Mother’s Day Gift Ideas

Mother’s Day is right around the corner – so I wanted to give you a few options for some great Mother’s Day Gifts! I have found everything from Flowers to Homemade Crafts! Enjoy!

Here are some Gift Ideas:

• $20 for $40 worth of Mother’s Day Gifts and Flowers from FTD.com (Groupon)
• $10 for $20 worth of Products from The Body Shop  (Groupon)
• $19.99 for Mother’s Day Slate (Up to $39.99 List Price) (Groupon)
• $15 for $30 to Spend at ProFlowers.com (Living Social)
• $15 for $30 to spend at Shari’s Berries (Living Social)
• Get a Personalized Mother’s Day Card from Cardstore.com
• Free Photo Mug + Shipping from York Photo
• Coupon Book for Mom (Craft Project)
• Handprint Homemade Card (Craft Project)
• Mother’s Day Gift Jar – All the Reasons I Love Mommy (Craft Project)

Do you have any great Mother’s Day Gift Ideas?

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What’s on sale in April

Wondering what’s on sale in May?  Here is a list of some of the deals you will find happening this month.  Knowing sales cycles gives you the advantage of being able to plan your purchases and stock up when those prices hit rock bottom.

Remember, using your coupons paired with a sale is the best way to save the most money on your grocery bill.

Be sure to check out the complete  Guide to Grocery Sale Cycles

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{ 05/01/2013 with 1 Comment }

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How To Get a Free Breast Pump

So my husband Mike and I are expecting our second child in October!  We have a 15-month old daughter named Annabelle and although we were a bit “surprised” with this news of baby #2, we are very excited and thankful our family is growing!  Here is a picture of our announcement

As many of you know, having a child can be very expensive.  We are very thankful that at the tender age of 24 I stumbled upon this site!  Living Rich With Coupons has changed our lives.  We were still dating and I knew I had to find a way to save money.  We had to save up to pay for our wedding on our own and I felt buried in college debt.  This is when I started my journey as an Extreme Couponer and since then I can’t imagine life without coupons and being a resourceful, frugal shopper.  We are on our way to being 100% debt free and Cindy and LRWC has so much to do with that!

Anyway, I’ve been hearing these rumors from pregnant friends about getting a FREE breast pump through their insurance companies.  I told my pregnant sister about this, and after one simple phone call to her insurance, she has a fancy new Medela Electric Breast Pump headed her way!  I got thinking, whoa, this is pretty cool, so I did some research and found out it’s true.

As of January 1, 2013, the provision of the Affordable Care Act that demanded insurance cover breast pumps, breastfeeding supplies, and lactation support has gone into effect.  That means that all mothers can get these pricey machines covered by their insurance companies with no deductible, no out-of-pocket expense!  This really made me excited because I am such an advocate of breastfeeding.  I truly believe it’s what’s best for you and your baby, plus it’s FREE…except for the breast pump of course, however that’s why I’m happy to share this tip with you all.

When Annabelle was first born, I was so unhappy to cough up over $300 for my Medela Breast Pump.  She came a month early and we didn’t have a pump yet, so Mike ran out to Babies R Us the day we got home from the hospital and made this big purchase on his own.  The pump worked great and I never had problems with it, but that is a lot of money for a young couple to come up with in addition to all the other first-time baby expenses!  Thanks to this new Act, most insurance companies are required to cover a pump in it’s entirety, or depending on your coverage, at least supply you with breastfeeding supplies.  I called my insurance company, Aetna, and I’m happy to say I’m eligible for a completely FREE breast pump with no deductible, no co-pay and no out of pocket expenses!  Woot!  Here is some information directly off the Aetna site, that will vary from insurance company to insurance company, but should be pretty standard:

The Women’s Preventive Health Breast Feeding Benefit includes:

• a standard electric pump (non-hospital-grade) within 60 days of birth, once every three years, or
• a manual breast pump within 12 months of birth, if you have not received an electric or a manual breast pump in the last three years, and
• another set of breast pump supplies if you get pregnant again before you are eligible for a new pump.

Aetna provided me with a list of vendors and brands of breast pumps covered under my plan.  I will be receiving the Medela Advanced Personal Double Breast Pump, which comes with double pumping kit, original 2-Phase Expression, A.C.power cord, power accessory battery pack, convenient shoulder bag with integrated cooler bag with ice packs, breast milk containers and shields, instructions and warranties.  This pump is selling at Babies R Us for $349.99!

So, if you’re a mother to be or know someone expecting, PLEASE share this tip with them or give your insurance a call.  The worst that can happen is you find out you’re not covered, but more likely than not you’ll receive something.  And please, if you’re on the fence about breastfeeding…give it a shot!  It’s the best “challenge” I ever overcame, because it was hard in the beginning, however once I stuck with it and didn’t give up, it became pure joy and ease and such a neat bonding experience with my little girl.  It saved us a TON of money too!

How many of you have looked into receiving a FREE breast pump?

If you are new to couponing, you may want to check out the Couponing for Beginners section where you will find a lot of answers to your questions.

 

Melinda Dilione is a contributor at Living Rich With Coupons. She lives in New Jersey with her husband Mike and their little bundle of joy, Annabelle.

 

 

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{ 04/19/2013 with 21 Comments }

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Best Generic Peanut Butter

Sometimes, when we don’t have a coupon for a name brand product, generic brands can cost you less.  We polled the Living Rich With Coupons Facebook fans to find out which generic brand of Peanut Butter they feel are the best.

There was a 3 way tie for first place between Great Value (Walmart) Brand, ShopRite Brand, Aldi Brand.

Here is the list in order:

• Great Value (Walmart)
• ShopRite
• Aldi
• Stop & Shop/Giant
• Whole Foods
• Market Pantry
• Wegmans
• Costco (Kirland)

Feel free to leave your selections in the comments below.  Also, today’s poll is for the best generic brand Bath Tissue.  Head over to the LRWC Facebook page to leave your favorite generic brand bath tissue.   Seems that people are pretty brand loyalty when it comes to their TP

If you missed yesterday’s post, you can see which were voted the Best Generic Brand Diapers.

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{ 04/18/2013 with 1 Comment }

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Best Generic Diapers

Sometimes, when we don’t have a coupon for a name brand product, generic brands can cost you less.  We polled the Living Rich With Coupons Facebook fans to find out which generic brand diapers they feel are the best.

Out of 55 comments, the winner are the Up & Up Diapers from Target with Walgreens Diapers coming in second and CVS rounding up third.

Here is the list:

• Target 14
• Walgreens 10
• CVS 7
• ShopRite 5
• Babies R Us/Toys R Us 4
• BJs 3
• Costco 3
• Walmart 3
• Safeway 1
• Stop & Shop 1
• Sam’s club 1
• Kroger 1

Feel free to leave your selections in the comments below.  Also, today’s poll is for the best generic brand Peanut Butter.  Head over to the LRWC Facebook page to leave your favorite generic brand peanut butter.

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{ 04/17/2013 with 10 Comments }

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How to use the New My Store Pages on LRWC

I know that some of you are still having trouble finding the Store Match Ups.  Above is the original video I posted but since then we have made a couple of changes to make it even easier for you view all the deals from the store page.

Here are the 2 changes:

 View Full Match Ups

Once you are on the store page, you will see a Read More on the bottom left (it was smaller and on the bottom right in the video) at the top half of the page.  Click that and the entire weekly match ups will expand and be in full view.

View Full Deals

Below the match ups and on the “Latest Deals” tab, you will see teaser posts of all the deals we have posted for that store.  We have now added a “Click Here to View All Deals” link on top of the teasers.  If you like to scroll and view the full deals, simply click the link to do so.

I know sometimes when things change it gets confusing so I just wanted to show you how easy this new format is and that everything you are used to is still there and can be viewed the exact same way as before.  The only difference is that we stored it all in one place instead of having links everywhere.  So now you will know where everything is, yet you can still see everything exactly as you did before.  Best of both worlds

If you have any questions please let us know.  Comments are  always welcome as it helps us to make the site better and easier to use.

Note: If you don’t see the video above you can try viewing it here.

Oh and as of right now, Acme, A&P, CVS, Harris Teeter, Pathmark, Rite Aid, Stop & Shop, ShopRite, Target, Walgreens & Walmart are all done.  Next up is King Kullen.

Enjoy~

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{ 04/12/2013 with 5 Comments }

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What’s on sale in April

Wondering what’s on sale in April?  Here is a list of some of the deals you will find happening this month.  Knowing sales cycles gives you the advantage of being able to plan your purchases and stock up when those prices hit rock bottom.

Remember, using your coupons paired with a sale is the best way to save the most money on your grocery bill.

Here are a few holidays, sale items and clearance deals for the month of March.  We are already starting to see a bunch of sales, deals and coupons for most of these items.

Be sure to check out the complete  Guide to Grocery Sale Cycles

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{ 04/08/2013 with 3 Comments }

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How to use the New My Store Pages on LRWC

You may have noticed some changes when trying to view the match ups for certain stores.  We are slowly changing over to a new “MyStore” format which has the match ups, preview ads, catalina offers, coupon policy, ways to save and anything else to help you save money at that store.

I know sometimes when things change it gets confusing so I just wanted to show you how easy this new format is and that everything you are used to is still there and can be viewed the exact same way as before.  The only difference is that we stored it all in one place instead of having links everywhere.  So now you will know where everything is, yet you can still see everything exactly as you did before.  Best of both worlds

If you have any questions please let us know.  Comments are  always welcome as it helps us to make the site better and easier to use.

Note: If you don’t see the video above you can try viewing it here.

Enjoy~

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{ 03/29/2013 with 9 Comments }

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Coupon Clipping Has Declined?  No Way I Say!

I can’t find coupons for what I am looking for!  Coupons are just for processed foods!  Coupon clipping has declined!  The economy must be getting better because coupon redemption is down. Yikes!  Well, pack my coupon binder up and call it a day because by the sound of the articles coming out left and right these days you would think that couponing is a thing of the past.

Lately, I have been reading article after article about how couponers are just not clipping anymore.   That shoppers are turning to store brands because they can get them cheaper then name brands with coupons.  I’ve already tackled the brand vs. store brand and I believe I won that argument.   So, why are the media outlets spinning a story to make you think that coupon clipping is down.  Well, besides the fact that they think it’s a hot subject, they simply don’t understand it.

Let’s start with some of the basic facts.  If you look at the chart above you will see that the amount of coupons distributed by brands in 2012 is down from 2010 and 2011 but is still above where it was from 2004 – 2009.  Plus, the amount redeemed by consumers is still at a high percentage, well if you can call that high to begin with.  The biggest change comes in the shortened expiration dates.  As you can see above, it dropped down to an average of 2.3 months for foods and 2.1 months for non-foods.

So, are couponers using less coupons?  Technically yes but not for reasons that the media outlets will lead you to believe.  No we all didn’t come into a windfall of money and yes the economy is still squeezing our wallets.  So, then why do they think that couponers have found a new way to save.  Well, it’s simple.  So simple in fact that they just past over it.

If the amount of coupons being distributed are less and the expiration dates are shorter, then, yes of course you will see a decline in the amount redeemed. The question people should be asking is not why couponers are clipping less coupons but rather, why is the distribution down.  Well, here is a simple answer…the economy.

Tough economic times hit everyone including corporations.  It hits them with budget cuts and distributing coupons costs money and a lot of money.  Corporations pay to place coupons up to be printed, they pay to have them placed in the weekly newspapers and they even pay the stores for processing the coupons.  So, if corporations are experiencing budget cuts, one place they make cuts is by lowering the amount of coupons distributed, reducing the expiration dates and lowering the value of the coupons.  And, common sense tells you that if you have cuts in the distribution of coupons then you will have lower redemption.  Simply fact, less out there, less to redeem.

The other thing you have to take into account, when you compare directly to 2010 is the Extreme Couponing show, which aired December 2009 and peaked all through 2010.  The show artificially boosted the rate of coupons distributed and redeemed with the flurry of shoppers trying to save like they saw people saving on that show, but that is a whole other story.  So really, 2012 has brought us back down to exactly where we need to be and exactly where we have been for many years before Extreme Couponing aired.

Is coupon use dying?  Absolutely not.  Couponers are still out there willing to save big dollars on their grocery bill.  This month alone we saw some great higher value, longer expiration date coupons and lots of them.  And for those that think that coupons are just for processed foods, think again.  Yesterday alone we posted coupons for fresh veggies and meat!  Trying to eat more natural?  Well, you still need paper goods, toothpaste, deodorant.  Couponing and saving in that category alone is enough to  put a pretty penny in your pocket. I am certainly not up for throwing my hard earned money in the trash!  How about you?  What do you think about all these articles.

Source:
Inmar
NCH Marketing
NCH Marketing
Today.com
NBC11 News
The Fiscal Times
coupons.org 

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{ 03/28/2013 with 20 Comments }

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She United Conference at SJU

On Saturday, March 23 St. Josephs University in Philadelphia is hosting the SheUnited Conference for 2013! The proceeds for this conference benefit scholarships for mature adult women! The Conference will have a vendor showcase and networking reception, a luncheon, 2 breakout sessions and more! And, I will be speaking at a breakout session for the conference! I am so excited about the opportunity to share the world of couponing with a whole new audience!

My session will be at 3:15 on Saturday (check out the schedule for the conference). Registration opens at 10:30 am at St. Josephs University! If you are interested in attending you can register below:

You can follow the SheUnited Conference on:

• Facebook
• Twitter #SJSheUnited
• Pinterest

She United Conference at St. Josephs University

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{ 03/19/2013 with 9 Comments }

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