In 2009 I did a TV show in Washington DC, with Kris Van Cleave, which was later picked up by CNN. Apparently, Matt Sharp an executive producer at Sharp Entertainment saw the show and came up with the idea for the Extreme Couponing show on TLC.

From the NY Times 12/27/2011 written by Brian Stelter:

“The show’s formation follows the recent timeline of the economy. After the financial collapse in 2008, as American households cut back on spending in the recession, a few television stations and newspapers ran features about fanatical coupon cutters. Some were professionals, like Susan Samtur, who had been writing books and articles about couponing for decades and whose pointers were suddenly back in vogue.

“Her weekly grocery bill you’ll have to see to believe,” said Kris Van Cleave of WJLA, a Washington-area TV station, when he interviewed Ms. Samtur in April 2009. With her coupons and rebates filed by category, she saved $144.11 on a trip with Mr. Van Cleave, paying just $9.43 for a week’s worth of groceries.

CNN picked up the WJLA report, and Mr. Sharp sent the video to a colleague at his production company, Sharp Entertainment. “There’s a show here,” Mr. Sharp wrote in an e-mail. “Something in EXTREME CHEAPLIVING.”

Check out the NY Times Article: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/27/arts/television/extreme-couponing-all-stars-and-extreme-cheapskates-on-tlc.html?ref=brianstelter

Recycling not only helps the earth, but sometimes offers incentives. I found a few programs to keep in mind.
You can sign up on the Brita Website for information as to how you can recycle your spent Brita filters. Stores in selected locations have had collection bins where you can drop off those spent filters. If you don’t have a collection site in your area, you can mail them in to a certain address. Visit http://www.brita.com/support/filter-recycling/

Mission Foods promotes Terracycle and Share Our Strength. Mission® partners with upcycling company TerraCycle, Inc.® to create the Tortilla and Tostada Bag Brigade™. For each unit of packaging waste collected and sent to TerraCycle through this program, two cents will be paid to either Mission® Foods’ charity partner Share Our Strength® or a Brigade™ location’s charity of choice. The collected tortilla and tostada bags and salsa/dips lids will then be repurposed into innovative consumer products. Visit http://missionmenus.com/makeadifference/utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=tile-text-getfacts&utm_campaign=feb2011
Staples gives $2 for each returned printer cartridge. Check for their double days and double rewards.
Bring your gently used women’s, men’s and children’s prescription glasses, bifocals and non-prescription sunglasses to your local LensCrafters. Our associates will then clean, repair and hand-deliver them to those in need.

Rewards programs are a great way to save especially if you’re a loyal user of the product. Companies wanting to recognize preferred shoppers are offering rewards for multiple purchases. A few of my favorites include:

www.Mycokerewards.com: enter codes from various products to earn coupons for freebies, items such as T-Shirts, and even donate to some of your favorite charities.

www.lorealparisusa.com/rewards is L’Oreal’s program. It works this way. Sign up for the L’Oréal Paris Gold Rewards Program, and when you purchase any 5 L’Oréal Paris hair color products, you’ll receive the next one FREE! Simply enter the code found within each box prior to coloring and it will count toward your reward.

www.Diapers.com Loyalty program, gives $5 off every case of diapers, every time you order. It’s easy! No complicated reward point systems to navigate. Just a cool $5 off every case of diapers, every time. For first time customers, get $10 off.

Enter code TAKEFIVER at checkout (the one and only time you’ll have to enter a code for this program), and start saving on your diapers today!

I’d love to hear about some of the programs you’ve found. Send them along, and we can all share in the savings.

Lately a lot of attention has been given to Extreme Couponing. This is exactly the way it sounds, couponing taken to the extreme.

It’s not like buying 4 boxes of cereal because they’re on sale 4/$6. It’s like buying 40 or 80 boxes because of the sale; or toothpaste on sale for $1.49 and buying 2 tubes, it’s buying 100 tubes. Of course each purchase would also have the additional coupon savings, bringing the cost way down.

The situation is that some folks have 1000 tubes of toothpaste, or 1400 rolls of toilet paper, or enough detergent for 20,000 wash loads of clothes. Where are all of these items stored and is freshness ever compromised?

I live in comfortable-size home and at times I do buy in quantity. For example, 5 cans of tuna for $4. I bought 10 cans, or 4-12 packs of Coke for $10. Combined, in addition, with my coupons naturally. I’m able to store these and use them easily within the printed dates

My feelings are that everything should be in moderation. And perhaps more important is that these sales constantly repeat themselves so there’s no reason to stock up just for the sake of it.

There are always items on sale, and with 350 billion coupons being issued yearly, coupons readily available. My advise, buy what you need on sale and with a coupon, but buy that quantity that fits the size of your home and use.

For over 100 free printable and digital coupons go to my www.couponqueen.com site.

One of the longest running promotions is the Labels for Education and Box Tops for Education programs.

General Mills runs the Box Tops for Education. They have donated hundreds of millions of dollars since 1996 to purchase new books, computers, playground equipment and much much more. Last year alone, they donated $49 million. There are now 330 participating General Mills products.

For more information and to start collecting for your school go to: www.boxtops4education.com.

The other great program is Labels for Education sponsored by Campbells. Once again hundreds of products are accepted for the promotion.

For more information go to: www.labelsforeducation.com

As a matter of fact there are bonus offers from Campbell’s Labels For Education (LFE) program, to help your school earn Bonus points. Now through May 31st, your school can receive one bonus point for each UPC submitted! Start collecting today to help your kid’s school reach their goal! Learn more at http://www.labelsforeducation.com/earn/bonus-offers.aspx?EID=4468&MID=3461418&LID=3767

In the October 2010 issue of Consumer Reports a study was conducted on the quality, value and taste differences between store brands and national brands. The results were quite interesting and surprising.

I have always touted using National Brands when they are sale-priced combined with a coupon savings. This has given me a 50-60% savings each and every time I shop. So here’s what Consumer’s found. They used 21 test items for taste and quality. Of the 21, 7 National Brands came in first, 3 Private Labels were the favorites and the other 11 items were a tossup. On the value scale, Consumer’s concluded that Private labels could save up to 30% or $1500 over the year.

To put this in perspective, if you never use a coupon, Private Labels might be for you. However, the best way to save is to combine many methods: Store Sale, coupons, double coupons, private labels, store coupons and any other tool that saves. All of this should take a common sense approach and you’ll achieve the best methods for you.

One of the first refund offers I sent away for was Lipton Cup of Soup. I found the certificate or the write up in a local store. Today, I still find some of these on tear-off pads usually near the product itself or as a write up on the package.

These write-ups are most commonly found on cereal boxes, cookie wrappers, household cleaners and pet food. In refunders’ jargon we call them Specially Marked Packages. Kelloggs, Keebler, Hersheys and General Mills are among the most popular for these unique boxes.

A very big portion of rebates are now found on the internet. These range from rebates submitted directly online or more often where you can print out the necessary form.
I love the internet submissions because it’s easy and nothing to send off. Staples is popular for these easy-rebates as is Rite Aid.

But many other great offers are found on the company web sites under promotions or special offers. I always check that link to see what’s new. As a matter of fact, I daily postings are made to our www.couponqueen.com website so you can see all the new and current offers.

For anyone who sends me an email at: susan@refundlebundle.com I’ll send you a list of 100 plus refund offers to get you started.

Supermarket shopping can be such fun and present a great challenge too. Strategies either learned or self-taught aid in tackling that ever wily beast. But coming out a winner is what we all aim to do.

One strategy that’s often discussed is stocking up. How much of a discounted product should we buy?

First we have to ask ourselves if the item’s integrity is comprised by long-term storage or not. Most items today have an expiration date including boxed and canned goods. And storage should depend not only on how long we keep the product, but how much we are likely to use before its’ expiration date.

Let me give you a few examples. Cereal can last up to a year, but the product is often on sale and always heavily couponed. So now it depends on how good the sale is, we ask, is a sale always a sale?

The best price I’ve seen lately for Cereal is Kelloggs, 4 boxes for $6 or $1.50 each. With my $1 coupon that’s $.50 a box. Yes, I’ll take at least 4 and maybe 8. $4 for 8 boxes is about the price for 1.

Onto detergent. Fab was touted as Buy 1 get 2 Free (BOG2F). The question, how much is the first jug? The price was $3.99 for the Buy 1, with my $1 coupon my cost is $3.or $1 a jug. I bought 9 and I know that will last a long time in my house.

Space is one other consideration when bulk buying. Do you have room? You can be very inventive finding unused space. 3 of my 4 sons live in apartments in Manhattan, and they still manage to have extras on paper goods, detergents and bathroom essentials.

My advice, stock up when it’s practical and when the savings is substantial.

Over the 37 years that I have been refunding, there have been lots of changes in finding and submitting the offers. The biggest is of course the internet. When I began everything was via mail, no shortcuts.

But times have changed. Probably 1/3 of all rebates are now found on the internet, and about ½ of those can be submitted online directly.

For example at Staples.com I can submit rebates directly online. It takes about 1 minute. The reason it’s so easy is that all my information has been preloaded through my frequent shopper card.

RiteAid.com has a wonderful program too. Throughout each month you enter receipts, and at the end of the month submit the total. You receive one refund for all your purchases. These can sometimes be as much as $500. Best of all unless you don’t have access to a computer everything is done online.

Other refunds are printable off the site. You can then submit them with the correct proofs of purchase. The check, free gift or free product coupon will be mailed directly to you.

This is such a benefit since years ago rebates were distributed through the supermarkets, and once all the forms were gone, you were out of luck. This method gives everyone an opportunity.

www.Refundlebundle.com lists about 400 different refund offers each month. Have a look at the discussion board on our site for almost daily updates of rebates and freebie.

The horizons of savings are almost limitless and what a boon for the consumer especially the saavy shopper.

Upromise was started at least 10 years ago as a form of a college savings program. You can enlist friends, grandparents and others to help contribute to your student’s long-term goals. I started one for Adam years ago, and it’s easy to sign up.

Just go to the web site: upromise.com and have all of your frequent shopper cards ready. Each time you purchase many of the 1000’s of items listed, you earn money which goes into a 529 account.

Give it a shot, and share this information to help others get started too.