Less Than Half

My partner is a serious grocery shopper. He religiously cuts coupons. When the food section arrives in the paper on Wednesday, he reviews the ads closely.

Then we have this long session where he goes through the ad to identify which items are on sale that we ordinarily buy. He matches the sales with coupons.

Then on top of that, the store where we regularly shop matches competitor's store coupons. Lately, one major chain has been offering $10 off a $50 grocery order, and another offers $5 off a $25 order. Then they run coupons of their own ... which our regular store will match.

Friday is the regular shopping day in our household. I had a long list. We usually go shopping together, but my partner is visiting his mother so I had to do the shopping alone.

I found every item, used every coupon, and had the store clerk give the discounts for the competitor's coupons. I must have had 30 coupons...

but you know what? It made a huge difference. I rang up $166.57 in groceries, and by using the store's loyalty card (which gives the discounts for the sale prices, and brought the total to $115.42), then all those manufacturer's coupons, and the competitor coupon "match" that my partner diligently finds, I brought the total down to $79.81.

I am ordinarily not one to go to all this trouble, but it was well worth it. My partner is very diligent, and his attention to detail and coupon-snipping saves us a ton of money each week. I love my man for many reasons, and this is one of them. We can put the money we might spend on groceries to good use on the house. Lots of maintenance to do this Spring.

Which reminds me... that's where I have been and where I will be this weekend: fixing up that old house I bought. I have made a huge amount of progress, and if everything gets done this weekend as I plan, then it will be ready to be painted and have carpeting installed by the third week of April -- a week earlier than expected. But... I am going on a motorcycle ride on Sunday. Gotta work in some fun among all the renovation stuff.

Life is short: clip your coupons!