Shaw's: $10 Catalina WYB $25, again

Retail Value: $39.38. Cost Out of Pocket $10. Catalina Earned $10.
Net Cost= FREE           100% Savings

Today was the last day for the $10 catalina when you buy (wyb) $25 in participating GM products. I already had a $10 catalina to use on this deal from my shopping trip last Friday and coupons to match this sale, so I wanted to try my hand at doing this deal another time. With coupons and catalina in hand, off to Shaw's I went.

In my first transaction, I decided to purchase 6 bags of Chex Mix. These were on sale for 2/$4. I had a coupon for $1/2 from a Sunday insert. This made them 2/$3. I purchased 4 bags of Betty Crocker Cookie mix on sale for 2/$4. I had (4) .40¢/1 manufacturer coupons (which doubled to .80¢/1) to bring these to $1.20/bag. Totino's Pizza Rolls were on my list and I used an online printable coupon of .40¢/2 (doubled to .80¢/2) to bring them to .60¢/box. And, I purchased (10) Yoplait yogurts on sale for 10/$6. I used a $1/10 coupon with these to being the total to 10/$5. Clearly, none of these prices were so AMAZING as to be MUST HAVES... until you consider the $10 catalina offer. My total before coupons/savings came to $28.00. After coupons and discounts, the total was $10. I paid $10 in cash and received a $10 On Your Next Order (OYNO) Catalina. Basically, everything I bought, was FREE.

Retail Value $31.18. Cost out of Pocket .62¢.
Net Cost .62¢           98% Savings

For my last transaction today, I flipped the $10 to purchase the Kibbles 'n Bits that I had gotten a rain check for on Tuesday. Kibbles 'n Bits were priced at $5.99 (which was even less expensive than was advertised previously. I don't know why, but I am not complaining!) and had a buy one, get one sale on them. This made them 2 bags for $5.99. I used (2) $1.50/1 manufacturer coupon from the Sunday insert to bring them down to $2.99 for 2 bags or $1.50 each (for the 3.6 pound bags). I did not want to use cash, so I needed to bring my balance to over the $10 mark. I added 2 bags of Chex Mix with the same coupons as above... and a twix candy bar at the register. My total came to $10.62. I paid with my $10 Catalina and .62¢ cash.

I really am very impressed with the Shaw's crew. Today, my cashier was Ethan and my bagger was Jill. She was so friendly and I appreciated that on a dreary, rainy day. There was a small snaffoo buying the Kibbles 'n Bits when the computer failed to register the buy one, get one sale. Ethan was great. I knew the amount on the register was too much, so I inquired about the price of the dog food and showed Ethan the sales flyer. He was so polite and professional. He called over his shift supervisor, Joyce who took one look and fixed the problem. Easy, easy. Problems will occasionally arise, but when they do, it is comforting to know that the cashiers are on your side, ready to help. Joyce even handed me a copy of next week's sales flyers early. I highly recommend the Bangor Shaw's store.

Starting tomorrow, there are going to be some good buy 3, get 3 sales. I am looking into taking advantage of the Classico pasta sauce. www.classico.com has a $1/1 printable coupon. You can print this twice. Quakes Rice Cakes are going to be on sale for $1 and they had some $1/3 peelies that will make these a fairly decent treat. Vitamin Water Zero is on sale for $1 with a bonus of (4) bottles when you buy (10), this makes them .71¢ each. I am going to look for a coupon for the Pillsbury Cake mix on sale for $1. I am also interested in the FREE MILK offer when you buy (4) participating GM cereals at 4/$10. There are several $1/2 coupons available for this offer, which would bring the cost to $8/4 boxes of cereal. When you consider that milk costs about $4/gallon, if you were going to need the milk anyway, it is like paying $1 for each box of cereal. Not too bad!

What sales caught your eye for next week?

Sonja ♥

Shaw's + General Mills Products= HUGE SAVINGS

Shopping at Shaw's today was AWESOME. I will admit, there is a little bit of an adrenaline rush when I am in line, waiting to see if everything is going to work out the way I planned it. I needed to make some minor alterations at the store to compensate for some coupon match ups and that only added to my state of excited nervousness. I came within $5 of what I intended to spend. Success!!!Total Retail for my purchases $139.05. My out of pocket expense was $ 38.03 AND I earned a $10 On Your Next Order (oyno) coupon, which made my net transaction $28.03. Total Savings 79%.
The sale Shaw's advertised was save $10 On Your Next Order when you buy $25 in participating General Mills products. The $25 mark is triggered before you apply coupons, so you don't actually spend $25 in cash monies to qualify for the $10 catalina. As usual, I wanted to spend as little out of my pocket as possible, so I broke up my purchases into 3 transactions.
Transaction #1:

The differences in the amount I paid and the sale amount reflect the additional savings I enjoyed from the coupons I used. Shaw's only allows "4 like" coupons for each transaction, so that was another factor in my transaction groupings. I used both online coupons and Sunday paper insert coupons in various amounts, which is why on one graph, it will show more money for the same product than on another graph.

Transaction #2:

The out of pocket amount is the cost after all my coupons were applied and before the additional $10 OYNO catalina. After earning the first $10 OYNO in transaction #1, I used it to pay down my out of pocket balance in transaction #2. And, since it only matters that the total before coupons reached $25, I earned another $10 OYNO catalina. In all, I earned three of them, but rolled them on each subsequent transaction. If I had purchased everything in one transaction, I would have paid $58.03 out of pocket and earned (3) $10 catalinas. The final net amount of $28.03 would be the same, but by employing multiple transactions, I used catalina money to pay and kept my money in the bank where it does my family greater good.

Transaction #3:

I am quite pleased with my results, but I have more coupons which correspond to this sale, so I will probably plan to revisit Shaw's when I am in Bangor again later this week. I am very visual, so I brought home the flyer to look through, mark up, and devise possibly a better deal than today's. The internet is full of sites that give you sneak peaks at ad scans for upcoming sale weeks. For this week's sale the most helpful one for me was from Money Saving Maine-iac's blog which You Can Read Here. Oh! And, purchasing 5 GM Cereals together in my final transaction (not 4) triggered a $2/5 any GM cereal catalina.

The other cool things about this sale is that all the items I purchased had a General Mills "box top for education" label, which are worth .10 cents each (today's total was $5.30) AND because I purchased more than ten qualifying items in each transaction, it triggered (3) 10 Bonus box tops codes worth an additional $3.00 That means, Searsport Middle School's parent/teacher group just got $8.30 richer just by my buying my family's groceries today.

At the end of today's trip, I had purchased: 15 boxes Totino's Pizza Rolls, 6 bags Betty Crocker Cookie Mixes, 6 boxes GM Cereals, 16 boxes Betty Crocker Potatoes, 8 bags Chex Mix, and 4 bags of Bugles... all for less than $30.00.

Sonja ♥

                                                                                                

Shaw's Today

$57.44 Retail Cost. Out of Pocket Expense $23.26

Today's Purchases:
3 bags Shaw's Brand Croutons
10 boxes Totino's Pizza Rolls
1 Single Serving of Tilapia
1 Single Serving of Salmon
(2) 3 lb packs of Chicken Breast
(1) 4 pack Bathroom tissue
6 Oscar Meyer Lunchables

My eldest daughter would live on Totino's Pizza Rolls if I allowed it. My younger two daughters favor Oscar Meyer's lunchables. I think that, as with everything else, balance in all things is recommended. They make a very handy afterschool treat, so I stick some in the freezer when I find them at a good price.

When I saw Totino's Pizza Rolls and Oscar Meyer Lunchables on sale as part of the 10/$10 sale, I had to stop in to stock up on some.

I used (2) $1/2 online coupons printed here and (3) $1/2 coupons from the Sunday paper insert. 10/10 is a good price. 10/$5 is even better AND, I earned an additional 10 box tops for education catalina to donate to the girl's Middle School PTG. Combined with the 10 box tops printed on the boxes, that is an additional $2 donation.

I also purchased (2) 3lb packages of Split Chicken Breast. At $6 for 3 lbs, this would not be a great bargain. But, Shaw's had a Buy One, Get One Sale on these, which made them 6 lbs for $6.

I bought 2 different single serving sizes of fish; one Tilapia and one Salmon. The girls and I do not care for fish, but my husband does. So, sometimes, I make a dinner and substitute fish for him when the rest of us eat pork chops, steak, or chicken. These single servings were perfect with that intention in mind. The best part? They were only $1 each. I would have purchased more of them, but it goes against my policy of buying unnecessary things without coupons to match with the sales. The sale price was good, but this was not something I needed to have, therefore, I chose to limit how many I bought.

Lastly, you may have noticed the lonely single package of toilet tissue. After nearly 9 months, I am sad to say that my back stock of FREE toilet tissue is gone. Read about that shopping trip HERE. But, it was good while it lasted. I will continue watching for another FREE deal on this. So far, none have been found. *Sigh*

Remember to check in to the Shaw's page on Facebook HERE for exclusive coupons to match with tomorrow's sale. Our local Shaw's will double up to (4) $1.00 off coupons tomorrow, in addition to their regular doubling policy.
Sonja ♥