Sometimes You Need A Plan B

After my meeting this afternoon, I ran over to my favorite (And by favorite I mean it's new and huge so it has lots of stock- I do not mean the customer service is my favorite- just to clarify.) Rite-Aid.  I am truly and immediately in actual NEED of body wash.  Since I started couponing, I have been able to find gobs of men's body wash for FREE.  But I've not had the same luck with women's products.  I mean, I give my local food banks bags full of men's body wash and deodorant regularly.  Which is nice of me.  But momma needs to smell clean too, you know!  And I am now just too stubborn to pay more than pennies for anything used in my bathroom.

This week at Rite-Aid though, there is some shower love for us girls.  The Nivea body wash has a great deal going.  Buy $15 worth and receive a $5 + up Reward.  And there is a GREAT coupon in the newspaper today for $3/1 Nivea women's body wash.  Finally a coupon for women instead of men!!  Remember that I get five Sunday papers for the coupons.  But if you don't, maybe you could pool your coupons with your friends and then split up the body washes?  Just an idea.

Of course I also always cruise by the clearance end cap in every store too.  Sometimes you find great deals and sometimes it's all yuck.  But it takes 20 extra seconds and often results in some great deals.  Like today!  Mine had the Nivea Touch of Bliss body wash in Apricot Blossom and Fruit Essence Scent (hello ridiculously long name!) marked down.  Regularly priced at $5.99, but on sale for $2.99.  I had already fallen in love with the non sale scent of Orange Blossom and Bamboo Essence though.  Since I needed a fifth bottle to reach my desired $15 mark, I bought one of those too.

So nine years later, here's what I picked up and the mini drama that ensued...

(4) Nivea Touch of Bliss Apricot scent body wash  reg. $5.99, sale $2.99
(1) Nivea Touch of Happiness Orange Blossom scent body wash  $5.99

Minus...
(1) $3/$15 survey coupon
(5) $3/1 Nivea Body Wash coupon

Drama...
They did not want to let me use all five of the $3/1 coupons because my total was less than that amount.  The sales girl was BEYOND rude to me.  First of all, she talked on the phone the entire time I was there and at not one, but two points, turned her back to me (mind you I was only buying those five body washes) to talk on the phone and/or to the manager who previously accused me of stealing even though he admitted I could in fact use a BOGO coupon with a BOGO sale.  I asked if they would just mark down the coupon.  The girl was just sooo rude and said no and literally threw the coupon at me.  Shocked, I said that I believed she could just mark it down to the value of the item being purchased.  She said no in an even nastier tone.  And said she would call the manager.  Even though the "you're stealing" manager was standing right there, leading me to believe he is not in fact a real manager.  The nicest manager came up and I politely explained what was wrong and asked if he could just over-ride the computer and mark the value of the coupon down.  He was all, OK no problem.  The sales girl was MAAAAD!  I am sure she and the fake "you're stealing" manager are still talking bad about me.  The thing is, this all got so out of control that my explanation of "yes you certainly can mark it down to the non-tax price" sort of got lost in translation.  So out of pocket, I paid NOTHING.  Which was not my intention.  Sometimes you just have to pick your battles, you know.

But you know what, I walked away with FIVE FREE body washes.  And I did it fair in square.  The sales girl was so mad and throwing stuff at me that she never even marked down the coupon.  So at the end of the day, the store actually made a flippin' profit larger than they should have.  I was nice and calm and polite the entire time.  With age comes wisdom, right?  And the city should be cheering that I am no longer in danger of running out of soap!

Total value purchased ... $29.97

Paid out of pocket ... $0

Percentage saved ... 100%

Then I went all the way out to CVS because I had a coupon (from a survey maybe?) that expires today for $4/$20.  And I am determined not to let Reward Dollars and big coupons like that go to waste if possible.

I planned to use it to buy Head & Shoulders,two mini first aid kits to keep in my car, two Green Bag Tags and three cases of Diet Coke.  The deal this week is buy three Coke Cases for 3/$11 and earn a $2 Extra Care Bucks.  I have an $8 ECB coupon reward thing (it's not an ECB- it came from the magic red machine and I think it's something to do with past purchases?). 

But I couldn't find the $8 ECB.  Aaaah!  I looked everywhere and realized I must have left it at home on my desk where I was putting everything together last night for this trip today.  I really didn't want to buy the Coke without that coupon though.  But I went well out of my way to shop at CVS to use the expiring $4/$20 coupon.  I needed to think on my feet to get myself to a pre-coupon purchase of more than $20.  Thankfully my coupon binder was with me.  I circled that store a zillion times.  But settled on seven travel size Degree Men deodorants because they were $1 and I had $1/1 coupon with no size restriction.  I was going to have to pay tax buy was OK with that.  Once again, another addition to my donation box in the form of men's bathroom products.  I also bought one of those embarrassingly giant cans of ice tea because I was about to fall over from dehydration.  It's not pictured as I drank it and the can was already in my recycle bin.  Sorry.

Purchased...
(1) Arizona Tea  reg. $0.99, sale $0.88
(1) Head & Shoulders shampoo  reg. $5.89, sale $4.99
(1) Head & Shoulders conditioner  reg. $5.89, sale $4.99
(2) Johnson & Johnson mini First Aid Kits  reg. $0.99
(7) Degree Men travel size deodorant  reg. $0.99
(2) Green Bag Tags

Minus...
(1) Free Green Bag Tag with purchase (I did not understand why this was free but the sales girl seemed excited for me so I went with it.)
(1) Buy one H&S Shampoo, get the conditioner for FREE from this Sunday's newspaper
(1) $1/2 any Johnson & Johnson Red Cross products
(7) $1/1 Degree Men's deodorant

Total value purchased not including tax ... $23.73

Out of pocket including tax ... $5.26

Percentage saved ... 73%

So in review, everything pictured is ...

Valued at ... $53.70 

Paid out of pocket ... $5.26

Percentage saved ... 90%

And earned...

$5 + up Reward from Rite-Aid

$0.99 ECB from CVS (from second Green Bag Tag)

$2 ECB from CVS (from H & S shampoo)

For others not in the CVS know, the Green Bag Tags are great.  You simply attach them to your re-usable bags and scan them when you make a purchase.  Every four scans result in a $1 ECB!  And the sales girl told me that you can scan them at every store you go to during one day.  I have never been to more than one CVS in a day, but she said if you go to say three in one day and make a purchase at each different store, you may have it scanned all three times. 

This post was sort of all over the place but the point is that while it was not quite the easy breezy plan I started with, I still did really well.  I do these posts both to show you what deals are available this week and to encourage others, the way they have encouraged me.  It's fun to see successful trips for items we all like to use. 

And guess where I found that missing $8 ECB after I got home?  In my stinkin' wallet!  Where I looked at least three times and had in my hand while paying.  I'll go get the Diet Coke later in the week I guess.