Do you ever feel like you need a vacation from couponing? Do you get tired of all the clipping, sorting, comparing, and shopping? Do you ever get burnt out? I do.
Don’t get me wrong, I love coupons and the deals that I find from them. But lately I’ve realized that I’m just not as excited to cut out the inserts each week. I love my coupon organizational system, but I’m not as pumped to organize each week. I still love to find the deals at stores, but I don’t jump at actually getting them anymore.
In my effort to understand my burn out, I came up with some signs that may point to this phenomenon:
Top 5 Signs You Need a Coupon Vacation:
1) You can’t find the kitchen table through all the stacks of coupon inserts.
2) The recycle bin is too full to put another newspaper.
3) Family activities only involve cutting, organizing, or matching coupons.
4) You hide from the newspaper boy.
5) Your scissors need sharpening.
In all seriousness, I do think you can get burnt out from couponing and I think it is important to take a break every once in a while. The truth is that deals come and go, so more than likely that AMAZING deal will come again. As we discussed in the Frugal Series, it is not necessary, nor feasible, to hit every sale you come across.
It is also important to remember that our time, as well as our budgets are limited, so if you can only shop one store (as opposed to 3 or 5), then that is ok. If you are only saving half as much, you are still saving. Coupons can help your budget, even if you are only able to use a few a week, so don’t worry if you don’t get them all.
Other ways that may help to relieve the need for a coupon vacation:
Use eCoupons, which allow you to use coupons without having to cut, organize, or carry! Place to get them include:
Shortcuts.com
P&G eSaver
Kroger Family Stores (Fry’s)
Cellfire
Ask for help from other family members every once in a while. Make it fun (break out the chips and dip) and enjoy each other’s company.
Take a break for a few weeks to get refreshed and excited again. Don’t worry about getting the paper inserts (gasp!). You’ll still find amazing deals when you are ready to get back into the swing of things.
What do you think? How do you combat coupon burn out? (or does this just happen to me?)
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Melissa, a mom of 2 boys in Arizona, understands the importance of watching a family budget. After leaving the business world, she dedicated herself to working at home and pursued her passion of helping people.
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I skipped the newspaper completely this past weekend, and actually skipped some drugstore/grocery deals! I’m like you–I still like getting the deals, etc, but I think part of it is that I have enough of a stockpile by now of most things that I can skip some deals, knowing that I can always get it the next time. And if I do by chance run out of something, I save enough the rest of the time that I can pay full price if I HAVE to for a specific item, knowing that I save on everything else.
I don’t shop the drugstores every week anymore, and this week for the first time in forever I didn’t *GASP* bring any coupons to the grocery store, because I didn’t feel like cutting them out (I use the insert method). I couldn’t even use the eCoupons, because I left my Kroger card at home with my coupons (I was bummed about that).
Corrie @ “Cents”able Momma’s last blog post..Kmart Super Double Coupons
LOL! You’re really funny–thanks for my first laugh of the day.
A few days ago, I decided to clean out the drawers in the bathroom cabinet. My own sign to cut back a little on the couponing was when I found 6 Schick Quattro razors, and not a refill in sight! Hey, I’m always getting amazing deals on them at CVS. But even if a coupon, sale and ECBs gets me a $9.99 razor for $3, I think I better back away from the razor coupons for a while.
Unless I can get one for the refills…
mom2fur’s last blog post..Frugal Friday: CC warning
i’m recently back to the drugstore game after a brief hiatus, but i did collect the coupons from each week so i have a mountain of them to tackle this weekend!
Charlene, I agree that is a big part of it- my stockpile is pretty well stocked! Although, I’m always on the look out for baby items (diapers, wipes) since those are always good to have extra of!
Corrie- doesn’t it feel strange to not have your coupons with you? I always feel like I’m forgetting something. Honestly, even if I’m doing a really quick trip (and shouldn’t need coupons), I leave them in my car, just in case!
Mom2fur- Thanks! I was trying to have some fun- glad someone else got my humor!
Brooke- I took a short break from the drugstores recently, too. I love the CVS deals this week and they have some really good ones coming up, too, so good timing for our “vacations” to end!
I have taken many a coupon hiatus in the 10 years I have couponed and when my stockpiles are busting at the seams I will take a few weeks (and when we moved a few months) off from drugstore shopping and major grocery shopping. My sanity is definitely also valuable.
On a flip side when I know a friend is having life overload and not being able to coupon is stressing them out I will offer to get their coupons together or pick up items. My frugal gift to them!
Great article Melissa! Thank you for the reminder.
Tia @ Tia Saving Cents’s last blog post..Souplantation B1G1 FREE Coupon & Mimis Coupons
LOL! @ your list of signs! Great tips for relieving the stress.
I found that one of the ways that I have relieved the stress is by not doing the drugstore shopping. Last year when I started blogging and reading blogs I read about all these people that were saving shopping at the drugstores. I tried it for 3 months and actually found that I was buying more to where I did not have any room for anything else and also spending more doing it because I had the mentality that I had to get all the weekly deals even if I had never used the product before. I finally snapped out of that mentality and realized that the way I had been shopping for years was working for me and I was saving $$, keeping a stockpile and had room to breathe without having to worry about opening a cupboard to have something fall on my head each time. Just this last week, I finished the last of the shampoo I got a 1 1/2 years ago! Today, I still have a few things left from my drugstore shopping days, however, I am not going back to that stress of shopping.
This week, I did my shopping without coupons & drugstores and ended up saving more than I spent!
Thanks for the reminder to not get stressed over a missed deal or even a coupon that expires while one is waiting for the next good deal on an item.
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I’m taking a break right now, in fact. I’m finding that there are fewer and fewer coupons for food we actually eat. Though I am still getting inserts, last week’s coupons haven’t been clipped and the ones from the two weeks before, while clipped haven’t been filed.
I think it’s because I’m too busy canning right now to bother with couponing.
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