Mar 10, 2009

Walgreens Basics


***Edit***
Rumors are swirling all over the "frugalnet", May is the last month that Walgreens will have their EasySaver Program. We are hoping that they still have the great coupons that have been in the EasySaver Booklet, but we shall see. I've also heard that they'll be printing rebates instantly at the register like Best Buy does instead of us submitting them the old way. I'm looking forward to see just what new program that they come up with! I'll change the information in here once the new changes take effect. In the meantime, take advantage of the EasySaver Rebates and coupons while they still have them!


Have you ever wanted to know how to take advantage of the great deals at Walgreens?

Here are my tips for shopping at Walgreens so that you can begin to take advantage of the great deals too!

First off, Walgreen's has their regular weekly sale ad - usually not super great prices, but the coupons in there can be used in addition to any MFG coupons you may have for additional savings.

Next, Walgreens has a monthly rebate booklet called the Easy Saver Catalog that contains all the rebates for the month, PLUS money-saving coupons in it, which can be used in addition to MFG coupons. These catalogs are located on the rack with the weekly ads in your store. Grab a few, you might need them! The ES Catalog has rebate listings for items purchased at Walgreens. This means, there are opportunities for you to purchase a product and get $X.XX back just for buying that item! You simply save your receipts for the qualifying purchase and submit the rebates online to get your money back! And, if you request the money to be loaded on a Walgreens Giftcard instead of them sending you a check, you'll get a 10% bonus just for doing that! That 10% bonus covers any sales tax that you paid on those items.

An example this month from the ES Catalog is Pert Plus Shampoo. My store has it for sale for $3.79. I used a $2.00 MFG coupon on it making it $1.79. There is a rebate available in the ES Catalog for up to $4.29. They'll refund me the $3.79, the original price (+10% on my card) making it an overage of $2.38! Basically, I "made" $2.38 for buying the shampoo:)

Here's a REALLY GOOD tip that I came across this last week. As soon as you get home from your shopping trip, go online and enter the receipt codes on your rebate eligible purchases. But, Don't click "submit". (You may have other purchases that you want to make when a new ad comes out that month, and you can only submit rebates once per month.) At the end of the month they will automatically process your rebates. By doing this you don't have to worry about forgetting to submit them or losing your receipt. I just lost a rebate from last month because I went to enter it on the 3rd and they had to be submitted by the 2nd. Don't make my same mistake!

Walgreens also does something called Register Rewards (RR). These are MFG coupons that print out with your store receipt, when you buy certain products. They can almost be used just like cash on your next order. An example right now is the Kellogg's promotion that if you purchase 4 boxes of Smart Start for $10, you get a $5 RR - so very cheap cereal! (Even cheaper if you have any MFG coupons for them as well!) You can then use those RR's earned, on your next purchase. The only catch with these is you can't "roll" the RR's, meaning, you cannot pay with a RR on more cereal and get another RR for it. You CAN, however, pay with a RR from a different promotion (i.e., Diet Coke, Clean & Clear, Irish Spring, etc.) and then still get another RR for the Smart Starts.

Register Rewards are considered MFG coupons in the register's software. The software is setup to not accept a greater number or MFG coupons than there are items in your order. Always remember that when checking out! If you ever run into this problem, simply throw a couple of really cheap items on there to "up" your number of items. If you homeschool, I've found the seasonal pencils that they have to be cheap filler items and my kids love getting new ones!

One last thing to keep in mind is that depending on the sales tax laws in your state, you might not be able to use coupons, RR's, or overage to bring your total down below the sales tax owed. Some states allow this but laws do vary from state-to-state. Also, when calculating sales tax into your deals, some states requires sales tax charged on the sale price before a coupon is deducted. So, an item may be "free" meaning you're only paying the sales tax on the original price for it.

~~~~~~~~~~Edit~~~~~~~~~~~`

There is a preferred order to submitting your coupons to avoid problems at the register.

Submit your coupons to the cashier in this order:

MFG coupons, including RR's
BOGO MFG coupons
Easy Saver MFG coupons
Store ad coupons

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Enjoy your shopping trips at Walgreens!
Walgreens BasicsSocialTwist Tell-a-Friend

No comments:

Post a Comment