Book Review: How I Paid $8 for $170 Worth of Groceries by Charmaine Gerber

Review: How I Paid $8 for $170 Worth of Groceries, Confessions of a Coupon Fashionista
Series: —
Author: Charmaine Gerber
No of Pages: 102
Release Date: April 22, 2012
Received From: Bought

Synopsis:

Have you ever handed over $8 to the check out clerk for $170 worth of groceries at the local supermarket?

I have. The clerk had to call in the manager, he came down and examined every single item on the receipt but in the end he confirmed that there was no mistake. Of course there was no mistake! It had taken a little bit of planning, but when opportunities like these presented themselves, I was ready to take advantage of it. Will you be ready if an opportunity like this presents itself again?

Whilst feats such as this may not be possible every time you shop, I estimate that ordinary Americans are throwing away many thousands of dollars each year on groceries, clothing, eating out, make up, toiletries, vitamins and more.

My name is Charmaine Gerber. I love coupons and I love saving money.
So much so that I have developed a savings system that can help you save thousands of dollars a year on everyday items in only 1-2 hours per week. I decided to let you know exactly how I did it (and continue to do it, week in, week out).

This system is not like many others that are advertised out there. It is about saving the most money on a range of essentials items in the least amount of time possible. This system can literally save you thousands of dollars a year.

In my system you’ll discover:

What online tools you can use to alert you when items you buy are on sale.

How to organize yourself so that you spend the least amount of time possible clipping coupons. I have 4 kids, so can only afford to spend 1-2 hours per week organizing myself. My grocery bill is around $500-$600 a month.

How my sister (with a family of six) spends a fraction over $200 per month on her groceries. Although she spends between 4-6 hours per week using my system.

How to save on healthy produce and organic products. Many people think coupons are only for junk food items. This is incorrect and I will show you many healthy and organic brands that offer coupons for their products.

I’ll show you how to deal with kids and get them to fall into your new household plan for savings.

How to get them to enjoy their school lunches and not hassle you for canteen money

How to master the sales cycles and how to take advantage of seasonal discounting.

And many other ways to save money on electronics, travel, eating out, vitamins, bedding, linen, clothing and more.

If you are looking for a system to get organized and start saving. This is the book for you.

Pick up your copy today!

Please note. This book is targeted towards USA consumers only.

My thoughts:

Ok, now the title is confusing. On Goodreads and Amazon it says How I Paid $8 for $170 Worth of Groceries, but the actual book says Confessions of a Coupon Fashionista. Don’t let the confusion of the names fool you, there is a ton, and I do mean a TON of information in this book! So much so that I’m going to write down and do a series of blogs on if this is working for me and what exactly I’m doing.

So far I’m a little frustrated. The book has so much information that it is nearly too much. So, I decided to do what Charmaine Gerber said a friend did, to look up store deals and spend $10.00 on something just to stock my shelves. Doesn’t sound like much but after just one month of doing that you’ll have $40.00 worth of groceries that are just for backup.

Tomorrow is my first day shopping and now that I have my coupons clipped and the store deals written down, I’m pretty excited. I decided to do a grocery list just for the coupons I have, and I do have a ton!

I also decided to put my grocery list and my coupons in order by the grocery store, any coupons that I printed or clipped that are not being used I put away in order of date so I don’t get confused with what I’m using this week.

So, all and all I think I’m pretty well prepared. The myriad of information in this really is amazing, daunting a bit, but still amazing. Charmaine does say that it takes time to accumulate a good set of coupons and it will probably take a good month to two months to really get on track but I’m planning on sticking to this!

I would recommend everyone with just one little hour to spare per week, read this and try some of the techniques. I’m quite intrigued but a little stressed! But as she says, if you think of coupons as money, saving a dollar here and there is definitely worth the time!

Shopped at: Target
Amount of coupons: $18.29
# of items: 27
Amount Spent: $126.21
Amount Saved: $26.09

Ok, saving $26.00 doesn’t look like much but that was with only going to Target and only using the coupons I had printed. Sadly I didn’t start this prior to Sunday or I would have had the Sunday coupons as well. So, I think this is a pretty good start. Especially since we normally spend closer to or over $200.00 a week, which is just ridiculous!!

I also spent nearly $10.00 on sale items! We use spaghetti sauce like it’s going out of style, so having good spaghetti sauce on sale does wonders for the pocket book!

For next week I plan to get the Sunday paper and clip coupons all on Sunday and have my list prepared and ready to go off of those coupons by Thursday.