Shut the front door!

(Click to enlarge)

Remember my Crest money maker at Rite Aid? Yeah, so I had no idea that it would qualify for TWO SCRs when I bought it. Usually I get an email notifying me that my SCR submission has been received and approved but this time, I didn't get one so I decided to check. When I first checked, I only noticed the first one which said I didn't qualify. I was annoyed because I thought there was a mistake. I even dug the circular out of the trash and prepared for a fight when I noticed that what I didn't qualify for was something I wasn't going for anyway so it wasn't a big deal. The deal was even sweeter when I noticed that I qualified for not one, but TWO rebates so that makes my money maker even better at $2.26! Woot! I love surprises like this.

Where are my goodies?

You might have noticed that there's been a shortage of deals postings around here lately. It's not because I don't want to post good deals or freebies, it's because there just haven't been much going 'round the past week or so. It's like it's hot then it's cold. I think it goes in waves. That or I come across some screaming good deals that either doesn't pan out or that it makes you jump through so many hoops, a circus poodle gets less of a workout that it's not even worth it. (I personally test and try each deal I post on here so I am extremely picky about what I share with my readers. I don't want to waste your time.) I'll definitely keep you guys posted whenever I see something good come up.

In the mean time, don't forget to do your daily Swag Bucks where you can easily get 3 Swag Bucks each day by clicking through their No Obligation Special Offers, Trusted Survey, and Daily Poll. Plus there is "Midnight Madness" where you have a higher chance of getting SB via searches. Don't forget to check the video ads as well.

Then there's also the Kroger Sweepstakes. Don't forget that! There are still 46 days left on that promo! You can win up to 2 prizes each cycle and the new cycle starts August 8!

Deals -

A couple of deals to share with you today:

Aaron Brothers - 1 cent sale is back! Buy any frame get the second one of equal or lesser value for 1 cent. (thanks, Robin!)

Crabtree & Evelyn - get a 50ml tube of Hand Therapy lotion for free! Plus a coupon for 15% off your entire purchase good through August 5, 2010. Coupon here.

Deals be runnin' with the devil: Zhu Zhu pets

I've held off on these for as long as I possibly could, but after much debate with my husband over IM, we caved and bought a pack of these rodents for our kids for their upcoming birthdays.

Target's deal of the day is a 3 pack of Zhu Zhu Pets for $15.99.

Use the code MT9ZC7RW at check out for an additional 10% off. Shipping is free. By the time it was all said and done, after tax 3 Zhu Zhus for around $15. My last check on Amazon, just one of them goes for $11, so that's a pretty good savings...even if you do think it's Tickle Me Elmo fad redux. :p

Source: Couponing to Disney

P.S. Don't forget to shop through sites like Upromise or Ebates. Shopping at Target.com through Upromise will give you 2% back for college. Ebates will give you 3% cash back.

Heads up, coupon buffs!

The folks over at FatWallet has a master list of current, up to the minute coupon codes! Apparently, the members there are really good about keeping them current, and removing any outdated/expired codes.

Source: Consumerist

Steals! - Medco Health Store

I really debated on whether or not to share this with you guys because it was a bit of a frustrating pain in the ass to do. One minute things worked as described, the next it didn't, then it worked again, then I had to cancel my order and reorder making one item I really wanted backordered, and I had to pay extra shipping for. (Shipping costs are a huge pet peeve with me since they are rarely refundable if you return something.)

My hope in the end is that my order goes through and I get what I ordered. If that's the case, I'll share my success with you. Till then, I'll let you decide if you want to go through the trouble of scoring some potentially AMAZING deals.

So there's Medco Health Store. They're an online pharmacy if you will, that's in conjunction with drugstore.com. (I know this because when I went to reorder something, they told me I couldn't do it because the deal was only good one per household, including same household with drugstore.com accounts.) Right now (and I don't know for how long) they have some steals going on:

Aim Toothpaste, Whitening, Mint Gel or Aim Ultra Mint $0.99 ea
Buy 4 Aim items, save $4 = 4 FREE Tubes of toothpaste
Pepsodent Toothpaste $0.89 ea
Buy 4 Pepsodent items, save $4 = 4 FREE Tubes of toothpaste
Butler Dental Floss, Fresh Mint, 140 yards $1.19 ea
Buy 5 Butler select products, save $5 - $0.19/ea or $.95/5
Carmex Cold Sore Reliever and Lip Moisturizer, Jar $1.49 ea
Buy 3, Save $3
Final cost– $0.49/ea
Band-Aid Butterfly Closures, Medium (10 ct) $1.79 ea
$2/1 instant coupon– FREE

Chapstick Lip Balm $0.99 ea
Buy 4 and save $2 with the instant coupon - $0.49/ea

K-Y Jelly, Personal Lubricant 4 oz $3.69 ea
$5/1 instant coupon– FREE ****

OR (you may not get both, it's either or for the deal)

K-Y Warming Jelly Personal Lubricant $5.29 ea
$5/1 instant coupon – $0.29 ****

Just to name a few. There are more stuff on sale, but frankly, after the trouble I had with the order, I feared that my sale items would disappear on me while I shopped, so I only snagged what I absolutely wanted and didn't bother to shop around. Rumor has it there are some Gillette shave gel (for men) and Nivea for Men body wash that's for a steal too, but I didn't look at those. I looked at some rumored Pampers baby wipes, and the price had increased from what was mentioned in my source.
**** Apparently between the time I started this post to the time I finished it, the deal for K-Y Jellies has changed. They are now buy 2 get $2 off so the deal is not as sweet as it was.

Here's what you need to do:

Find the product either by searching their site or by clicking the links above. (You may have to clear your browser history, cache, etc...I did, not sure if it helped or not.) If all works well, it'll take you to a list of items that qualifies for the instant coupons and you can add it to your cart from the list. Otherwise, there should be a link next to the picture of the product mentioning the promo. Click on that and it will take you to a list of qualifying products that you can add to your cart.

I've read that some people had the price change on them while the items were in their carts (or disappeared.) I didn't experience that, but what I did experience was either the items not showing up on search at all, or the link appears to be broken so it shows an error message of sorts. I wanted to score some Pampers wipes. My source (which I'll link at the end of this post) said it was on sale for $3.49. I clicked on the link and it's not on sale at all. I also wanted the Aim toothpaste...that didn't show up at all. Neither did the dental floss, so I placed my order with just Chapstick, Band-Aids (which were in stock), and Carmex. An hour later, on a whim, I went to check and behold, all of the other items I wanted...all the toothpaste were available! So I went to add it to my order. I couldn't. I had to cancel my order first, then place it again with the new items, only now the Band-Aids were out of stock and I now have to pay an extra $1.99 backorder shipping! Not that it's a huge deal, but it's an extra $2 I shouldn't have had to pay so I've emailed them to see if they're willing to waive the fee. I doubt it, but it never hurts to try.
I'm finding that their system is REALLY fickle. Just take a look at my savings for example. Again, not a huge deal but it is confusing and shows just how weird their pricing is and how much it fluctuates in a matter of just a couple of hours. (The screen shots were taken about 2 hours apart.) The first screen shot is of my email confirmation. It shows I have a savings of $36.11:

(Click to enlarge)

The second screen shot is one I took when deciding to make this post, not knowing my savings would fluctuate after I've placed my order:

(Click to enlarge)

Thankfully, my order total did not change. I'm not sure what to make of it, and at this point, I'm not even sure if they'll fulfill my order. I hope they will. My source has ordered from them before with similar stellar deals and it was fulfilled. My hope is that they won't look at my request to have my backorder shipping waived, laugh at it, look at my order and say, "screw you, I'm canceling your whole order because that's just too good of a deal you're getting."

So there you have it. It's up to you if you want to give it a shot and see what kind of deals you can snag. Like I said, Medco seems to be affiliated or powered by drugstore.com, whom I have shopped with on several occasions in the past and trust. A lot of their site even reminds me of drugstore.com from their design, prices (I compared the Band-Aid to drugstore.com and their prices were identical. The deal was nearly identical as well) to check out process and account review. They also give you reward points just like drugstore.com. They are also VeriSign Secured. I'm not so sure they're a bad deal, or even fickle, it's just you have to act fast and smart to get their deals. A little persistence, give and take doesn't hurt either. They certainly aren't what I'm used to in terms of shopping experience, but it could also be that they're a different type of merchant as well. I'm not ready to fully pass judgment yet, but I am alert. If you do decide to go for this deal, please do keep me posted. I'd love to know what you scored and how great of a deal you got. I will definitely keep you posted if and when I get my order fulfilled along with the details. :)


Source: Hip2Save


Update: I received a response from Medco customer service apologizing for the tech glitches, but unfortunately my order is past the edit stage so they couldn't waive the $1.99 backorder charge. They did, however, issue a $1.99 credit on my account for me to use on my next order. I will further update when my order arrives.
June 24, 2010 1:22pm CDT

$1 Smoothies @ Jamba Juice

Today, June 16, 2010 only, score a Jamba Juice Superfruit Smoothie for just $1!  Limit 2 per customer!  Details here.

Shopping & homework

I went and took advantage of the Stride Rite 25% off sale today at an outlet mall. I have to be honest, just a few weeks ago, I'd stocked up on a few pairs of shoes for my kids for Fall. I was annoyed that not even a month later I'm met with a 25% off coupon that's good in the outlets too, which is very rare.  Outlets are often excluded from coupons.  Out of the 3 pairs of shoes I bought then, only one was returnable. Two pairs were off their "Back Wall" clearance and the sale was final. I intended to take the one pair back to return them and either buy them back with my coupon or replace them with a different pair.  So I'm standing waiting for the cashier (who all of a sudden disappeared in the middle of my return transaction) and I got a little impatient so I started looking around. I found the exact same pair of Marvel Heroes White/Black sneakers I was returning, on the shelf and I looked at the price.   When I first bought them on May 15, they were $9.99 without any sort of coupon or discounts.  In fact, I only bought them because they were so cheap.  Now those same exact pairs of shoes are $19.99!!!  That's proof that stores do indeed inflate their prices to match and compensate for any promos they have going on.  That is one heck of an inflation...the price doubled, all because of a 25% coupon.  If I were to return those shoes that I paid $9.99 for and buy them back at $19.99, even with my 25% off coupon, I would be paying $14.99 instead of the $9.99 I originally paid. I would be over paying by $5!  That annoyed me.  The cashier was back and started processing my return when I came to this revelation and I immediately told her to stop the transaction, that I was keeping the shoes. 

Admittedly, their coupon promo did work on me. I walked out of there buying 2 more pairs of shoes for my kids...but at a steal.  I bought them each another pair of all leather upper sneakers that were $14.99 for future wear.  (My experience tells me that that is a very good price for Stride Rite shoes.)  Here's how the deal went down:

$14.99 x 2 = $29.98 (the original price of one pair of these sneaks were $29.99)
Here's where I got a lil ninja. :)
The last time I bought shoes there, my receipt had a survey for me to fill out for $5 off my next purchase. I asked the cashier if I could apply that to my order along with my 25% off coupon. She said, "yes." WOOT!
So -
$29.98 - 5 = $24.98
24.98 - 25% (6.245) = $18.73

Yes! I scored two pairs of good quality Stride Rite sneakers for my kiddos for under $20.  That's cheaper than what I would pay at Walmart or Target and these shoes are better quality.

Then, onto the Lego store.  I had to go into the Lego store to get some VIP points credited from my last visit there.  I kind of half expected a bit of a fight to deal with retro credits but it was taken care of no problem whatsoever.  Being that I was with my husband, in a Lego store, there was no way I could've walked out of there without buying something so I scoured around for something cheap.  Then I came upon this:

Yep, that's right. Star Wars Lego on mark down all because the box had a dent on it.  The pieces inside are perfectly fine, but I saved myself a little money by picking a box that's less than perfect over a perfect box.  Besides, my kids would destroy the boxes when we got home anyway so why pay more for it? 

Moral of the story here is, stores do mark up their prices to go with their promos. Do your homework.  Don't judge a book by its cover.  A little imperfection can save you money.

Happy shopping and hope you're enjoying the Memorial Day sales going on out there. Shop wisely.