Your first super deal!

So I'm just going to jump right in with an awesome deal that I scored this week. There is going to be a lot of terminology here, and I would definitely qualify this as advanced. Read through, and then let me know if you need anything clarified.

Weis has a fantastic offer this week. You get an instant $5 off a $25 Campbell's purchase. Your first tip, Weis always uses the original shelf price, not the sale or after coupon price. So here is what I bought:

 Now, let's add on some coupons. Weis doubles all manufacturer's coupons, up to $1.00. That means that if a coupon is for .25 off, it doubles to .50 off. A coupon for .75 off, doubles to 1.50 off. A coupon for $1.00 off stays one dollar. Get it? Good!

Now let's talk Catalinas. Catalinas (CAT) are coupons that print out at the register. They are not typically random, you usually have to purchase an item to trigger one to print. Catalinas are good for your next purchase. Sometimes they are coupons for other items. Sometimes they are $ amount coupons, good towards any purchase.

     This Week, Weis has a few Catalina offers.Let's focus on the one that matches my purchase. The offer is: Buy 2 Campbell's Go Soups and get $1.50 CAT  to use on a future purchase. Buy 3 or more, and get $2.00 CAT. Let's stop right here for a second, and do a little math. If I buy two, I get $1.50 back, or essentially .75 cents per soup. If I buy three or more I get $2.00 back, or essentially .67 cents per soup. Right there is something you need to be able to do. Most people would buy the three, thinking they were getting more money back, when really you are getting less. The same exact offer is being offered on Campbell's Kettle Style Soups.
I bought 2 of each, so I earned a total of $3 in CAT. Now, some people like to take that $3 and look at it as a further discount on this shopping trip. I don't. I can't use it now, it doesn't lessen the actual amount of money I am handing the cashier right now. So therefore it is just a bonus, that will help a future purchase look better.

So, let's make this shopping trip even better. Do you know those three lovely coupons that come in the mailed circular? They all are for completely free products. All you have to do is make a $25 purchase. Did you know that the $25 is based off the shelf price also? NOT off of the sales price! So that means, that the same $25.29 worth of soup is good for getting my three free items! So let's add those on beow, and see what that does for my percentages...

 On this transaction, I actually had a $1.50 CAT from last week, so I actually only paid $2.87.

I am going to touch on another term here called Rolling Catalinas. This shopping trip was done making five seperate purchases. I did this for a few reasons. 

1. The $5 instant Campbell's savings was limited to one per transaction.
2. I was able to take the $3 in CAT I earned on this transaction, and put them on the next transaction. In that transaction I earned more CAT and applied those to the next transaction, and so on. (Rolling Catalina)
3. I was able to print out multiple sets of the three free items coupons from an email that was sent to me by Weis. (Remember what I said about signing up for EVERYTHING that a store offers...)

So there you have it. A step by step breakdown, with lovely little charts.

You can not realistically do this without a list. It is just not a good idea to even try it. 

Oh and I went back over my receipts, found some mistakes that were made on Weis' end, and dashed back to the store and got $15 cash back. So my actual grand total was $393.45 worth of groceries for $62.69. That is an 85% savings. Always go back over your receipts.