Taking on Walgreens & CVS

This is going to be a good week, I believe, to get started with Walgreens and CVS. There is quite a bit to cover. But there are some REALLY good items this week to help get you started. Let's start with CVS and work our way to Walgreens.

CVS

I am going to place a 'print friendly' button at the bottom of this page so you are able to follow these instructions exactly as how I write them out for you. This will ensure the least amount of money out of pocket with the greatest amount of savings.

• CVS will provide what they call Extra Care Bucks (ECB) on many of the products they are selling each week. -Think of ECB as gift certificates for CVS, you can use these of future transactions in their store on almost any items, with just a few exclusions.
• We are going to 'Roll Over' your purchases into a couple of transactions, to ensure least amount out of pocket (OOP) & greater savings.
• You will need to get a CVS card in order to get the savings and any ECB back. Just pick one up when you are checking out, and then go home and be sure to register online.
• Your ECB will print at the end of your receipts, just tare them off, and keep in a safe place for future transactions.

Here are the items you are going to buy, these items with the right coupons will make you money, yes you will make money!

- Gillette or Old Spice Body Wash 10-18 oz. ($2.00ea) - Receive $2ECB for each purchase, limit of 2

Purchase 2

Use the -$4/2 Gillette Body Wash Q (P&G 5/2; x5/31)
OOP: Only tax -- FREE
Receive: $4ECB - MoneyMaker - you just made $4 and got two free items

- Buy 2 Nivea Body Wash for $4.99 (making it $9.98 total) & Buy 2 Nivea Lip Care at $2.99 ($5.98)

for a grand total for all four items = $15.96 (Receive $5ECB when you purchase $15 worth of Nivea items.)

Use 1 B1G1 Free Body Wash Q from the June All You magazine*
Use 1 B1G1 Free Lip Care Q from the June All You magazine*
Use 1 -$4/1 or -$3/1 Nivea Bodywash Q from P&G 5/2

Use 1 -$1/1 Nivea Lip Care
OOP: $2.98 with the -$4/1 OR $3.98 with the -$3/1

Receive $5ECB, a money maker of either $1.02 or $2.02 (depending on the Q used)

Thanks, Money Saving Madness!

*If you have not purchased an All You or subscribed to All You magazine, I highly recommend you do so. You can purchase an All You magazine at Walmart (only), but it is less expensive to purchase an annual subscription. If you want to sign up for a subscription go to Shop At Home, sign up for Shop At Home if you haven't already done so and receive a $5 sign up bonus. Type in Magazine.com in the search, you'll receive 5% back on all purchases, one in Magazine.com's site search for All You, and after all discounts it'll only end up costing you around $12. If anyone is interested I can send you a $5 gift certificate to use at Magazines.com, which will then bring your total down to $7. I will need you email address to send you the gift certificate. Just email me your email address!

***Notes about CVS***

You can use as many coupons as you need to make the appropriate purchases, plus you can use as many ECB as you would like, or have, for each transaction. CVS is very coupon friendly.

In order to use ECBs your transaction total must be greater than or equal to the amount of the ECB, if not and you want to use your ECB instead of money out of your pocket, you'll have to purchase some additional items not get your transaction total up enough to use the ECB.

CVS will not give "change" for having more ECBs then your transaction toal.

- Example: You have a $5ECB in hand and ready to use. Your transaction total only equals $3.56. You will need to grab an extra item or two to bring your total up to at least $5 or more to use your ECB, otherwise just pay OOP.

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There are some other good items on sale at CVS, visit Money Saving Madness, after you have bought the above items you can then use your ECBs to go back and purchase the additional sale items you may need or want to stockpile on.

My goal is to try and walk out every time with ECBs in my pocket, however, in the beginning this may not be entirely possible.

Next week, I will talk about how to purchases in multiple transactions, and how to 'roll over' your ECBs.

Walgreens:

Walgreens is a bit trickier than CVS. They are not as coupon friendly.

• Their policy is that you can not have more items than coupons.

If you have a MF coupon & a Walgreens coupon and only have one product, you'll have to throw in what is known as a filler item (usually a small piece of candy or something really cheap to make the coupon work).

You can also receive what Walgreen's calls Register Rewards (RR), as compared to CVS's ECB. RR print off the catalina after your sale is complete. RR can then be used on future transactions. Please note, that with RR these are consider coupons and you cannot have more coupons then items, if you do throw in a filler item.

Here are some of my favorite items this week at Walgreens. Some more Money Makers! For a full list visit Mummy Deals.

Colgate Total Advance or Enamel Strength ($2.99ea)- Receive $2RR

Use -$1/1 Colgate Toothpaste from the Diabetes & You Walgreen's booklet or SS 5/9

OOP: $1.99 + tax

Final: FREE after $2RR

Complete Mulitpurpose Solution (12oz) ($7.99) - Receive $8RR

Use -$2/1 from RP 5/16

OOP: $5.99 +tax

Final: $2 Money Maker after $8RR

**For the Daring at Heart**

If you would like you could 'roll' these two transactions, here's how you would do this:

You will tell the cashier you are going to do two transactions:

1st Transaction:

Colgate Toothpaste ($2.99)

Use -$1/1 Colgate Toothpaste from the Diabetes & You Walgreen's booklet or SS 5/9

Pay OOP: $1.99

Receive $2RR

Final: Free after RR

2nd Transaction:

Complete Multipurpose Solution ($7.99) (& grab a filler item)

Use -$2/1 from RP 5/16

Use $2RR from 1st Transaction

OOP: $3.99

Receive: $8RR

Final: $4 Money Maker!

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I hope this helps getting you started at Walgreens & CVS. Please if you have questions don't be afraid to ask.