CVS Sillyness

I've talked before about trying to reduce my family's food spending, and thanks to various internet sources, I'm happy to report that I've had what I would consider some great success. Our mid-May to mid-June food cost was $295.80. That's still $45 over my goal, but it's better than the $400-$500/month we were spending before.

I have to tell you about my weekend trip to CVS. Where my food spending was $0.

Last week I came across this excellent blog, from two different sources, actually. It's that interesting. Basically this man is trying to prove (to his sister, with whom the bet was originally made, and to the rest of us, who are just trying to learn) that he can eat well on $1/day using coupons and other saving methods. It's definitely different than the method that j. is using over at 365 Dollar Year, which is where my interest in food budget reduction originally came from, but it's also incredibly interesting. I spent a couple hours one night reading the entire thing, then decided to try one of his methods over the weekend.

I planned two trips to CVS using the couponing blog above and this site. To start with, I had two $5 off a $25 purchase coupon I had gotten the last time we were at CVS picking up prescriptions, one from the coupon machine at the front door, one printed on my receipt. So my goal was to get as close to two separate purchases of $25 each as possible. On the first trip, I had a bit of trouble because of my own failure to read correctly, but it ended up working out in my favor.

I purchased 3 boxes of Cheerios, 1 Gillette Pro-Glide razor, 1 Cover Girl lipgloss, and 3 Power Bars. With coupons and $3 in ExtraBucks that I already had, I spent $14.96 out of pocket. I also received $10.97 in ExtraBucks back, making my out of pocket $3.99. I then realized that I had picked up the wrong type of lipgloss and hadn't gotten the deal/EBs I had expected (it should have been $4.99 with $3 back in EBs), so I asked the cashier to return the lipgloss. She probably should have made me redo the entire purchase because of the $1 off Covergirl coupon plus the $5 off $25 I had used, but I think she got flustered and just refunded me $6.48 in cash. So at this point I was $2.49 ahead.

I decided to wait until later in the day to go back. I felt bad about the refund mix-up, and I didn't want to encounter the same cashier again. I'm still trying to get the hang of this extreme couponing, and I suspect I'm going to mess up sometimes until I get better at it.

On my second trip, I got 1 big bottle of Herbal Essences conditioner, 1 John Freida conditioner and 1 John Freida frizz smoother, the correct Covergirl lipgloss, 3 more Power Bars, and a 4oz. canister of dry roasted peanuts. I used the $10.97 in EBs from the previous trip, the other $5 off $25, and a few manufacturer coupons to bring my total down to $2.34.


Subtract that from the $2.49 I was already ahead, and as far as I can tell, CVS paid me 15 cents, plus gave me $8 in ExtraBucks for a future trip to take all this stuff out of their store. This picture doesn't include the other 3 Power Bars that the kids and I already ate. Sorry for the blurry photo!



This really wasn't terribly difficult, and I'm already working on my trip using this week's ad. The worst part was the embarrassment with the lipgloss return, so I'll just have to be more careful in the future. I also got lucky with the $5 off $25 coupons, and definitely wouldn't have done as well without them. But one came from simply scanning my card at the machine near the door, so it's possible that anyone could get this deal as well.