company, I've run the gammit from adoring to abhorring the inocuous cents-off coupon.

Standing at the checkout watching $20.00 disappear from the grocery total is a near spiritual experience but spending a good part of Sunday afternoon clipping and filing, then (1) forgetting the coupon folder at home for several weeks, only to have the coupons expire when I finally get my act together or (2) leaving the folder in the baby seat of the grocery cart after loading the 12 bags of groceries (self-bagged) and speeding off -- clipping has also been a heartbreak ;)

I'm still on the fence about the true worth -- time expended vs dollars saved and will be interested in further comments here on WiseBread. I'm still skeptical after all these years of people that say they load a cart full of $300.00 worth of groceries and end up with the store owing them money after the final tally.

WiseBread keep up the good work!

I'm an avid coupon clipper and it works well for me. I combine deals with sales and rarely have to pay for personal care products. I get snack foods, which I eat in moderation when life gets crazy, for around 25% or less of the regular grocery store price. It takes me a bit of time, but not a lot. I've developed a system that balances usability with ease of maintainability. It's not the prettiest of systems and I don't get all the deals, but it does save me a significant amount of money. And, by stockpiling things when I can, it also saves me time and hassle. I don't run out of personal care or paper products and rarely out of most food items. When I get extras of things I can't or won't use before they go bad, I donate them or pass them on to friends.
Couponing isn't for everyone, but it does work well for me.

Week after week I look at the coupons available in the newspaper and can't find a single thing that I usually buy. (Produce comes from a CSA, meat 1/8 of a cow at a time and bulk grains and staples) Last week, I saw a coupon for Kraft cheese - finally! When I got to the store, the store brand was cheaper than the Kraft - even with the coupon!

I live in an area that doesn't offer double coupons, which is a total bummer!

We're getting a dog soon, so hopefully I'll be able to use coupons for food and treats.

I am able to double coupons at our grocery stores and clip coupons for products I use. If I find an especially good coupon and sale on something I do not use, I will buy it for the Food Pantry. It makes my dollars go much farther, whether for myself or charity.

Hmmmmmmm it seems like one could divide the comments (would never want to divide people!) into several categories. I am of the sort that I use them when they apply to something I want. But we use mostly unprocessed foods, so it is tough to get coupons for those items. LOL I try to find coupons (and yes, I puruse the Sunday paper) for stuff, but rarely has it made much of a difference. And I too have had my share of problems redeeming coupons. I have learned to go on line, but, too, my printer can get cranky trying to print coupons. Would love to be one of those who saves lots of money, but haven't been able to make it work for me.

No clipping - I buy things I don't need if I attach myself by clipping the coupon. I save the intact inserts and pull out what I need if I see a great deal matchup.

I don't typically clip coupons (because I don't get the newspaper), although some of my extended family does. So, I ask them to hold on to coupons for certain products that I use and they don't. I will also use coupons that come in or on a package of something I'm buying. Additionally, I make sure to sign up for coupons for free products if I see a link online. And I ALWAYS make sure to look for coupon codes for online purchases.

I clip coupons pretty regularly. Most things I buy are either on sale, or I have a coupon for it. It really can make a difference.

I print coupons from online sites like MyPoints (where I save money with the coupons AND earn points toward saving even more money), but I only print coupons for items that I actually use and buy regularly.

I'm always on the look out for coupons. I buy a lot of toothpaste and like items for little or nothing with coupons. Coupons help me stretch my grocery budget each week.

In your post you say "apply it when and how it will fit my life" That is the secret to almost anything in life. Use coupons when it works for you and don't when it doesn't. If you value your time or hobbies more than clipping coupons then don't clip. Ramit Sethi at I Will Teach You To Be Rich says making more money is more profitable than saving a few cents here and there. If you read Simple Dollar, Trent explains that every financial decision is a choice we make based on our own lifestyle needs. It makes sense for me to make my own home repairs where I've saved hundreds and maybe thousands of dollars but this may not be a wise choice for someone else. Apply what works for you, when it works for you and how it works for you.

I have a tendency to clip coupons for a while and accumulate "stuff" and then go cold turkey for a while as I use up the accumulated goodness I've acquired.

I clip them if I have the time, but I don't have a good way to organize them so I tend to lose them.

I hardly ever use coupons - but mostly because I hardly ever see coupons for things I buy. We don't have kids, so we don't spend money on much besides food and gas. We also try to buy the least-processed forms of food that we can, and coupons tend to be for things that come in boxes.

~Q

I used to burn through cash like it was gas in an H1. Since getting married to a "dutch", aka frugal, gal, I have since changed my ways. We've always tried to spend as little as possible on groceries and such but haven't used coupons until a few months ago. We subscribed to an online coupon site and had great luck with it. Once we got the hang of it, we canceled our subscription (to save more cash) and simply work the system we learned and altered a bit. We follow these steps below.

1. Get a binder and some baseball card holders. You should be able to get these at Wal-Mart. We ended up getting a box of 100 off eBay.com.

2. Get the Sunday paper.

3. Cut out the coupons for the items we are likely to use. Regardless of brand. Brand loyalty will drain you of precious dollars.

4. Organize the coupons in the binder. use a page for each category. Some ways to do this is alphabetically by brand name or store name or type of food. Do what makes best sense for you and the way you think.

5. Look through the ads for the stores you go to and those that you don't but are near you. We look through the Hy-Vee, Price Chopper, CVS, and Walgreen's ads. Write down the items that look like good deals and then see if you have coupons for them. This will be a bit discouraging at first since most coupons won't get used for a few weeks. Give it some time though.

6. Maximize your coupons with store coupons when possible. Some stores have their own "coupon" program. For instance, CVS has Extra Care bucks. We've had great luck with these. They work like cash but have an expiration date. Certain sale items qualify for these coupons that you can use on future purchases.

7. Hit the stores weekly and buy only the items you would typically buy and that you have coupons for at first, if you don't know what the prices typically are. The only exceptions are items that never have coupons, like meat, produce, etc. If you know pork roast for $1.50 a pound is a good price, put it on your list.

8. Start a list of the items that you buy and the lowest prices that you get them for. This will allow you to make educated decisions on future purchases. We use a spreadsheet for this. To make it easy to look things up, we order them by item type, i.e. Dairy, Meat, etc., and then by item name, i.e. Apples, Eggs, etc.

This system has worked great for us. We've had a few bumps in the road, i.e. forgot a coupon or two, bought the wrong item, etc., but we've stuck with it, saved some dough, and tried some new stores, like CVS. Happy clipping.

I use online coupons and always google "(merchant or product) discount" or "(merchant or product) coupon" when I purchase anything online. I haven't had *much* luck with clipping, but I did get some cheap and tasty strawberries a couple of weeks ago with a coupon.

I clip coupons. I save them. I sort them. I buy Sunday papers solely for the purpose of getting them. I sign up for free ones online. I buy coupon books from school kids. I match coupons to sales at stores. My 6-word obituary will be "I have a coupon for that."
That being said, I try to stick to coupons there's a chance I'll actually use, and I still compare prices when I get to the store. We don't do cereal, so $1 off three boxes of cheerios will get me nowhere. I do stock up when I get a good coupon and am able to match it to a good sale.
I <3 coupons.

Subscribed to the Grocery Game to see what the good deals were. The whole thing didn't really work out for me. I tried getting a Sunday subscription to the news paper so I could get the coupons there, but for like the first month they didn't deliver it to my 2nd-floor apartment so I canceled. Which meant I had to buy a Sunday paper when I thought of it. Some weeks there was hardly anything in it I would use. Same thing for online coupons. I'm a little wary of installing random plugins just to print coupons, and some of these sites would only print one coupon per page, which is a huge waste of ink. And quite often I would buy things that, while I used them, I wouldn't have otherwise have bought if I hadn't had a coupon. In the end I think I save more just by stocking up when things are on sale, using the in-store coupons at HEB, and buying store brands instead of brand names for things I don't care about.

It's kind of hit or miss with grocery store coupons. Sometimes I get around to clipping them and sometimes not. Sometimes I can use them before they expire and sometimes not.

I do however try really hard to use my CVS extra bucks and Walgreens cashback (or whatever they call it).

I will clip coupons if I see them in the mail but do not go out of my way to buy newspapers for them. I find myself searching online for coupons and printing them out more often than clipping anything.

For me, I've found myself going of in spurts...doing it intensely for awhile and then completely abondoning it later. It always seems to be an on again off again sort of thing with me.

i don't use em - the places i shop (chinatown for groceries and dollar stores for household/personal) don't take them.

I only clip coupons on products that I use regularly. I put a higher value on coupons that are in the $.55 to $.99 range since they can be doubled at my local grocery stores. I very rarely clip coupons that require you to buy more than one of an item.

We were $50k in debt and after rethinking our philosophy about money we made the million dollar (pun intended) decision. We will live within our means and, actually live beneath our means so that we can not just get out, but stay out of debt forever. Coupons were a tool that freed money for us to pay off all debt, except our mortgage, in 3 years. I am so passionate about it that I blog too about deals and freebies, like Carrie who was mentioned in the post, but as a means not as an end. Keeping a few bottles of shampoo on hand means I kept the money in my pocket for them and can apply to more important things than shampoo. Okay, I will slowly back away from my soap box...

I really try to just clip coupons for things that I already use, so I am not tempted to buy things just because I have a coupon.

I scan the coupon sites (like coupon.com) and when there is a coupon for something I buy, like Cheerios or Rice Krispies, I print out the coupons until the print limit is reached. Then when it goes on sale (the current trend is for items to go on sale for multiples, like 5 for $10), I stock up. My store doubles coupons up to $1.00 so occassionally I will save a large percentage of my grocery bill. I clip coupons knowing I won't use them all unless the item goes on sale.

You know those people you hear about who get the six turkeys for free at Thanksgiving by working the store giveaways? Yes, I am that crazy. That said, I only buy stuff with coupons that I would buy for full-price, like toothpaste or soap. Sadly, most coupons these days are for over-packaged food products that I will never eat.

Here are my favorite tips:

1. Why buy the Sunday paper when you can get 8 coupon sections from the recycling bin in the garage of the apartment building down the street every weekend without even having to dig?

2. You can combine a store coupon with a manufacturer's coupon for additional savings. For example CVS pharmacy runs a 50 cent coupon for Crest toothpaste in their sales circular. You can stack that with a 50 cent coupon Crest ran in the Sunday coupon section for a total savings of $1.

3. In California gift cards purchased with cash have no expiration date. Gift cards include coupons that offer you the full value of a particular item. So if you receive say, 36 "Redeem for a free half gallon of double-churned ice cream" coupons from your neighbor's recycling bin, well, that's 18 gallons of free ice cream you just got yourself that you don't have to store all at once.

4. If I can buy toiletry items (shampoo, toothpaste, etc) using coupons for a super low price (like less than 10 cents) I will buy as much as I can (even if it's not my brand) and donate those items to homeless shelters. My charity dollars go further and purchases stuff that's really needed.

I am a clipper too! I clipped throughout college because not only was it a relaxing activity on a Sunday morning...but I was poor! Poverty level hasn't changed so when I am not traveling I clip for sure :-)

I've been a regular coupon clipper for years, long before this recent economic turbulence. The coupons are my favourite part of the Sunday paper! Why not get something for less if you can? I feel it's very much worth the time and "effort" it takes to find and clip coupons. My coupon usage has increased recently, especially thanks to the Internet. Now, before I go anywhere to buy anything, I always do a quick check online first to see if a coupon exists for whatever product or service and there usually are some! I use coupons or coupon codes both in brick and mortar stores and at online shopping sites. Even if it's "only" a few cents off here and there it really does add up!

I used to scour the internet for coupons and print and clip, but few stores now take internet coupons. If I see one in the paper for something I use, I'll clip it, but otherwise I don't go out of my way.

i do clip when i can. the problem of course is remembering to bring the coupons with me...its amazing how much one can save...

I have lost too much of my time trying to find coupons that I would actually use. (Time is money too!) Most of the coupons I find are for highly processed, non-nutritional foods that I should not be eating anyway. Even if I do find a coupon for Kraft Mac n Cheese, the generic brand is still cheaper and my son doesn't know the difference. Now if they start making coupons for fresh fruit and vegetables, especially locally grown, then I'll be all over them. In the meantime, taking advantage of my store's discount card and store brands saves me tons of money.

I clip and use regularly.

I love coupons. Last time I was at the grocery store I had $27 worth (of course it was food I was going to buy anyway). I also love the BOGO ones for shampoo and razors.

I find myself using coupons more often now, not because of the economy, but because I now find it fun (aside: I like talk radio now too).

I am definitely not a fanatic though. I don't buy things I don't like/use even if they end up to be free, but I do occasionally buy things that we like, but definitely don't need because it's such a good deal. Case in point: pop-tarts for $1. Bought 10, got 2 free movie tickets and qualified for a $10 rebate. AWESOME. Now, do two DINKs really need 10 boxes of Pop-Tarts? Um, no, but we do like them and we got the Pop-tarts for free plus 2 movie tickets. Who could pass that up?! Also, the look on my husband's face when I unpacked them was so totally worth it.

I'm big on coupons - for years I've kept track of how much the coupons total to each shopping trip... it helps keep me motivated. Sometimes I do accumulate more than I can use and it's a bit of a pain to hold onto it, but recently I gave a box of that stuff to a woman I met at school who had just moved into a homeless shelter to get away from an abusive husband... without coupons and freebies I'd never be able to help out that way.

I use them religiously, but highly selectively. I go for the best bang for the buck with a sale + coupon combo. I don't buy stuff just because I have a coupon - it has to earn it's use!

I tried to use them, but all I ever did was collect them, carry them around for awhile, then remember I had them only to discover they were all expired. So, I finally decided all I was doing was creating clutter and gave it up. It was also hard to find coupons for things like fresh vegetables and whole foods, which is mostly what we eat.

Well, since I've switched to organic foods that really knocked off a lot of the coupon cutting for me. Now I try to look at the products and ask myself "Is it something I would want to consider buying without a coupon?" If the answer is yes, I clip. If not I feel no qualms about passing it by. The deals are there but now I'd rather pay a bit more for quality and impact.

I say a penny saved is a penny earned, especialy when you can get the high-dollar coupons. I use them every single week!

I am not a frequent coupon clipper, sometimes I do clip them when I see a necessity item such as bread in the mailings. However, I find that sometimes coupons will dictate your purchases, I dont need that extra bag of chips, but if there's a coupon for $2 off, I might just slip up and buy it. Coupons can save you money on items that you were going to purchase, however, it may also cause you to spend more, even if those goods are at a discounted price.

I visit sites like www.southernsavers.com that pair the coupons with the sales flyers for me. One common thread in the comments section was that people can't find coupons for produce. Just yesterday I went to Target with my $1 off a pineapple coupon and my $1 off a 1lb or more of apples coupon. Go to http://www.organicgrocerydeals.com/forums/view.php?pg=coupon_generator to print only the # & type of Target coupons you want without the wasted paper.

I have recently started coupon clipping, and am enjoying it so far, for the most part. I follow a couple of great blogs, and have been having an awesome time saving money and getting free stuff.

I used to believe that coupons were a waste of time because they were only for brand name items and processed food. I also do not eat a lot of processed food and I cook all meals at home. But I still find plenty of coupons for things we do like to eat, as well as toiletries and other stuff I hate spending money on. When you stack coupons and take advantage of sales, that's when you save money. And it's better to get coupons for free-I ask my dad for his, and I raid the recycle bin of our rental condo for more coupons. Fred Meyer also has a coupon exchange bin at the front of the store which is great, I can't believe the people who don't look at their coupons and discard catalinas with free items on them(Thanks!)

I still have to do a better job of streamlining - It takes me about three times as long to do a shopping trip now than it did before now that I have coupons because I'm always digging in my organizer looking for a coupon.

Our income has been drastically reduced over the last year and a half, so I feel good about being able to use coupons to stockpile necessities for times when money is tight.