Saving and Giving has moved to savingandgiving.net! I hope that you'll all join me over at Saving & Giving's new home. I'm planning some fun giveaways to kick things off. I'm still working on the site, and I'd love to hear your input. Let me know which features you want me to keep. You can email me at savingandgiving@gmail.com. If you're currently an email subscriber, you shouldn't see any change in your daily email newsletter. I switched the feed over so that you should continue to receive your daily updates.

Saturday, April 4, 2009

CVS Trip 4/4

Merchandise Value: $66.65 (sale prices)
Paid Out-of-Pocket: $5.89 plus tax (over 91% savings)
ECBs Earned: $10 for next week

I made one last run to CVS today to take advantage of the coupon that I was emailed. I also printed my quarterly ECBs from home, so I had those in-hand too. I was pleasantly surprised when one of my favorite cashiers told me that I could take advantage of any of next week's deals that were already tagged! I hadn't studied next week's sale flyer yet, so I just kept my eyes open. And I'm glad I did!

Next week is another baby rewards week. All of the Huggies products are buy $25 - get $10 ECBs back. Yahoo! The only diaper-type products we buy now are night pull-ups, but those were included. They were $10, and the wipes refills were $5. I still had 4 of the $5 off Huggies coupons, so I was THRILLED!!! (These coupons are no longer available for printing.) Here's what I got.

Transaction #1:
1 Huggies Night Pull-Ups $10.00
3 Huggies wipes refills $5.00 each
1 Peeps candies for the preschool party $0.96
Merchandise Total: $25.96

Coupons Used:
- $5 off any $25 purchase email coupon
- $5 off Huggies coupon (wipes) x 3
- $1 off Huggies Night Pull-Ups coupon
My receipt shows another $5 coupon, but I have no idea what it was!

Total Due: -$0.04 (Yep - That's a negative!) + tax ($1.40)
ECBs Earned: $10 (Huggies)

Transaction #2:
2 Lady Speedstick 24/7 $1.99 each
1 Suave Kids Shampoo $1.99
2 All Small & Mighty Detergent $4.49 each
1 Glade Sense & Spray $5.99
1 trial size AquaFresh $0.99
2 Dr. Peppers $1.59 each
Merchandise Total: $25.11

Coupons Used:
- $5 off any $25 purchase (My CVS manager lets me use this more than once!)
- $0.75 x 2 Speedstick 24/7 from recent newspaper inserts
- $1.00 x 2 All coupons from All You Magazine
- $1.49 Aquafresh coupon (old printable)
- $1.59 x 2 Dr. Pepper coupons I got in the mail
- $4.00 Sense & Spray from a recent newspaper insert
- $3.00 Suave freebie coupon I got in the mail
- $4.00 ECBs from previous weeks

Total Due: $1.44 plus tax ($1.17)
ECBs Earned: $1 (Glade Sense & Spray)

Transaction #3:
2 Ziploc Freezer bags $2.50 each
1 Huggies wipes $5.00
1 Dr. Pepper $1.59
1 Planter's Peanuts $3.99
Merchandise Total: $15.58

Coupons Used:
- $3 off $15 purchase coupon (CVS)
- $1.50 Ziploc coupon from All You?
- $1.59 Dr. Pepper coupon I got in the mail
- $3.99 Planter's freebie coupon I got in the mail
- $1.00 ECB from transaction #2

Total Due: $4.49 plus tax ($0.54)
ECBs Earned: $0
But I still have the $10 from Transaction #1 and my $7 quarterly ECBs.

I also realized that I must have handed my cashier the $5 coupon for the Huggies wipes (Transaction #3) in Transaction #1. OOPS! I couldn't figure out why my total was so low for #1 and so high for #3. Aren't we spoiled when we think $5 OOP is high!?!?

2 comments:

Tracy said...

Sheeesh...That's amazing! I really wish I could get this good at CVS'ing! I have tried a few times but just haven't really "gotten" it yet! Awesome!

Jennifer said...

Thanks, Tracy. Don't give up! That was the key for me. I got frustrated, because I wasn't getting the awesome deals that I saw everyone else getting. Then I realized that they'd been at it MUCH longer than I had.

I highly recommend collecting coupons from different sources so that you can do copycat deals. If you see someone's deal online, you might be able to copycat it and do the exact same deal of your own.

My best advice to you would be to begin SMALL. Just buy 1 or 2 items. This week, I recommend the Skintimate shave cream. It's $3.49, and you get $3.49 back. Save the $3.49 for next week, and try to buy something that generates ECBs again.

A great resource for you would be Alyssa at KingdomFirstMom.com. Every week she runs a CVS $5 Challenge. The deals that are posted can't cost more than $5 out-of-pocket. That would help you get started without spending much!