Wednesday, August 25, 2010

I'M ON A MISSION....

How do you keep your coupons?  Do you have an envelope in your purse?  A ziploc baggie?  A binder?  A container of sort?  What works for you???

I have tried everything, from the coupon organizer that you can pick up in Dollar Bins or at the $1.00 store (accordian looking holder), to envelopes in my pocketbook, to ziplocs in my car, to a binder, to my ever so faithful shoe box container.  This seems to work well for me, though it is quite big.  The one good thing is that it fits perfectly into the "kid" seat in a shopping cart to make it easier to go through.  I do get A LOT of people staring when I am in the isle looking through it for coupons though (it is quite amusing.

I think I am unlike any other shopper in that when I go to a store, I know somewhat what I am going to get, but I have to go up and down every single isle to see if there are any "clearance" items, and if so, since I always have my handy dandy shoe box with me, more times than none I will have a coupon.  My husband is always asking why it takes me hours to go shopping?  However, when he sees everything I get, he understands.

Except lately I have been slacking and finally I was on a mission.  My organization couponing skills have seem to come to a hault.

My husband praising my coupons (tee hee hee).

Yup, I had to cut through all of these coupons and trust me, there were stacks under the stacks...
All cut and ready to put into my shoe box.
My handy dandy shoe box.

This box is my life.  It has all sorts of savings in there, from grocery store items to Bed, Bath & Beyond, to Children's Place, to you name it, it is in there.  The shoe box is organized by small envelopes with index cards taped in the envelopes and labeled, i.e., Baby Items, Grated Cheese, Bread Crumbs, Yogurt, Razors, etc., which makes shopping much easier for me.  I just need to find the tab and pull out the coupon.

I love my organizer.  What type of organization system do you use???  I can't wait to hear.

3 comments:

HannahAchrissmile said...

I've tried many different ways to organize my coupons too!
So far the best system that works for me (when I actually keep up to date with it!) is:

I write on the front page of the insert what date it is ex 08/08, and put all the SS inserts together in a clear sleeve sheet protector, all the RP inserts together, etc... and file them all in a binder. I have a binder for each month, and the dates in chronological order.
Then I have clear baseball card holders for all the misc. coupons I find, print, dont use etc. These holders then get filed in an accordion style filer, all labeled and ready to go.
When I go on my favorite blogs and look for coupon matchups, they tell me which insert the coupon is in and I just go find it and clip it.
If I'm looking through a flier myself and want to know if I have a coupon for something, I just search for the item in an online coupon database, and know where to find it.
When I go to the store, I take all the coupons for items I'm buying in an envelope, with the items all listed on the outside. Usually I'll take extra coupons along for items that I often find clearanced.
This system works great for me so long as I keep everything up to date!

Sarah said...

I do something very similar to Hannah. I keep every date in it's own page protector though. I don't clip anything I don't have to. I keep my baseball card sleeves in the back of my binder tabbed off by category. I match up the sales with the coupons too. I also print out a list of what coupons were in the inserts each week. That way, when I'm browsing the isle and see a good price on something, I can quickly check to see if I have a coupon. One store I shop doesn't have an ad, so this printed list is helpful there.

Anonymous said...

I use the Pantry Pouch. It attaches to any wall or behind door with a Velcro Adhesive strip. I label coupons by category, watch for items to go on sale then pull them from (Meat, vegetable, cereal, pocket of coupons in the pantry pouch product. Pantry Pouch has sewn in Velcro and Velcro adhesive strip. It is reinforced and incredibly durable. It was awarded Moms Best Award for innovation, design, durability, and organizational feature.