Coupon Blog

Latest Post: How I Paid My Way Through College Without Help From My Parents

Paying for college is hard for the vast majority of people. It’s even harder for some. For me, it was downright grueling. There were plenty of factors that lead to such difficulties, like being an out-of-state student and coming from a family that couldn’t help much financially. However, there were some factors that helped me survive through it, both financially and mentally, like careful spending, the heavy use of coupons, and (the largest of them all) getting married. This is my story.

Since you’ll need to understand exactly why I was an out-of-state student, among other things, I’ll start off with my goals for college from when I was in High School. At the time, I wanted nothing more than to be a video game designer. I still want that to a certain degree, but not as much as I used to. After doing extensive research, I realized that the best way to become a video game designer is to learn how to program games, enter the industry as a programmer, and then prove that I have good ideas as a designer while I’m there. So, I looked into college that could give me a solid programming eduction, and that did research related to video games in one way or another. I was also intrigued by the idea of doing research into virtual reality gaming, so I looked for colleges that did some of that too. After looking around, I came up with only two options that really fit what I wanted; Clemson in South Carolina and Georgia Institute of Technology in, well, Georgia. Clemson was local, GT was definitely not. So, I looked into applying to both, and ran into a snag for Clemson. Clemson requires that you have 3 semesters of foreign language credits. I only had 2. While I felt that it was a stupid reason to exclude me, I was nonetheless excluded. That left Georgia Tech as my only option. Thankfully, I got in without any problems. (more…)

Why a Coupon Blog?

Not only do we like coupons, we like blogging about the savings as well. Join in as we blog about coupon news, videos, events and share articles about anything to do with coupons. Check out the most recent coupon blog posts below.

Coupon Blogs

During the first half of this year 1.6 billion coupons have been redeemed and out of that number, 10 million are digital coupons collectively increasing their use in 2009 by nearly 25%. Coupons are the ultimate answer to saving money in a very tenuous economic market, and if any of us are to be successfully frugal, we need to have time, patience and a plan to be organized. It gets very tedious typing in various keywords into Google, Yahoo or Bing looking for the best daily deals, so streamlining our searches and at the same time reading helpful suggestions created the need for quality coupon blogs.

Coupon blogs help people make better decisions with their finances. We can derive the benefits of consumer opinions, and we can rely on updated information as well as suggestions to find some really good deals any of us might skip over. Let’s use as an example, we blog this week about Barnes & Noble having a 20% discount on mystery book purchases. If someone purchases one mystery paperback for regular price, the next mystery paperback would be half price. Why not buy a book for a present whether it be for your child’s next book report or a stocking stuffer for Christmas?

Coupon blogs puts consumers in contact with others who have purchased the same products or are considering making a purchase. Gaining experience from others is worth a lot of time and money. We can avoid some pitfalls , enjoy tips for saving money and even ask questions as to the merchant offerings. All of this is quite unique as compared to walking into perhaps a JCPenney store and searching for sizes, brands, and direct feedback from other shoppers in the store; I mean how often if ever does that happen? If you read the blogs about the coupons for JC Penney saving $10.00 to $15.00, it’s definitely a savings in your wallet, and easily found on a coupon blog; and probably a lot harder to spot while browsing through the mall.. There are many free gifts offered, free shipping offered and give aways exclusive to blog writing and consumer and member feedback. When was the last time a merchant at the mall offered to pay for your gasoline to and from the store?

I have found there is usually some good and innovative advice I had never thought about when I read coupon blogs. There are “ how to” articles which have enriched family fun. There can be price comparisons of family restaurants, reviews as to the most popular menu items, combination coupons and sound advice and personal experiences relating to merchants. Anything related to coupons both offline and online can be discussed with the primary purpose of helping all of us to realize the most rewards while spending the least amount of money and deriving the most pleasure for ourselves, our friends, our co-workers and our families. Most blogs change quite often, and it is an excellent opportunity to share new store alerts, unique products and even fashion trends we admire. So come visit us and sit a spell… read some interesting ideas and feel free to participate or send in what you would like to see discussed in the future.

–Cheryl Hanna

Sources:
New York Times Business, A Clip-and-Save Renaissance
Small Business Information at About.com, Coupon Crazy Consumers
eHow Article, How to Find Coupons and Deals