Sometimes it pays to price match

Price Matching. For those unfamiliar with this couponing strategy, it's where you take your ads to another store and request they honor the competitor pricing. One major national chain does this: WalMart.

The advantage of price matching is not having to drive to all the stores (drug and grocery stores) to get the best prices of the week. WalMart has recently made it's coupon policy a lot more friendly. They do take internet coupons. They do price match competitor coupons WITH a specific price listed. While they won't honor the BOGO deals or deals for rewards dollars the drug stores are famous for, they WILL honor a BOGO if it lists a specific price.

Here's how I worked it today: Walgreens has bagged Werther's candies on sale BOGO, with a listed price in the ad of $2.29. I have two coupons for 75 cents off the werther's candies (smart source 3/13). Walgreens doesn't allow "overage" so you can't use a coupon on the free item. That means, my OOP at Walgrees for these candies would be $1.54.

Instead of heading to Wags, I went to Walmart where they will let me use two coupons on those items! They rang up $2.99 a bag. The cashier price match them by ringing the first bag at $2.28 and gave me the second bag for a penny. It's a weird glitch in the system, but they can't "give items for free." Then, the cashier scanned my coupons. I ended up paying .79 cents TOTAL for both bags!

Walgreens also had Cap'n Crunch on sale for $1.75. My Wags only has original. Walmart carries more variety in the size on sale AND I was able to use my 50 cent coupon (red plum 4/17). I paid $1.25 for the cereal! Another option for this deal is to use the $2 off 3 boxes of Quaker cereals from the Pepsico Moments to Save flyer from a couple weeks ago. You'd score 3 boxes of Cap'n Crunch for $3.25 or just $1.08 a box! This coupon expires Saturday, so use it fast!

Whenever you price match, bring the ads with you. The cashiers are supposed to keep the competitor circulars at front with them, but that's not always the case. Bring your own copies just to be safe and to speed up the process.

I've found some cashiers are better than others at price matching and working the coupons. It doesn't hurt to profile your cashiers. I will wait longer in line if Linda (my favorite cashier) is working just because I know she knows what she's doing.