4/07/2011

Extreme Couponing... INSANE!

Finally caught my first episode of TLC's Extreme Couponing after hearing all the hoopla about the show.....

I would have to say wow.... I'm still blown away by the show a day after....never did I expect that much could be saved using coupons... seriously I found myself standing yelling and cussing at the TV and my wife.. "WTF???" "Oh Come on!!" " There's no way!!"


The above video shows a woman getting $280.38 worth of groceries and pays only $6.92 after all the coupons! Another lady on the next episode racks up over $1900 in groceries and only pays $101 after her coupons!!! Another carts $680 worth of goods and pays $6.86 in 18 different transactions! Another got $550 of groceries for $6...a 98% savings!!! Crazy.

I mean I've pulled the multiple transactions scam before at the local IGA... sirloin steaks go on sale..$2.99 per kg warehouse packs...great deal but limit of 2 per household....I grab my 2 packs and go home; I come back with the wife and we grab 4 packs at 2 different cashiers...go back in for more at different cashiers... voila.... who hasn't tried that?

But this extreme couponing? The closest I've ever come to those savings was when I loaded up the cart at Superstore and made a run for the doors! I mean I understand the concept..in the US, many of their grocers let people stack their coupons...the stores even have double and triple coupon days... stack them with manufacturer coupons and in-store sales...

Very much like how I stack Airmiles savings... I get so many airmiles for shopping at Safeway; use a in-store coupon for 5 times the airmiles; then use my airmiles reward American Express credit card for even more miles!

The most extreme I've heard was a man went to numerous Safeways for a special promotion on airmiles when you bought cans of Campbell's soup... ie. 100 bonus miles for 1 can, etc. He did the math: bought enough cans of soup to earn the airmiles needed to fly him and his family on a trip around the world... with the airmiles deal, it cost the man less than half the amount it would of if he just paid for the trip outright... It was in all the local newspapers a few years ago and probably got most of us hooked on collecting them and other loyalty points in the first place... he ended up donating the cans of soup to charity and flew his family around the world.

But is this extreme couponing possible in Canada? My wife and I are fairly frugal...we scour our flyers weekly and try to get the best deals we can; we compare prices across most of the major stores, even drive to 2-3 of them weekly...heck I'm proud of the points we rack up with the Costco Executive membership...it is now free plus I get cash back every year and more airmiles with the points stacking! But this stacking of coupons while so seemingly farfetched, is just not available at any grocers in Western Canada like it is in the United States... most stores here restrict the number of promotions you can have on any one item in Canada.. in fact upon some further research only London Drugs from what I have found can you stack coupons... the only rule is the coupons must have different scan codes so they must be from different sources.

I may want to give it a shot at London Drugs in the near future if I can find the right deals but there only so many items that I would want to buy there anyways... do I really need that much moisturizer or bags of chips? So Canadians, it looks as if we're SOL...

Thing is, if we could stack coupons like in the USA, I can understand buying 10 packs of hotdogs..my kids live and breathe hot dogs.. In my part of Canada we are pretty much borderline hoarders with such long winters..most of us buy bulk and freeze everything anyways hence why there's so many of the warehouse type grocers in western provinces.. But, what are you supposed to do with 35 bottles of Maalox anyways..or 40 bottles of mustard... 7 pounds of cheese... if you don't use the items purchased, isn't it a waste anyways regardless of the deal you got on them? Little wonder why "Hoarding: Buried Alive" is aired next on TLC. .

And these "Coupon Divas"? They're like Lex Luthors.... with coupons... Imagine if they were to put their minds to serve the greater good?..."What deficit? And as for Japan... we can clean up and rebuild the whole island for a grand total of.. $5.98!" "Oh wait, we didn't use plastic bags...Japan owes us 39 cents..."

2 comments:

youngandthrifty said...

I'm a bit wary of the consumerism and the amount of waste in buying so many things (like hoarding deodorant).

I'm just happy with buying a few things for cheap, besides, I don't think stacking manufacturer coupons is allowed here in Canada.

Happy to hear you like the show too. I only watched the one episode.

@crazyfasteddy said...

@youngandthifty:

I could only watch 2 episodes..the hoarding was too much for me also...stacking coupons is only allowed at London Drugs in Canada as mentioned in my post.