Mom Saves Community Millions on Groceries

[Hum]

Emily Graves, 29, is a mom of two who manages to save her community millions of dollars a year with just her weekly grocery list. She says anyone can do it.  

By day she?s a typical working mom living in Ottawa, Kansas. But it?s her hobby, creating a shopping list that compares sale ads, that?s turned her into a retail rock star.

?The comp list is a spreadsheet of all the deals from local grocery stores. I look up ads from 25 different stores and find the best deals for the groceries,? Graves explains.

Her price comparison spreadsheet allows her to buy everything she needs at one store that price matches. The comp list includes dozens of everyday items, such as cheese, cereal, toothpaste and laundry detergent.

Graves began compiling the weekly list two years ago for herself when she was a stay-at-home mom. ?We needed to save money, and we couldn?t really think of any different way to save on our budgets. So cutting groceries was going to be the best option for us,? she says.

At first, she sent the list to her mother for fun. Soon, friends were asking for it. It continued to spread through word-of-mouth, and now Graves has 20,000 weekly readers through her blog, Twitter, Facebook and an email blast. The list itself has grown, too, and it takes her 20 hours to complete it.

?I?ve always found coupons to be very time consuming,? she says. ?They?ll expire, or I?ll forget about ?em.?

This month Graves is featured in All You magazine. Readers and a panel of judges, including myself, voted her "America?s Smartest Shopper" for the incredible savings generated by the list.

 

Graves surveyed her readers last year and learned the average savings is $80 a month. Even if only half her readers save that much, that?s nearly a million dollars a month and $9.6 million over a year.

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[Gotenks98]

Phail cuz she does not use coupons. You can save an extreme amount of money with them. Furthermore you dont even have to clip them yourself. Just use a coupon clipping site for what you want and they will send you the coupons. No reason to not use coupons at this point.

[spacer]

I'm sure the grocery stores love the fact that they are losing so much money because of this list. Now that the secret is out, I wonder how long it will take for the stores to put a stop to it.

[Joe User]

I'm sure the grocery stores love the fact that they are losing so much money because of this list. Now that the secret is out, I wonder how long it will take for the stores to put a stop to it.

 

I don't see how they could do that.

[HawkMan]

I don't see how they could do that.

Stop price matching.

[Hum]

Using coupons is an illusion.

 

Manufacturers and stores add in to the product prices the cost of using the discount of the coupons. :laugh:

 

For example, if they figure 10 percent of all customers will use the coupons, they add a cent or two in compensation.

 

Those who don't use the coupon, are paying for 'your' savings.

 

Coupons are just another form of advertising and an attempt to get your brand loyalty.

[jerzdawg]

Using coupons is an illusion.

 

Manufacturers and stores add in to the product prices the cost of using the discount of the coupons. :laugh:

 

For example, if they figure 10 percent of all customers will use the coupons, they add a cent or two in compensation.

 

Those who don't use the coupon, are paying for 'your' savings.

 

Coupons are just another form of advertising and an attempt to get your brand loyalty.

how do the free item coupons fit into your theory?

[Sandor]

Stop price matching.

They'd all have to do it in unison...and they won't.

[Hum]

how do the free item coupons fit into your theory?

'free items' are to get people hooked.

 

It all gets figured in the pricing.

[Growled Member]

I'm sure the grocery stores love the fact that they are losing so much money because of this list. Now that the secret is out, I wonder how long it will take for the stores to put a stop to it.

 

It probably won't be long now.

[HawkMan]

They'd all have to do it in unison...and they won't.

Why wold they ?

Not all store do it right now,as she says she only shops at those that do.

So if one more stops doing it, that puts more pressure and lower margins/higher losses on those that still do. Which will cause more to stop, putting even more pressure on the remaining ones until none are price matching

[Sandor]

Why wold they ?

Not all store do it right now,as she says she only shops at those that do.

So if one more stops doing it, that puts more pressure and lower margins/higher losses on those that still do. Which will cause more to stop, putting even more pressure on the remaining ones until none are price matching

 

Highly unlikely there would be zero places doing it. It's often a competitive advantage and they certainly don't make a loss on your custom even if they match.

[fusi0n]

awesome

[HawkMan]

Highly unlikely there would be zero places doing it. It's often a competitive advantage and they certainly don't make a loss on your custom even if they match.

 

When only one is left doing it, or even 2-3. and a whole community is using this list they would be losing money left and right. Price matching is a competitive advantage when it done one a few products. when a customers is price matching their entire shopping cart to other stores having a loss sale or buying at lower prices, then they lose money on every item in the cart, and when there's a lot of customers doing this, they start losing a lot of money. and then it's not a competitive advantage, it's a competitive liability. 

[Praetor]

i just don't see how can a store stop a costumer from checking the prices; there's also the online store which also has prices, how could they stop one from fetching the data from there?

[Slammers]

Using coupons is an illusion.

 

Manufacturers and stores add in to the product prices the cost of using the discount of the coupons. :laugh:

 

For example, if they figure 10 percent of all customers will use the coupons, they add a cent or two in compensation.

 

Those who don't use the coupon, are paying for 'your' savings.

 

Coupons are just another form of advertising and an attempt to get your brand loyalty.

 

Obviously coupons are factored into prices etc. but there is no reason not to use them. If a coupon makes something you were going to buy cheaper, thats a saving, not an illusion.

You sound like you dont use coupons on some strange principal.