Thursday, April 23, 2009

Organizing Coupons

This is a picture of the zipper binder that I keep my coupons in. I'm a coupon clipper, but I am by no means the Queen of Coupons. You know those you see on TV who buy a cartload of groceries and only pay $4.62. That just never happens to me, but I try my best to match up coupons to sales. I take my binder with me to the store if I come across a good deal on an item and I can quickly check for a coupon. I have a Kroger near my house and usually shop there. They double coupons up to .50. So a .50 coupon will become a $1.00 off and I like that.



Now for a peek inside the binder. I have an alphabetical listing of general products in the store and the aisle they are on if I get stumped and can't find something. Next I have an alphabet index that I use. I have tried various ways of organizing coupons over the years and found that by filing them by the first letter of the product name made it much easier to find when I'm in the store.

I use baseball card holders to put my coupons in. I try and make sure the product name and the expiration date is easily visible. It requires some creative folding sometimes. Wal-mart carries the baseball card holders.


I admit that it takes some time to keep this organized and occasionally I'll fall behind with the "stuffing" part. But over all this binder system has saved us quite a bit of money over the years at the grocery store and drug store.


Also, another tip: If you have a coupon organizer put your name and phone # on it or in it. I've had the store call me and tell me my binder was there. I had left it in the cart I used and at checkout they had bagged my groceries in the cart in front of me.


6 comments:

  1. Very neat idea!! I am sure I would use a LOT more coupons if I kept them organized like this, and could find them before they expire!! Right now my "method" is, when I find a good coupon, I stick it in my wallet with my debit card so I won't forget to use it. But it gets messy quick!!

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  2. Thanks for this post, Joy. As frugal as I try to be, and I truly do, I have never been very good with the couponing. For one thing I buy so many "store brand products" that don't have coupons. But, there are a few brand name products we really like and I do purchase and I need to get better about this.

    Thanks for the photos. I don't quite understand what you meant by stuffing the baseball card holders. That isn't the Alphabetised tapped sheets you show is it? Hate to be so dense!!

    Susan

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  3. I purchased the alphabet tabs separately and then put a couple of baseball card holders sheets behind each letter.
    By stuffing I mean actually sliding the coupon into the little pockets. I put one coupon per pocket unless I have duplicate coupons then they go in one pocket together.
    I find this easier than accordian files, I would miss coupons sometimes when they are just all in there together. Doing a binder is better for me visually to see which coupons I have. Hope this helps. ♥ Joy

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  4. I am not good at couponing either. I never thought about those baseball card holders! I have them here too. Right now I'm using one of those cheap plastic photo albums, but there may be several coupons in one section, and I end up not seeing some and forgetting about them. I really want to get better at couponing than I am, so thanks for another idea!

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  5. I just realized one of the pictures didn't download when I published before so I added a picture of one of my pages. Joy

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  6. I don't do a lot a couponing, but I am always inspired to be more frugal by those who do couponing. I saw someone in the store the other day with her coupon binder, and her precious husband was right in there with her. I loved it. Thanks for posting this.

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