I Wanted a Good Deal on a Stapler

This last week I did some shopping at Staples. I was struck with this thought: You have to study the way a store markets things to know how to get the best deals there. I was shopping for general office supplies. When I went to look for staplers, I went to a section where they had about 25 different ones to choose from. The cheapest one was $7.99. Since I wanted three, that seemed quite expensive to me. However, when pushing my cart through the aisles, I found a "dump bin" of staplers that included a normal size stapler, staple remover and box of staples for $3 by the packing materials. I don't know if it was a special purchase or what, but I liked the price! If I never had ventured away from the stapler section, I wouldn't have found the deal. Staples also has "dump bins" near the front with special purchase office supplies that they are selling at a good deal. I got many of the things I was looking for in that section for a dollar or two. My theory is that if you want a stapler, they want to sell you one at full price. However, they place the "dump bins" in places that you will impulse buy since it is such a good deal. So, I have come to the conclusion that if I am going to shop at Staples, I should plan time to quickly walk through the aisles before making my purchase. You will have to study each store to find where the deals are to be found. Each store is run differently. If you make friends with the clerks at the stores, you may be able to find out when things are typically marked down or put on clearance. So, take a few minutes next time you are out shopping to consider how the store you are shopping at markets it's goods to you.

Use coupon codes when buying online

Today I made a purchase online. Several hours later I realized hadn't checked to see if there were any coupon codes for the merchant I made the purchase from. You can save significantly by taking that little step. All you have to do is type in the name of the vendor and coupon code. If I was going to buy something from Amazon I would type in "Amazon coupon codes." I could then look through the list and see if there were any that applied to my purchase. Sometimes the discount available is free shipping, other times it is a % off your purchase, or sometimes you get a certain dollar amount off. Some companies have special discounts if you are a new customer and other coupon codes you can use over and over again.

Speaking of online purchases, I will remind you to check out www.slickdeals.net . They have a great list of deals that are available online. They often will list deals with the coupon code needed to get a great deal. Several weeks ago I was able to get a 4 year subscription to a magazine for $4.40 (That's $1.20 a year!!!). It's retail value is $3.99 an issue. Prior to reading about the deal I could get at www.slickdeals.net, the cheapest I had seen the magazine was $10 a year.

Stack those deals

It's a good time to stack deals. It takes a little time to get all your coupons in order, but you will save more. Tomorrow we have a cereal sale at one of our two local grocery stores. They have boxes of cereal on sale for $1.68. I went to safeway.com (go to Coupon link...you can use those coupons at other stores unless they specify they can only be used at Safeway) and coupons.com, and printed off coupons for cereal. You will have to download a little program that allows you to print the coupons. Then go through the list of coupons and select the ones you want and print them off. You can go back to the site and keep printing coupons if you want to buy more than one box of a particular kind of cereal until you reach the limit set for each coupon. The extra $.50-$.75 cents off a box makes for a great buy on cereal. So take a few minutes and collect some coupons before heading off to a sale to save even more.