Stockpiling Through the Year: A Practical Example

Earlier I gave you a guide to stockpiling through the yearly sales cycle. I wanted to provide you an example of this.

September is a month of back to school sales. With back to school comes Box Tops for Education (BTFE) Contests and with that sales on items that bear the box tops for educations. What brands bear the Box Tops for Education label? General Mills, Kimberly-Clark, Ziploc, and most recently added Nestle Juicy Juice.

This week my grocery store (Pick N Save/Copps) has the following promotion going on: buy 10 BTFE bearing products get a catalina for 50 BTFEs, buy 15 items get a catalina with 100 BTFEs and buy 20 items get 170 BTFEs. I don’t have any kids in school but BTFEs are good for trading coupons during the school year. A few months ago I traded 130 BTFEs for a coupon for a FREE jumbo pack of diapers.

So, I started looking for coupons to match this sale. It makes sense, if these products are being heavily promoted then chances are there are high value coupons to go with the great sale prices. These are the coupons I found on Coupons dot com that matched the sale going on at my store:

$1 off one Pillsbury Grands Biscuits (on sale 10/10) so I get them free after coupon
$1 off two Betty Crocker Potatoes (on sale 10/10) I get them free after I double this coupon*
$1 off two Old El Paso products (on sale 10/10) I get them free after I double this coupon
$1 off one Chex Mix available here (on sale 10/10) so I get them free after coupon
$1 0ff any Green Giant Steamers (on sale 3/$4.98) free with overage after doubled coupons

Here is one easy transaction I can do to get free food plus a catalina with BTFE’s
$5 five Chex Mix
$5 five Pillsbury Grands Biscuits
$10 ten Betty Crocker Potatoes
$5 in other grocery items
=25
-5 Chex mix coupons
-5 Pillsbury coupons
-10 Betty Crocker Potatoes coupons doubles
=$5 and get a catalina with 170 BTFE which is a $17 value

This should leave me well stocked with mashed potatoes and biscuits for the holidays. I always make sure to check the expiration date when I buy food for my stockpile like this because I need it to last me a few months.

You may want to check your grocery stores sales circular for BTFE promotions coming up. The coupons on Coupons dot com get reset once a month in general so make sure to print these high value coupons before then are removed from the website.

* My grocery store doubles 5 coupons up to $1 in value when you purchase $25 worth of items.