Although prayer and grace are integral to the success of any venture, here is where they really come into play for me the most. Step 3 is the plan. Remember Proverbs 19:21, "There are many plans in a man's heart, Nevertheless the LORD's counsel—that will stand." and Proverbs 16:9, "A man's heart plans his way, But the LORD directs his steps." My most successful couponing ventures were not the ones I expected. And often a "perfect" deal will fall through and I will be so disappointed only to find that a better deal was waiting for me. So really give it to the Lord here and you will be SO blessed as you walk hand in hand through the aisles. Sometimes with wild toddlers ahead and behind. You will have such peace, even if no one else in the store does. ;)
So there are two ways to plan. You can do it yourself, or you can have someone do it for you. I'm sure you are thinking you will go for the second option, but let me warn you, that option comes with more disappointment. Although, when you are first starting out it is definitely the way to go, until you have some experience to work with. There are LOTS of blogs out there to help you out. You want to find one that is somewhat local to your area since stores and deals vary by region. Two of the blogs I use are www.thekrazycouponlady.com and www.hip2save.com, but I have also heard that www.thethriftymama.com is good. There are store specific blogs too, like www.totallytarget.com, www.iheartcvs.com, and www.wildforwags.com. These sites will spell out store ads in a format similar to this:
Item for sale ($4.50)
Use this coupon $2 off from smartsource insert 1/20
And this store coupon from the ad for $.50 off
Submit for $1 rebate
Final price: $1
That makes it easy to glance at each store and make your list, pull your coupons, and head off to the store. But here's where the disappointment comes in, let's say you get there and the item is really $5.50 because that sale price was only in another region, now you can either pay more, or go without.
When you do the match ups yourself, it may take longer, but you are sure that it will work, and if it doesn't, you can show the ad to the management and they will usually work with you. You can't show a blog to a manger. They will laugh at you, and rightly so.
If you do the match ups yourself, it is obviously more work. You should be pretty familiar with your coupons since you cut and sorted them all, so just cruise through the ad like you normally would, but when you see something you want/would use, check for a coupon. Look for big promos like Spend $25 get $10 back, then find coupons for the things involved in the promo. Unless otherwise stated, the $25 is your total BEFORE manufacturer coupons, so if you can get together $15 worth of coupons on that $25 worth of merchandise, it's all free when you get your $10 back. The krazy coupon lady has a "print coupons" section that is like a database with all the printable coupons she knows about (which is a LOT) and they are all listed alphabetically which makes it easy to find a specific coupon for an item on sale.
I like to know before I go to the store about how much I will be spending so I can tell right away if something is fishy with my total and don't have to go back to customer service to fix it. Like for instance, once I was at Winco and my $1 off coupon scanned as a $.35 coupon. Not as good of a deal! She fixed it easily when I caught it, but your cashier is not paid to make sure you get your deals. That's your job.
So, that's the planning stage. Next we'll talk about the shop.
