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SALT LAKE CITY -- Wondering how you are going to pay for the school supplies your kids need?
There is a solution.
One extreme-couponing mom has figured out how to buy school supplies for pennies on the dollar. She says anyone can do it, and it doesn’t require coupons.
Price matching at Walmart is the secret.
Go through your Sunday paper and the circulars that come in the mail each week. Each store will be advertising a few lost-leader school supply items.
These items are priced ridiculously low. The store may even lose money when you purchase these items — but it's worth it to get you in their store. They do this hoping you also will purchase other items that aren’t on sale.
Go through the sale ads each week and make a list of all the lost-leader sales from every store. If you put all these sales together, you can get everything you need for pennies.
For example, Office Depot recently had copy paper for $1 a ream, glue for $.01 and binders for $.50. Office Max had 100 sheets of filler paper for $.01 each, pens for $.10 and pocket folders for $.25. Target had big Mead one-subject spiral notebooks for $1.
The trick to saving big is not buying anything until it's a lost-leader sale. Walmart will price match any advertised sale.
Start collecting these supplies now and watch the sales each week. You can find everything your kids need, and you won't break the bank.
The supplies pictured (13 packs of pens and pencils, four reams of printer paper, five packs of lined paper and two spiral notebooks — a $42.37 value) were only $6.25 using this system.
Happy shopping.
Kimberly Giles is the founder and president of LDS Life Coaching and www.claritypointcoaching.com. She is a life coach who has a radio show, LIFEadvice, on Utah's AM 1430 Saturday mornings at 8 a.m.
