Getting more mileage out of your coupons

Posted by Matt

Hello Frugalizers. My apologies for not sharing with you in a while. It hasn't been for lack of topics; that's for sure. My amazingly frugal wife comes up with new tips all the time, including this week's.

Our readers know by now that we try to buy quality, so imagine our surprise when our string trimmer died suddenly after only a few years of service. Leah called the service center and the tech told her that it sounded like the motor on our machine had burned out and that it would be cheaper to buy a new one than to fix the old. This is one of the downsides of the marketplace putting too high of a priority on low prices...we end up buying "disposables" and potentially spend more in the long term buying things multiple times that could (if well built and well maintained) last a lifetime. Now, having said that, let me get off of my soap box and back to helping YOU, dear reader.

We decided that we would replace our string trimmer with a lawn edger, as that is mostly how we had used the last model. (Maybe they are not built for that?) Leah just happened to have a coupon for Lowe's, but with gas topping $4/gallon, didn't want to drive to their nearest store 8.5 miles away. Knowing that "it never hurts to ask", she called the nearest Home Depot (2.3 miles away) and was told that they would honor a Lowe's coupon. I spent a few quick minutes online checking reviews and reading Consumer Reports articles and we had a new edger that very afternoon.

Many businesses offer "price matching" and it is a great way to save money (including product and fuel costs) and time!