fire away wildfire! I don't use a lot of coupons but I shop the sales so that I rarely ever buy anything at full price. Teach me more 🙂

I'd like to learn too!!

Me too.

I've been wanting to try this please anything you could add to help would be great

I don't use a lot of coupons, but what I do is look at the flyers on thursday, then make a list of things I use that are going to go on sale the next day. Tip for you! Walmart and Superstore will price match so I take the flyers with me depending on where I want to go. It saves me from going to multiple places. I Also stock up like a crazy person so I don't have to buy that item until it goes on sale again and avoiding buying it at regular price. this also helps if you are working on your long term storage too. Another tip: Superstore limits quantities but Walmart doesn't!

Yes please, would like to see easy instructions and help in learning this.

co-op is doing its 10 for 10 sale for the next while. some good deals on canned goods among others.

Great to see interest in this. When I get home from work tonight and finish shoveling out after this snowstorm I'll start with some of the basics, sites to sign up for, the best rewards programs, etc.

Alright, let's get started.

The first thing to know is that you can't do extreme couponing like they can do in the US. Our grocery stores are just not set up for that. Your best source of information on how-to's, coupons, store policies, tips and successes can be found on the website. Smartcanucks.ca This is an all Canadian site and has a lot of information on there. You'll learn a lot just by browsing it.

Rewards programs: If you don't have an optimum card from Shoppers drug mart, get one now. They are by far the best rewards system out there. If you get a full 95,000 point redemption you can get up to $200 + free, no minimum purchase. It doesn't take much to get that many points if you shop on the bonus offer days where you get 20X the points, buy items that have bonus reward points and sign up for their newsletter that gives you coupons based on the products you buy and special offers during the week where others only get bonus coupons on the weekend.

Coupons: Read the fine print on the coupon to make sure that you are able to redeem it for the right purchase. Every stores coupon policies are different so ask a clerk what they are in advance or go to the website so you're not disappointed when you try to redeem. Some say things like no more than 4 like coupons per transaction, a transaction is all of what you buy, a purchase is when you use one coupon for buying one item. Clerks get confused on that a lot. If you're certain you're in the right, don't be afraid to ask for a supervisors opinion. A lot of clerks aren't properly told their stores coupon policies and they're not very practiced on it.

You can often find coupons direct from the manufacturer, just go to their website and look for promotions, coupons or deals tabs. Sometimes you'll have to give them your email address, not a big deal usually.
Some other great sites are:
Brandsaver.ca
websaver.ca
gocoupons.ca
couponsforcanada.com
rightathome.ca
scottbrand.ca
Ziploc.com

Some can only be ordered from the same household once so if you have a PO Box then use that too, or create a separate account for your spouse. There are even coupon trains from smartcanucks where you pass along coupons you don't use to people that do and it moves around through the mail system, adding and detracting coupons through people that need them or don't. I haven't tried it but some swear by it. There is also notifications on smartcanucks when flyers come out where there will be lots of coupons in and its a good time to stock up. Often they have an expiry date months if not years in advance so save these coupons for when you find the items on sale from the flyers.

Organization: No one wants to go to the store and have to sort through hundreds of coupons to find the one they want so organization in advance is important. You can use a file folder with specific tabs, trading card pages in a binder work as well. Whatever works for you really but its a good idea to have them easily visible when you open it up so you're not searching forever. Put them in tabs according to what works for you.

Things might be on sale one month and then a month later on sale again for a lower price. Over time you'll find out what these items lowest prices are and then you buy them at those time.

Overages: This is becoming less and less common but if you have a sale item, for say $1.50 and you have a $2.00 off coupon some stores will give you overages. This basically means that because the store will be getting the full amount refunded to them of the coupon from the manufacturer they will give you the extra $0.50 towards the rest of your items. Basically they're paying you to shop. Most stores though don't do this now but instead pocket the extra $0.50 and you get your item for free. However you'll still have to pay the tax on the item so it's not completely free.

Scanner code of practice: Great little piece of information when you pick up on it so watch for it at the till. If you buy an item that comes up at a different price when you're at the till, call them on it and if they adhere to the scanning code of practice, which most stores do, they will either give you the item for free if it's below $10 or $10 off if it's above $10.

Price Matching: Walmart does price matching, it takes a little bit of prep ahead of time. I'm sure there are others but I haven't ever gotten really involved in it.

Things to watch out for:
Some people get so addicted to the thrill of getting stuff for cheap and sometimes will buy stuff just because they get a good deal on it, don't buy things you don't need!

Expiration dates - things will often go on sale because they're likely to expire. If you buy 10 bottles of BBQ sauce that are due to expire in a month, are you really going to use them in that time? If not, don't buy them. Seems common sense. That being said, some things that are best before actually will be fine for a lot longer than that but know what products are like that before you buy them.

Buy products on sale that have coupons on the packaging - nothing better than getting a sale item, with a coupon AND having good coupons on the package for things you would use in the future. Ex. Taco kit that cost $5.99 with a $1 off coupon + a coupon on the box for $4 off a pound of ground beef. Be careful to look at the expiry date on the coupons on the package though as they can be stocked a long time ago and the coupon might have already expired.

Remember to thin out your coupon organizer and get rid of the old coupons as they expire. Be sure of your coupons being valid for what you're buying to make the checkout process smoother and sometimes even let the clerk know in advance because yes, it does take a bit longer to use coupons at the checkout. Canadian coupons don't scan the same way American ones do unfortunately.

That's long enough for now so if anyone has questions I'll answer them as they come up and add to this topic as we move forward.

Thanks for listening and I hope you all can use the tips.

Thanks for the info and links. Sounds like a full time job organizing all those coupons.
I'll need to start alot smaller scale at first.

Only one not for me, is I won't be getting any shoppers D mart buyers card . I like to shop at the smaller
pharmacies, which , also have sales.

Thanks so much for the information, I've been thinking about couponing but didn't know where to start.