Walmart Shopping Trips

I use to shop at Walmart prior to my coupon days. Most people that I run into are Walmart shoppers. Walmart does have decent prices on a lot of their items and yes they generally tend to be just a little cheaper (some products a little and some a lot) on many of their products that they sell.

Since I have started using coupons I can always get a better deal at any of my grocery or drug stores than Walmart by using coupons and shopping the sales.

Walmart usually sells their boxes of Kellogg's cereal for around $2.75. Publix may charge $3.99 for that same box on any given day BUT if you wait for them to put it on sale for Buy One Get One Free and then add a $1/2 or a $1/1 coupon to the cereal you are getting it for $1 - $1.50 per box.

I usually make one stop into Walmart per month...sometimes 2 depending on the coupon deals.

When I shop there I only buy the things that are free or pretty darn close to it.

I went into Walmart twice this month (because I was getting Redbox movies) and here is what I bought...

#1
1 Crayola Star Wars Giant Coloring Book: Retail: $6 Clearance Price: $3 (Christmas gift)
10 Kotex PantyLiners @ $1 each, Used $1/1 coupon making them free
5 boxes of Crayloa Crayons @ .25 each
2 Boxes of Markers: 1 @ $1 and 1 @ $2
1 ALL You Magazine: $2.24, Used a .50/1 coupon from last months issue
9 boxes of Hefty Storage Bags @ $1 each, Used $1/1 coupons making them free
3 Adams Dog Flea Collars @ $.97 each, Used $3 coupons making them free and I also received the overage from each coupon ($2.03 for a total of $6.09 in overage)
2 Pringles @ $1.50 each (as a request from DH)
1 Gallon of Milk @ $1.98
1 .88 toy for my daughter

Total: $37.26
Used: $28.50 in coupons
Total OOP: $10.14 with tax ($7.76 subtotal)

#2
Barbie Hopscotch marked down to $2.50 (orginally $10)(gift stash)
4 packs of Rubber Body Parts marked down to .75 each (putting back for Halloween party)
10 Kotex Panty Liners @ $1 each, used $1 coupons making them free
8 cans of green beans (DH's favorite) @ .58 each (no other store could beat there price this week)
11 Kites marked down to .20 each (these things are awesome for Kite Day parties)
1 Big kite marked down to $2.50 (and then of course I saw the same one for $1.75 at Target today!)
2 Seasonings @ .50each
8 USA tatoos marked down to .25 each (for 4th of July next year)

Total: $27.84
Total OOP: $17.84 plus tax
Had I paid original prices for everything I would have spent...$44.64 even with the coupons!

I splurged on some of these things with the extra money I have left over from saving my budget money over the last few weeks.

I do include any purchases that I make for toiletries and groceries in my $50 weekly budget. The other items have their own budget of $100 per month (for misc items). I always find great clearance sales all over and so we made sure to include that in our monthly budgeting. Sometimes I go a week or two without buying anything and then there are times when I spend $150 or more (like I did at Kmart here)!