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We’re starting off this Sunday with a little Walgreens lesson.  Walgreens is one of the best stores to score some really great deals by way of their Register Rewards.  Register Rewards print out after your transaction and can be used as cash at Walgreens except not on the exact same item that you received the RR on.  For example let’s say I bought a box of toothpaste and this week the promo was buy the toothpaste for $3 and get a $3 RR back.  That’s free, but you did have to start with your $3 investment.  I can take that $3 RR from the toothpaste and pay for my next order which may be a $3 pack of cookies.  You do have to have more items than you have RRs in one transaction so you need to find a cheap little item to add to your order to use the RR on and you might have to pay a few cents extra.  Does that sound complicated?  Once you figure it out, it’s really quite easy.  Successful Walgreens shopping does take some planning and there are great sites out there to help you like Wild for Wags, Hip2Save and The Krazy Coupon Lady.  They will post “match ups” on Saturday taking this week’s ad, matching sales and RR offers up with coupons and even give you transaction scenarios.  As you’ll see at the end here, the score is well worth the time and effort.

Balance bars were $1.59 with a $1.59 RR.  So they were free.  Zarbees cough & sleep drink were $5.99 with a $5.99 RR.  So they were free too.  But then I had $1-off coupons that I printed via coupons.com on Swagbucks which made them $4.99 with a $5.99 RR so that’s a moneymaker – I made $1 on each of these = $5 to me.

Colgate Optic White toothpaste was $4.99 a box.  They were on sale 2 for $7.98 with a $6 RR.  I had coupons from the Sunday newspaper for $1.50 off each.  So I got $3 off the $7.98 which is $4.98 and I got the $6 RR which made it a $1.02 moneymaker – I made $1.02 on every (2) of these = $5.10 to me.

Walgreens brand pads were $3.19 but on sale for $2 each with a $2 RR.  So they were free.  Not a product that I use but a great donation item and I needed the $2 RR to roll to pay for other items like my Balance bars.

Candy was not on the list.  These were all my filler items.  So if I have a $2 RR from the pads that I want to use on the $1.59 Balance bar, I need to add something in to get me over the $2 mark.  So I threw in treats that were on sale to use for Halloween gift packages for school and church class teachers.  The Russell Stover Halloween candies were 59-cents, on sale for 39-cents.  Hershey & Reeses were on sale for 59-cents.  And the Chips Ahoy were 79-cents – which is way too much, but I didn’t really pay for them 😉

So here is a money breakdown….:
(10)  Colgate Optic White toothpastes reg. $4.99 x 10 = $49.90
(5)  Zarbees cold & cough reg. $5.99 x 5 = $29.95
(5)  Walgreens pads reg. $3.19 x 5 = $15.95
(5)  Balance bars reg. $1.59 x 5 = $7.95
(11)  Russell Stover Halloween candies reg. .59 x 11 = $6.49
(5)  Hershey/Reeses reg. .79 x 5 = $3.95
(3)  Chips Ahoy packs reg. 79 x 3 = $2.37
—- total regular price:  $116.56
I paid $11.16, and still have $8 back which = $3.16.
That’s a 98% savings.

98% was so good that I had to go back and play again throughout the week.
Looks like I need to get crackin’ on those Halloween treats.