Thrifty Thursday - Free Sorrento Cheese Sticks!!!

There are peelies on packages of Sorrento Cheese sticks for a $5.00 mail in rebate when you purchase two Sorrento snack cheese products.  There is a FIVE rebate per household limit on this rebate and everything has to be purchased between 3/1/10 and 9/30/10 and received by 10/31/10.

The smaller packages of string cheese are $3.99 each at my local Wegmans but they will probably be on sale at some store somewhere in the near future so pay attention to your sales flyers.  There was also a coupon for $3.00 off when you purchase two Sorrento cheeses in the May 2, Smart Source coupon insert. 

Deal Scenario:
Purchase 2 small packages of Sorrento cheese sticks for $3.99 each = 7.98
Use $3.00 off 2 coupon from May 2 coupon insert = 4.98
Send off for $5.00 rebate = FREE CHEESE + $.02 overage - but who's counting :-)

My children love cheese sticks, as do I, but it is hardly ever the most economical way to purchase cheese so this is a fun, free way to get a treat for them (and me). 

Happy snacking!

Free Money In Your Inbox (check your junk mail)

Magazines.com sends out emails a few times a week.  I almost always delete them but I do look to see if the email title has anything about a gift card in the subject.  Most of the time, the subject title involves a "discount" or "savings" and I hit delete but, sometimes, a few times a year, the subject says, "gift card" and I do NOT delete that email.  The reason I don't delete that email is that you are given the option of using your gift card code or cashing it in for a check!!!  The current email that I just received had "$5 Gift Card Enclosed for Mother's Day Deals" as the subject.  If you do receive this email, look down at the bottom and it will tell you that you can go here to request a check instead of using your gift card code on a magazine subscription.‏  If you want or need a magazine subscription, go for it, but I'll take my $5 check instead.  You might think, what's the big deal about getting $5?  Well, they offer gift cards at least 5 or 6 times a year so that is $25 or $30, assuming you catch all the emails and request all the checks - not bad for doing nothing.  If you haven't signed up for their emails, go ahead because they are sure to send out another offer sometime soon. 

New Me, New Plan, New Posts

I've decided to get my act together and start posting regularly.  I was having a hard time for a while but now I've decided just to share the things here that I share with my girlfriends in the real world - nothing earth shattering, but fun and probably money saving.  I also think that having a theme for posting tends to help keep me on track. 

I'm thinking of the following: (please let me know if they sound ridiculous)

Savings Sunday (stores and sales I'm going to hit this week)
Manic Monday (an overview of what my week contains - meals/food prep)
Mama Tuesday (what my daughter calls it since she doesn't go to school T/Th - a fun "mommy" tip or activity to do with munchkins)
Wild Wednesday (the day my husband and I have together with no kids - either involves a very cheap date or home improvement - probably a rundown of something totally mundane with a tip to make it easier
Thrifty Thursday - some fun way to save money/stretch a buck
Take Five Friday - a link, story, antecdote to make you take 5 and enjoy life - also mandating I tell you how I took 5 over the week - trying to work in my own 5 is hard so I'm hoping to be accountable here
Family Saturday - suggestion for something to do all together whether your family is just one or 100

Also I will throw in additional posts that may not fit the schedule but this will at least give me some structure and guidance and also provide a regular posting routine for any readers that I might someday get :-)

Rebates Create A Happy Mailbox!

I have started to receive my rebate checks and items in the mail and it adds a bit of excitement to my day.  I just received my copy of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang from Kelloggs which might come in handy if we do get all the snow that they are calling for this weekend.  I also received two checks for $5 each from Johnson & Johnson products for purchasing Glade candles.  I posted more about my rebate system here but, these three transactions were definitely money makers and took no time at all.  If you have been reluctant to try rebates, you might want to reconsider.  I did and have been pleasantly surprised at the ease and benefit of rebate programs.   

Rebates - Worth it?

Today, as I was filling out a few rebate forms, I decided to share my thoughts on rebates and let you know the system that works for me.  I will submit for some rebates, but I am not willing to jump through a thousand hoops just to get $1.00 back. 

I have three file folders within one hanging folder that I use for rebates:  Rebates - To Do, Rebates - In Process, and Rebates - Pending.  Whenever I print off a rebate form or find a rebate program that I will participate in, I fill out the informational part of the form, name, address, etc. and drop it in my Rebates - To Do folder. 

I then put the name of the item on an index card that is on my bulletin board.  Currently the card has, "glade candles, huggies diapers, organic pet food, olay stuff" written on it.  These are the products that I currently have "Rebates - To Do" for.  The index card just reminds me not to throw away a receipt that contains a purchase for any of these items before checking to see if it works with the rebate.

When I have a receipt that applies to a rebate, I go ahead and pull the rebate form from the "To Do" folder, fill it out completely, copy it all, place the date sent at the top of the copy and put the copy in my "Rebates - Pending" folder and go drop it in my mailbox for pickup.  This works most of the time unless it requires more action, then I use the "In Process" folder.

My "Rebates - In Process" folder contains those rebates that need more than one purchase to send in.  Right now it has my Caregivers Marketplace information ($.75 back per pack for Huggies), organic pet food forms (buy 10, get 1 bag free) and the DVD circles from the backs of Raisin Bran (need 5 for a free DVD). With Caregivers Marketplace, you need to purchase at least 5 items before sending in the form so I just keep paperclipping my receipts to the form until I have what I need and then I follow the above steps for copying and mailing.  The pet food requres UPCs from the bags of food so as I clip those, I attach them to the form and as I finish a box of cereal, I cut the circle and clip it to the form. 

None of this is rocket science but this is what keeps it quick and simple for me.  With this system, I know exactly what I need to save, where it is in the process and then I don't lose track of what should be coming in the mail.  Today, all I had to do was sit down for about 10 minutes and finish off some rebates to get them ready to mail tomorrow.  For 10 minutes time, I will receive: 1 DVD (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang) from Raisin Bran, two $5 checks from Glade candle purchases, $13.48 from Olay quench purchases, and $5.25 from Caregivers Marketplace = $28.73 + a DVD! 

The icing on the cake is that the cereal was free using double coupons and a killer sale, the candles were $.99 each after sale/coupon, the olay was BOGO and the diapers were bought on sale with a coupon and all of these items are ones that I WOULD HAVE PURCHASED ANYWAY. 

I'm not going to purchase a product that I don't/won't use just to use a coupon to get a rebate to almost cover the cost of the item that I wouldn't have purchased in the first place :-)  I'm not that girl.

   

Free Olay Lotion (x 2)

If you want to try the new Olay Quench body lotion, now would be a good time since there is a rebate form here for you to get your entire purchase price back by mail with a limit of TWO rebates per name or address. If you have a coupon, this would be an even better deal. You have until January 29, 2010 to make the purchase so you've got some time to watch the sales and look for coupons. I've found that most times there are coupons, rebates and sales all around the same time for the same products in order to promote those products multiple ways. Since you can submit two rebates in the same envelope, pay attention for BOGO sales for this product!