FreeSalsa
Well-Known Member
Joined: Dec 27, 2010 18:43:26 GMT -5
Posts: 1,013
|
Post by FreeSalsa on Apr 29, 2013 23:42:49 GMT -5
Oh, forgot to mention...when I went to pick up my fruit box, it's in my old neighborhood, where I used to pick up the freebie coupons that are in with the ads on Sundays and tossed in the driveway. My old street doesn't get them anymore, but I discovered today that a few of the surrounding streets still do. I feel bad picking them up from in front of houses, since each house only gets one. But I drove around a bit more until I founds some apartment buildings that had some left out. I figure if 4-100 people live in that building and not one of them picked up the ad in 24 hours, nobody really wants it that badly so it's ok to grab it.. I got three copies today but I will try for a few more next time. And in doing that first and getting to the fruit place at 6:30 instead of 6:20 a.m., I got almost a full box, instead of just half a box, which is what it has been lately since I've been getting there earlier. They had ten extra minutes to fill up the box. More product for the same effort = good.
|
|
hopetoberich
Established Member
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 15:31:10 GMT -5
Posts: 403
|
Post by hopetoberich on Apr 30, 2013 6:43:10 GMT -5
About the bag tags.....can I scan it for each card for the $2 coupon? I have one for 2 cards but if its not active now can I scan it for all cards? Whatdoyathink? Is that to sneaky? I will go today and scan anyway for one card free coupons don't pop up anymore like they used to.
|
|
constanz22
Senior Member
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 14:32:17 GMT -5
Posts: 4,219
|
Post by constanz22 on Apr 30, 2013 7:31:41 GMT -5
About the bag tags.....can I scan it for each card for the $2 coupon? I have one for 2 cards but if its not active now can I scan it for all cards? Whatdoyathink? Is that to sneaky? I will go today and scan anyway for one card free coupons don't pop up anymore like they used to. I was wondering if the "final" GBT EB is going to print on all cards, too. Not sure. I got one yesterday. I have another EB on another card I have to spend this week, so will let you know...I would "think" it will print on all cards.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on Apr 30, 2013 8:37:28 GMT -5
About the bag tags.....can I scan it for each card for the $2 coupon? I have one for 2 cards but if its not active now can I scan it for all cards? Whatdoyathink? Is that to sneaky? I will go today and scan anyway for one card free coupons don't pop up anymore like they used to. The UPC on the bag tag is generic so it should scan and produce the EB for each card that you have. I read that some stores are removing them from your bag and keeping them. They have no right to do that. You purchased it; it belongs to you.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on Apr 30, 2013 8:42:03 GMT -5
Oh, forgot to mention...when I went to pick up my fruit box, it's in my old neighborhood, where I used to pick up the freebie coupons that are in with the ads on Sundays and tossed in the driveway. My old street doesn't get them anymore, but I discovered today that a few of the surrounding streets still do. I feel bad picking them up from in front of houses, since each house only gets one. But I drove around a bit more until I founds some apartment buildings that had some left out. I figure if 4-100 people live in that building and not one of them picked up the ad in 24 hours, nobody really wants it that badly so it's ok to grab it.. I got three copies today but I will try for a few more next time. And in doing that first and getting to the fruit place at 6:30 instead of 6:20 a.m., I got almost a full box, instead of just half a box, which is what it has been lately since I've been getting there earlier. They had ten extra minutes to fill up the box. More product for the same effort = good.Correction: More produce for the same effort = MOST EXCELLENT!!
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on Apr 30, 2013 8:45:24 GMT -5
I went into CVS yesterday to get my free bag of M&Ms. I had the gal scan my bag tag and I got the $2 EB. She told me the bag tags were ending on 5/31 and each time we reached 4 uses, we would get the $2 EB. I think that's pretty generous although I agree that this will probably come back to bite them. Not necessarily at my CVS because it's the closest store to our housing development. People will go there for stuff rather than drive 3-5 miles to Raleys/Safeway. But the three in the town next door will definitely suffer--they have more grocery stores than we do. God forbid any of us should need toothpaste, but you can get some for free at Target this week. They have the 3 pack on sale for $5.99. Use the $1 q from P&G insert (April or May--April expired 4/30 though). Pay $4.99 plus tax and get a $5 target gift card. It was supposed to be B3G$5 gift card but the ad did not say that so they are honoring the ad. I'll take any freebies I can get these days, even toothpaste. I don't see it free much anymore. What brand is this? Crest
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on Apr 30, 2013 9:49:56 GMT -5
Good idea. I would like to report that the CVS brand of lotion that is the generic for Vaseline lotion (aloe vera scent) is not holding up well, after about 6-9 months. It's starting to smell a bit off. I might be able to finish the whole bottle but we'll see. I'm not surprised. Vaseline IC doesn't hold up very well either. I did stockpile about a dozen of the "New" Suave Naturals, using them as a filler, when they were on sale for $2.50 and I had $2/1 coupons. They will not hold up either, but DH liked the Mandarin scent, so he is happy to work through them. I'm currently using Olay. When that's gone I'll break into my massive stockpile of high-quality, long shelf-life lotions (Aveeno, Lubriderm, Eucerin, and Nivea). I KNOW that the Aveeno holds up for years and that is the brand that I have the most of , so we'll use the other brands first.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on Apr 30, 2013 10:53:15 GMT -5
THE GROCERY CHALLENGE IS DOING JUST FINE!! I know that the numbers of participants that we have on the GC is down because let's face it - there just aren't that many deals to talk about. We will never know how many people stopped posting over the years because they lost interest in sharing or because life got too busy to post or because life got too busy to coupon anymore. Maybe several thought they'd take a well-deserved break, but never got back into it. Who knows? But guess what? We're doing just fine. I posted on the WUC Drug Chain/CVS Forum this morning a little after 8:00 am. I was doing some other stuff on the computer and went back to WUC about 1/2 hr. later and I noticed that my post was still the most recent post on that forum!! That means that of the hundreds of members and guests that participate there, no one had anything to say about any of the drug chains for 1/2 hr. I knew that things had been slowing down there too, but a 1/2 hour lag on a very popular, national couponing network, on one of their busiest forums, says a lot for what's happening these days. Considering that, I think 5-6 pages for the month for the GC isn't bad at all.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on Apr 30, 2013 17:05:11 GMT -5
CVS GREEN BAG TAGI can comfirm that the GBT UPC does not self-destruct after you get a $2EB. DS used my bag tag to get a $2EB on his card.
|
|
hopetoberich
Established Member
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 15:31:10 GMT -5
Posts: 403
|
Post by hopetoberich on Apr 30, 2013 19:56:25 GMT -5
Cool, glad to hear is does not blow up a well! Now to find all the old cards.....they won't be taking mine without a fight.my made up grand kid has asked for it! Lol.
We have a huge brand new CVS being build across the street from the rickety old one. I think they missed the boat a bit on customers now that couponeres don,t go there much.....but they did a head count when things were flying and it justified a brand new building back then. Now they would be lucky to have a new shed being built!
|
|
marvholly
Junior Associate
Joined: Dec 21, 2010 11:45:21 GMT -5
Posts: 6,540
|
Post by marvholly on May 1, 2013 7:03:54 GMT -5
So far another NOT impressive grocery sale week. I still need to check 1 independent store & my av fruit/veg market. In spite of that this is going to be an $$$$ grocery week. I NEED cat food. I NEED parmesan cheese. I will soon need coffee, cheddar cheese, mozzarella cheese & swiss cheese (looking for a $5 Fri at Safeway on cheeses). It is a good thing I was able to put aside $19 over 4 weeks in April I needed. That will cover some.
Just heard on Tue that our new Super WalMart groundbreaking is 5/1 w/opening projected for spring 2014. Also, we are getting a Marianos (lovcal/regional independent) just east of the new Walmart. That is defiantly going to change my shopping route/routine.
|
|
973beachbum
Senior Associate
Politics Admin
Joined: Dec 17, 2010 16:12:13 GMT -5
Posts: 10,501
|
Post by 973beachbum on May 1, 2013 9:30:27 GMT -5
Hi all! I haven't posted lately because I had computer problems that made it really difficult. I guess I would have tried harder if I had a great deal to post but we all know that didn't happen. I haven't set foot in CVS, or any other drug store, in at least a month. This year I have shopped there very little. I do go in at least once a month for a prescription but that is it. The couple of times I bought something that gave me a ECB I made sure to use it that same day. No way am I going there just to get a free candy bar. Have a great day all!
|
|
murphath
Well-Known Member
Joined: Dec 22, 2010 16:12:33 GMT -5
Posts: 1,981
|
Post by murphath on May 1, 2013 10:38:18 GMT -5
973beachbum wrote: No way am I going there just to get a free candy bar. That is exactly what I did the other day. And I'll do it will DD's card today. Of course, for me, it's a store I pass no matter where I go as it's at the bottom of the hill. Marvholly:Not much happening with the grocery store ads around here either. I did get my Raley's points reward though ($6.00--most of which was points they gave me to get started and the double points on some of my cherry picking items. Took me 3 quarters to earn it!) It came with some good Raley's coupons as well so I'll go there some time this week. It's the only place around here that sells Organic Valley milk and we have fallen in love. If you haven't tried it, and you like milk, beware: you'll become addicted. The 1% tastes just like full fat milk. The nonfat, which is what I use, is also very good. I'm not hounding as much because nothing too great out there. And because I have a decent stockpile. I'm still using coupons, Just4U etc. at the grocery stores which helps. As always, if I wanted to get back into the game full bore, I'd have to spend some money to get the stash of EBs, UPs etc. I'll wait until I really need something that's not in my stockpile. In the meantime, I'm just doing the close to free or fantastic deal stuff. One thing about Target that I noticed: on the P&G B1G1 free (such as buy swifter starter kit, get 1 cleaner free) you get the full value of the coupon. I had to buy a new mop so I decided to get the Swifter. I had the $3 off q and the B1G cleaner free. The cleaner was $4.71 but the full $6 was taken off.
|
|
skubikky
Senior Member
Joined: Dec 20, 2010 7:37:12 GMT -5
Posts: 3,044
|
Post by skubikky on May 1, 2013 12:14:03 GMT -5
One thing about Target that I noticed: on the P&G B1G1 free (such as buy swifter starter kit, get 1 cleaner free) you get the full value of the coupon. I had to buy a new mop so I decided to get the Swifter. I had the $3 off q and the B1G cleaner free. The cleaner was $4.71 but the full $6 was taken off. That's cool. It's gonna be take what you can get. I realize I'm going to have to shift my mindset to paying OOP and just trying to get the lowest price with hopefully a coupon thrown in to help ease the pain.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on May 1, 2013 12:35:45 GMT -5
Cool, glad to hear is does not blow up a well! Now to find all the old cards.....they won't be taking mine without a fight.my made up grand kid has asked for it! Lol. We have a huge brand new CVS being build across the street from the rickety old one. I think they missed the boat a bit on customers now that couponeres don,t go there much.....but they did a head count when things were flying and it justified a brand new building back then. Now they would be lucky to have a new shed being built! The culture of how CVS corporate wants their stores run has definitely changed. They used to allow the DMs and store managers to run their stores as they saw fit. They were allowed to push through CRTs to allow stacking, they were allowed to make generous substitutions (once I got albacore for $.39/can because they had run out of regular tuna), they were allowed to write rain checks generously and let you use them until the quantity ran out, they were allowed to accept expired CRTs and EBs, etc. Then EC aired in late 2010. The DMs and store managers continued with what had always been "business as usual", but they were extending it to a boatload more couponers. My guess is that there were not enough profits from regular customers to make up for all the perks that they had and were continuing to give the couponers and corporate took notice when profit margins fell. I can't remember exactly when (I think it was sometime in 2011), loss prevention stepped in and started auditing stores. Slowly but surely the generous "perks" that DMs and store managers had been allowed to extend as "they saw fit" and that couponers had become accustomed to, started to disappear and OOP started to rise. I believe that both management and the staff were threatened with disciplinary action and even termination for infractions. I suspect that some couponers who had been shopping and stockpiling at CVS for years slowly started to pull back and eventually stopped shopping entirely, but were replaced by newer couponers who had no clue about what used to be and were able to get what were still pretty fantastic deals. Then CVS drastically pulled back on issuing $/$$. For me and many others, I think that was the straw that broke the camel's back. Customer service that probably never should have been extended in the first place had disappeared and now THAT?? My exit was pretty abrupt. My last $/$$ was issued in early December. I rolled into the cash card deals and got out. It seems that CVS management and CVS corporate were too eager to gain market share and that is why they bent over backwards with CS, started the GBT and BC programs, and kept issuing $/$$, etc. Unfortunately, though, once you let the genie out of the bottle and give people a bunch of stuff, they don't take well to it when you take it away; and ironically as a result of all that "stuff", many couponers no longer need all the rinse and repeat deals that CVS offers. For CVS, it's a Catch-22. The great things that brought us in are cutting into their bottom line; but taking them away means we walk which will do the same thing. I follow what is going on at CVS on WUC and the participation on that forum (which I believe had the highest participation rate on the site) has drastically declined in the last 6-9 months. I check in regularly just to keep up on the latest and greatest. It has been interesting to watch and I wonder what CVS will do going forward. Maybe they will just suffer through the lower sales as they establish a new normal or maybe they will succumb to offering perks to bring us back in. Right now it appears they are doing the former rather than the latter, but you never know....they may change their mind. Unless they do, I'm on the sidelines watching.
|
|
saveinla
Junior Associate
Joined: Dec 19, 2010 2:00:29 GMT -5
Posts: 5,229
|
Post by saveinla on May 1, 2013 12:52:30 GMT -5
In my area the pharmacy is the big money maker here in all 3 drugstores. I have 5 CVS stores within a 1.5 mile radius (3 of them are 24 hour stores), 3 RA, 2 Walgreens and they are hopping all the time. People who come to the pharmacy browse and get other items also. Yesterday, I had stopped by the CVS near the high school and there was an old lady in front of me, who spent 188$ for wound care supplies. I don't think any of the drugstores will suffer here even if they don't offer too many deals. I am not sure about the areas which do not have many options, but I have not noticed any lack of sales here. I am amazed at what people will spend at CVS and I wonder why, but may be it's just a habit for them, like it is for us to search for the lowest price.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on May 1, 2013 13:25:10 GMT -5
One thing about Target that I noticed: on the P&G B1G1 free (such as buy swifter starter kit, get 1 cleaner free) you get the full value of the coupon. I had to buy a new mop so I decided to get the Swifter. I had the $3 off q and the B1G cleaner free. The cleaner was $4.71 but the full $6 was taken off. That's cool. It's gonna be take what you can get. I realize I'm going to have to shift my mindset to paying OOP and just trying to get the lowest price with hopefully a coupon thrown in to help ease the pain.That's the way that it ALWAYS used to be before the drug chain rewards (RRs, EBs, UPs) and rebates (Longs' United Rebates, WAGs' Easy Saver Rebates, and Rite Aid's Single Check Rebates). Getting low or no OOP on food items that were relatively cheap to begin with was possible back in the day, but getting free non-perishables was EXTREMELY rare, even at grocery stores that doubled. That is why I was all over the non-perishable freebies like white on rice. I know that I often got on my soapbox about couponing for and stockpiling non-perishable freebies, but I had never seen sooooo many products that had NEVER been free in the previous 20 years that I had been couponing and stockpiling - not even "cheap" shampoo!! Geez, I didn't even really need a price book for products that were offered at the drug chains; my rock bottom price for soooo many things was $0!! Now and going forward, the couponer/stockpiler's best friend will be the price book. Knowing your rock bottom prices and your rate of usage for products is going to become really important so that you'll know when to buy and how many to get. The positive thing is that lack of freebies means that you'll probably no longer want so many sets of inserts. 3-6 sets garnered from family, friends, neighbors etc. will probably do it for most people unless they find a rare "killer" deal and then hopefully there will still be some clipping services still around to accommodate you.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on May 1, 2013 17:30:07 GMT -5
ANOTHER GREAT EXAMPLE OF "IF YOU DON"T ASK, THE ANSWER IS 'NO' "!!Talk about a brain fart. For some reason I got it into my head that I had one more Sunday to use my Staples Rewards. Then late last night I realized that they had to have been used yesterday. I can't remember EVER letting a reward expire. I tell ya, mentalpause is a bitch. I was so disgusted with myself, I almost picked them up and put them in the shredder, but then that little voice stopped me and said, "Hey, why not call tomorrow and ask if they can still be used?" So I did. I asked for the manager and he said, "No problem. You have a couple of days." So off to Staples I went . I had $13.98 in rewards. I bought a container of binder clips that were on clearance for $2 that we needed. I swear the ones I have/had have legs. I also found two more hardback books by best selling authors who I like to read for $1 ea. I looked around, but couldn't really think of any other office supplies that I needed, so I bought (2) packages of Scott Paper Towels (6 rolls = 9/pick-a-size) on sale $4.99 ea. I need them like a hole in the head, but they were a good value. Hey, it's not like they'll expire. My total came to EXACTLY $13.98!! Since I was out and about, I ran into CVS to pick up a couple more bottles of Dawn (free after $2 GBT EB). I really couldn't think of anything that I needed or wanted there either and although I have a boatload already, we go through a lot of dish liquid so, hey, why not? While I was in the CVS shopping center, I thought I might as well go into Safeway to check their meat markdowns. I had already looked at the ad and checked J4U and knew there was nothing on my list from that. I found pot roast on clearance. Normally, $4.99/lb., on sale for $2.99/lb. and marked 30% off of the sales price which meant $2.09/lb. to me!! It's supposed to be really hot tomorrow, so that will go in the crock pot for dinner.
|
|
FreeSalsa
Well-Known Member
Joined: Dec 27, 2010 18:43:26 GMT -5
Posts: 1,013
|
Post by FreeSalsa on May 1, 2013 23:39:27 GMT -5
Sprouts 99c whole pineapple--got a rain check Tecate 6 pk beer $4.99--got a rain check Clif bar $1 - .50c 4/7 SS = .50c (some places got a $1 Q = free) organic cucumber .69c Rudi's organic bread $3.50 - Sprouts Q in coupon book in store $1 = $2.50 (today only, last day of sale, first day of Q. There's also an IP on Facebook that could probably be stacked but I couldn't print it, probably because I already did weeks ago.) Organic Sprouts tortilla chips $1.50
|
|
FreeSalsa
Well-Known Member
Joined: Dec 27, 2010 18:43:26 GMT -5
Posts: 1,013
|
Post by FreeSalsa on May 1, 2013 23:40:30 GMT -5
ANOTHER GREAT EXAMPLE OF "IF YOU DON"T ASK, THE ANSWER IS 'NO' "!!Talk about a brain fart. For some reason I got it into my head that I had one more Sunday to use my Staples Rewards. Then late last night I realized that they had to have been used yesterday. I can't remember EVER letting a reward expire. I tell ya, mentalpause is a bitch. I was so disgusted with myself, I almost picked them up and put them in the shredder, but then that little voice stopped me and said, "Hey, why not call tomorrow and ask if they can still be used?" So I did. I asked for the manager and he said, "No problem. You have a couple of days." So off to Staples I went . I had $13.98 in rewards. I bought a container of binder clips that were on clearance for $2 that we needed. I swear the ones I have/had have legs. I also found two more hardback books by best selling authors who I like to read for $1 ea. I looked around, but couldn't really think of any other office supplies that I needed, so I bought (2) packages of Scott Paper Towels (6 rolls = 9/pick-a-size) on sale $4.99 ea. I need them like a hole in the head, but they were a good value. Hey, it's not like they'll expire. My total came to EXACTLY $13.98!! Since I was out and about, I ran into CVS to pick up a couple more bottles of Dawn (free after $2 GBT EB). I really couldn't think of anything that I needed or wanted there either and although I have a boatload already, we go through a lot of dish liquid so, hey, why not? While I was in the CVS shopping center, I thought I might as well go into Safeway to check their meat markdowns. I had already looked at the ad and checked J4U and knew there was nothing on my list from that. I found pot roast on clearance. Normally, $4.99/lb., on sale for $2.99/lb. and marked 30% off of the sales price which meant $2.09/lb. to me!! It's supposed to be really hot tomorrow, so that will go in the crock pot for dinner. This reminds me, I have to call Rite Aid and get my expired Ups extended.
|
|
marvholly
Junior Associate
Joined: Dec 21, 2010 11:45:21 GMT -5
Posts: 6,540
|
Post by marvholly on May 2, 2013 6:08:50 GMT -5
Dancin I feel the same way about my Safeway (dominicks) ad again this week. In fact none of my stores have much I want but I will still be shoping the clearance/markdown shelves while I am out. Also, one store that I have not seen the ad on and w/my slow internet connection I am WAAY too lazy to check online plus I need some bread/rolls from their day old rack. Even my big/fav fruit/veg market is NOT exciting this week.
I know my CVS store mgrs are really fed up w/the .....stuff corp is (not?) doing/allowing them to do.
|
|
murphath
Well-Known Member
Joined: Dec 22, 2010 16:12:33 GMT -5
Posts: 1,981
|
Post by murphath on May 2, 2013 10:46:00 GMT -5
Dancinmama wrote: While I was in the CVS shopping center, I thought I might as well go into Safeway to check their meat markdowns. I had already looked at the ad and checked J4U and knew there was nothing on my list from that. I found pot roast on clearance. Normally, $4.99/lb., on sale for $2.99/lb. and marked 30% off of the sales price which meant $2.09/lb. to me!! It's supposed to be really hot tomorrow, so that will go in the crock pot for dinner.
Just to show you how bad my Safeway is: when meat is on sale, there's a yellow tag underneath the regular price tag to show you how much you're saving. If it doesn't sell, they pull off the yellow tag and then put the 30% off tag on it. How do I know? Some of the yellow tag is still on the package. Not that there's much clearance anyway because, as I said, Safeway and Raley's are the only game in town. When I was working full time, I didn't have time to "cherry pick" deals.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on May 2, 2013 11:32:27 GMT -5
In my area the pharmacy is the big money maker here in all 3 drugstores. I have 5 CVS stores within a 1.5 mile radius (3 of them are 24 hour stores), 3 RA, 2 Walgreens and they are hopping all the time. People who come to the pharmacy browse and get other items also. Yesterday, I had stopped by the CVS near the high school and there was an old lady in front of me, who spent 188$ for wound care supplies. I don't think any of the drugstores will suffer here even if they don't offer too many deals. I am not sure about the areas which do not have many options, but I have not noticed any lack of sales here. I am amazed at what people will spend at CVS and I wonder why, but may be it's just a habit for them, like it is for us to search for the lowest price. I hear ya and I agree that the pharmacy is their bread and butter; but CVS spent a lot of money on advertising and incentives and created a business model that would bring customers in to shop the front end of the store, even if they never used the pharmacy. My take on things is that all went well for quite a few years. The stores were hopping and the business model appeared to be doing what CVS corporate had set out to do - increase front end sales. Sales volume and profits were soooo good that they bought out Longs Drugs to gain market share in areas where they were not yet established. From what I can tell with my own store (a Longs conversion in '09) and I assume many others all went well until sometime in 2011 (after the advent of EC) when CVS stores were flooded with too many of the same type of customer - the customer that only wanted to shop for free. It took them longer than I would have expected, but CVS finally realized that there was a price to be paid for all that sales volume, a lot of which was being subsidized by THEIR OWN MONEY($/$$, % off, etc.)!! My theory is that CVS is trying to establish a "new normal" in front end sales and has taken, and is continuing to take, steps to flush out the customers that only want to shop for free by drastically limiting the free CVS money that they give them ($/$$) and in some cases even eliminating it (the GBT EBs). They definitely will see a drop in volume, there is no way that they won't; but they will probably compensate for it by eliminating jobs (also saving $$ on benefits) - a cashier here or there, an extra person that might have been hired to stock, etc. It will be interesting to find out if what we've seen is the end of it or if CVS corporate will pull back even more.
|
|
dancinmama
Senior Associate
LIVIN' THE DREAM!!
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 20:49:45 GMT -5
Posts: 10,659
|
Post by dancinmama on May 2, 2013 11:51:27 GMT -5
Dancinmama wrote: While I was in the CVS shopping center, I thought I might as well go into Safeway to check their meat markdowns. I had already looked at the ad and checked J4U and knew there was nothing on my list from that. I found pot roast on clearance. Normally, $4.99/lb., on sale for $2.99/lb. and marked 30% off of the sales price which meant $2.09/lb. to me!! It's supposed to be really hot tomorrow, so that will go in the crock pot for dinner.
Just to show you how bad my Safeway is: when meat is on sale, there's a yellow tag underneath the regular price tag to show you how much you're saving. If it doesn't sell, they pull off the yellow tag and then put the 30% off tag on it. How do I know? Some of the yellow tag is still on the package. Not that there's much clearance anyway because, as I said, Safeway and Raley's are the only game in town. When I was working full time, I didn't have time to "cherry pick" deals. The difference probably is that my store can't do that and move the product. When I went in yesterday it was after 2:30 and they probably had (8) pot roasts and a few other things still in the clearance bin. Safeway and Nob Hill (owned by Raley's) are the only grocery chains in my town also, but we have a lot of Hispanics in our town and two grocery stores that cater specifically to them (Arteagas, the ONLY local grocery store with two locations, and Mi Pueblo) so that probably accounts for part of the difference.
|
|
rubyslippers
Well-Known Member
Joined: Jan 2, 2011 19:32:42 GMT -5
Posts: 1,001
|
Post by rubyslippers on May 3, 2013 6:47:02 GMT -5
I stopped at CVS the other day and got a free candy bar with DH's card and then the $2.00 greenbag ECB which I used on 2 Dawn. They still didn't have any peanut butter, so I'll have to burn my ECBs next week.
I've been holding on to a couple of Lowes $10/50 IPQs and used them this week on building and garden materials.
Overage at Walmart with the Almay coupons got me a pound of butter, Arnold flat buns and ketchup for $.62 OOP. Yesterday I price matched a local store's bacon for $1.99 a pound. Meijer had their coffee at a price drop and that's about all I got there.
I went over my April totals and my coupon savings were the lowest for the year, but I spent less than I have been so it wasn't a bad month. I am out of UPs at Rite Aid and it's actually a relief to not worry about how to roll them every week. Since that is closer to me than CVS, I'll jump in if and when I see something worthwhile.
|
|
constanz22
Senior Member
Joined: Dec 18, 2010 14:32:17 GMT -5
Posts: 4,219
|
Post by constanz22 on May 3, 2013 7:37:27 GMT -5
Thank you CVS for $8 in free money! LOL, was able to scan my 2 regular cards and 2 old back up cards to get the free candy bar and $2 GBT EB on each. Then I turned around and used the one that was on a card I never use to buy a half gallon on milk for 1.99 for zero OOP. I'll take it.
|
|
marvholly
Junior Associate
Joined: Dec 21, 2010 11:45:21 GMT -5
Posts: 6,540
|
Post by marvholly on May 3, 2013 8:51:43 GMT -5
Ok, I bit the bullet & started the May thread.
|
|