Consumers turning to coupons

Cash-crunched consumers are turning to coupons to supplement their shrinking monthly budgets, both in the traditional paper medium as well as online deals.

While coupon clipping may seem intimidating to some, all that work for a few pennies saved, many local avid coupon clippers have come to realize it's worth the time. Jane Estes considers it part of her job as the manager of her family's budget.

"I consider the time it takes to clip all the coupons and store them is money I'm making through savings," Estes said.

She has streamlined her coupon clipping process and significantly increased her pantry stock without spending more than is allotted for her weekly grocery budget. Often, she has money left over after her diligent coupon use.

"I've been clipping coupons for more than a decade, and all my friends laughed at me," she said. "But now they are asking for tips, because they see what a difference it can make. You just have to do a little bit of work for a lot of savings, I think."

Clipping coupons has become a national trend.

Coupon use is on the rise after more than two decades of lackluster consumer use. Annual coupon redemption has increased for the first time since 1992, the marketing firm Inmar reported in January. The international marketing research firm found that coupon use began increasing in the United States in October of 2008, in direct relation to the economic downturn.

The average face value of a coupon was $1.44 in 2009 for name brand companies, which issued 367 billion coupons last year. That creates a significant savings avenue for consumers who spend the time to search, clip and use coupons

Estes, a former retail manager and mother of three boys under age 6, spends two hours on the weekends clipping coupons and organizing them in a plain plastic 12-tab organizer she picked up at a dollar store.

"I am too busy to sit and clip coupons in the week, so I put time aside, and the kids are at an age to help, and we get all the coupons from the Sunday paper clipped in one sitting," she said, adding she also looks for coupons in the weekly mail. "It's made a world of difference."

After clipping and sorting the coupons into her organizer, Estes pours over the weekly grocery ads. She removes coupons from her stash and puts them in envelopes for each store.

Estes has made sure to meet the manager of each grocery store chain she visits and ask what their coupon policies are, if they honor coupons from other stores or price matching for meat, dairy and produce, which cuts down on her driving to other stores for their advertised deals.

She started a coupon exchange with fellow coupon connoisseurs she found online through meetup.com. Occasionally she buys a stack of 100 coupons or more on eBay for $5 or less.

"Getting coupons from other states can increase your savings," Estes said. "They may circulate a $1 off coupon that they don't do here in Las Vegas, and that's usually a great deal. You might have to wait for the (item) to go on sale, but then you can (often) get it free."

With couponing, she no longer pays for a few items such as toothpaste, aspirin and condiments such as ketchup, mustard, barbecue sauce and salad dressing. Her system is to collect as many $1-off coupons as she can for these items she expects to eventually go on sale, and then wait.

"I stock up when I get a good sale and always make sure I clip those coupons and ask my friends for their coupons if they aren't going to use them," she said.

She also waits for specific items, such as canned vegetables and soup, to go on sale for a dollar or less a can and with a monetary return, such as $5 back if you buy 10. Her coupons often bring the total down to half price and, with the monetary return, they are relatively free.

A key is to remember to use any dollars-off coupons for return trips and not forget about them.

"I've forgotten $5 and $2 coupons off our grocery bill and they expire," Estes said. "It's like throwing money away."

Her average grocery bill is $200 total before coupons and at least half that after.

"I try to average 50 percent off my grocery bill and not more than $1 per item when you add it all up," she said.

At the end of her trip, if she's bought 54 items, including meat and produce, she won't have spent more than $55. Meat is rarely something she can buy with a coupon, but she goes to the wine aisle of the grocery store and scouts for coupons that include $2 or more off a meat purchase, sometimes without a purchase.

"I buy meat after a holiday, when it usually goes on sale, and we freeze it because it can be so expensive," she said. "We probably save a few hundred a year on meat that way."

She has also begun to shop at consignment stores for her young children's toy needs and thrift stores for clothing and household goods.

"I never thought I'd find such good deals, new clothes and shoes, especially shoes, at thrift stores," Estes said. "We are really particular and only went because my mother-in-law insisted, but we were really surprised at the good deals we found (at thrift stores)."

Many local families have turned to Goodwill of Southern Nevada to supplement their wardrobes, furniture needs and kitchen ware supplies.

"We have great deals at Goodwill," said Kathy Topp, director of marketing and community affairs at Goodwill of Southern Nevada.

And if you haven't been in a Goodwill store lately, you should, she said.

"We have strict quality control standards," she said. "That means everything that is in our stores has been sorted. You won't find anything torn or stained or in bad condition."

Families can very easily find values, new and gently worn clothing, accessories and shoes, for pennies on the dollar of what they might spend at a typical department store, she said. Most clothing is priced at least 80 percent below chain stores.

But Goodwill offers more than clothes.

"We also have dishes, cookware, furniture, as well as a healthy selection of new goods that are either donated to us, or that we purchase at a deeply discounted rate," she said. "We are then able to pass along the savings to our customers.

For example, Goodwill has plans to stock its Eastern and Sahara avenues Goodwill stores with new, in-the-bag seven-piece comforter and bed sets for $24.99.

"We have great savings like that all the time," Topp said.

Sales for Goodwill of Southern Nevada have increased since the economic downturn, with more families finding the stores around the valley.

"Sales in our eight retail stores are up about 4 percent from last year," she said.

That's good news for other valley residents.

"The important thing to remember is that our Goodwill stores fund our mission," Topp said. "When you buy something at Goodwill you are helping someone in our community work, as sales from the stores pay for Goodwill's job placement programs. Obviously, with the unemployment rate at a record high, the need for our free services is up, as well."

Upcoming sales and special events include:

n On Black Friday (Nov. 26) all shoes, handbags and sweaters will be $1.99.

n Every other Saturday is 50 percent off clothing.

n Every day seniors 55 and older get 25 percent off (select items and departments not included.)

"We always have a ton of sales going on," Topp said. "The best thing to do is to grab a sales calendar when you walk in the store or print the sales calendar from our website at www.sngoodwill.org. At our website, you can also sign up for our e-mail list. We often will blast out specials via our e-mail list."

Surprisingly, marketing departments have increased coupon and coupon distribution to a point higher than it has been in more than 30 years. More than 3 billion coupons for consumer packaged goods were redeemed last year, an increase of 27 percent over 2008.

Online coupons have been a recent addition and have significantly contributed to the rise in coupon distribution and redemption, Inmar reported last year. Internet distribution of coupons is up 92 percent and consumer use of these coupons is up by more than 360 percent.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal has recently launched a daily, online and valley-wide coupon offer with its My Best of Las Vegas Deal of the Day promotion. Readers of the Review-Journal can go to the R-J's site and sign up for free to receive e-mail alerts on exclusive daily deals at significant discount rates for area restaurants, family fun centers and other venues.

"On the homepage of our print newspaper and website every day there will be a promotional space just for (the latest) My Best of Las Vegas Deals," said Tyler Mack, online sales manager for the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

My Best of Las Vegas Deals of the Day will be featured in bold banner ads on the top left of the home page of ReviewJournal.com as well as its affiliated sites.

Online coupon sites have increased locally since 2008. Groupon.com came to Las Vegas a few years ago and has quite a few local followers who swear by the great deals they receive.

Julie Anderson uses the site Groupon.com at least once a week for her family of four to be able to dine out and attend events within their tight monthly budget guidelines, she said.

"We've gone to a pottery place with both kids and some friends for half price, lots of dining places we would never have checked out and just have a good time finding deals," Anderson said.

The deal-of-the-day website began in Chicago and quickly grew to more than 150 markets in the United States and Canada. It works on a point system. If a certain amount of Groupon users sign up for the daily offer, it becomes available to all of the users. The business model works well for retailers, who offer Groupon a cut of the profits. It's very family-friendly, Anderson said. And Groupon doesn't offer deals to strip clubs, plastic surgeons or any possibly controversial businesses.

The Groupon website notes that more than $650 million has been saved through its daily deals and more than 15 million coupons have been bought on its site.

Paul Reed is a "big foodie," he said, and only recently found Groupon and Restaurant.com.

"I've been cutting corners and thought I'd have to stop going out to restaurants, which I used to do three or four times a week," Reed said.

By using online coupons, and clipping coupons from the View Neighborhood Newspapers, he can eat at his favorite restaurants as well as those he may have overlooked in his more lucrative dining-out past.

He logs onto Restaurant.com daily for its latest deals, buying $25 and $50 gift certificates to area restaurants for as little as $5, although the average is around $10 to $15 per certificate.

"I've expanded my list of favorite places and tried new things because the deal was just so great I couldn't resist trying it out," he said. "I've taken friends and clients, too, and it's been fun to look out for something really cool on (the restaurant coupon) sites."

Karen Tillman is an avid couponer who purchases the Entertainment Book each November. It's a big deal in her house.

"My kids and I sit down at the table and write down all the good coupons we like in the book," the mother of four said. "It has to be either half price or buy-one-get-one for it to be on the list and we go to the list to plan what we will do for our weekend."

The $35 price for the annual coupon book is built into her budget she said.

"We make that money back after the first two coupons we use, at least," she said.

Tillman estimates the active family, who use the coupons in the Entertainment Book for dinners out, rounds of golf, tickets to amusement parks and other family-friendly activities, saves more than a few hundred dollars a year using coupons.

They visit Tillman's family in Southern California at least twice a year, and the Entertainment Book has been valuable for those trips as well.

"We use the rental car and hotel discounts (in the Entertainment Book) and we can share it with our (visiting) family," she said. "Coupons have made our fun times more fun, because we can do more."

While she admits that couponing does require a bit of work, she has made it fun by including the entire family and showing them how the work can produce great results.

"My kids are learning the value of a dollar, and how to make it stretch," Tillman said. "We include everyone, even our extended family, in learning how to save money. We wouldn't be doing as much as we do without coupons."