Couponing for Beginners-Volume Six (The different inserts and what's in them!)

As I mentioned in a previous post, there are three common types of inserts in the Sunday paper. Smart Source has been around for as long as I can remember, and is in pretty much every Sunday paper every week. In the Smartsource insert, you will find a variety of coupons, usually on more food items than personal care items, and usually smaller amounts off. The most common coupons in the last few Smartsource inserts were for 50 cents off yogurt, 1.00 off two boxes of Cheerios, etc. I probably use more internet printable coupons than I use coupons out of the Smartsource inserts, but I still save every coupon at this point (unless it's for something I know we don't use, like meat) because you never know when you will have a Target coupon or Rite Aid coupon to go along with it that might make the product free!

Redplum is the next common insert. This insert is usually in the local version of the paper, not the statewide paper. This insert has coupons similar to Smartsource, but also includes some coupons of greater value, and often a lot of personal care coupons. Usually the coupons for personal care items in the Redplum insert are for a dollar or more off, and if the coupon doesn't exclude trial sizes, this makes for a lot of free stuff!

P&G is the only other insert I have seen more than once. This insert comes out every once in awhile (there were two of them over the last two months, but one of them was because of the Olympics, so I doubt it will happen again soon.) and contains VERY high value coupons for products manufactured by Proctor and Gamble. You can usually find their coupons online where you can load them onto savings cards like Safeway and Albertsons. I'll talk more about that in another post. This is how I get a ton of free product, usually combining them with various store coupons to get the most bang for my buck. :) If a paper is coming out with a P&G insert in it, I will always suggest that you buy more than once copy because chances are there is at least one coupon in there that does not exclude trial sizes, and that usually means the paper has already almost paid for itself just from one coupon! These are my favorite inserts. :)

The other inserts in the Sunday paper are usually just the ads from various stores (around here Grocery inserts come in the mail on Tuesdays but sometimes they are in the Sunday paper as well.) If your grocery inserts come on Sundays be sure to keep your eye out for Albertsons ads and look through them thoroughly for doublers. I keep my ads for a few days so I can easily plan my shopping trips.
The only other insert that usually contains coupons is the USA weekend or the PARADE magazines. Usually they will have one or two coupons hidden in the middle or back of them. They can be for anything from diabetic glucose monitors to a package of crackers, so always look through them just in case. :)