Okay, lets have some fun.
I see a lot of coupon Guru's telling us we all need coupon binders with as many categories as we have coupons. And, while I can agree that organization is KEY in maximizing savings, unless you have a rather large family, quite a bit of storage room and, lets be honest, a whole lot more time than the 30-45 minutes most want to spend on organizing this may not be your best solution.
It might surprise you to learn, I don't carry your basic coupon binder. Now, I have had a binder, the one pictured above is one of my own, from back in the days of what I lovingly refer to as my OCD (Over Coupon Delirium) days. It's one of my many failed attempts at coupon organization. So, I thought before I shared my scaled down version of coupon organization it would be fun to hear what works for you.
Question of the Day…. How Do You Organize Your Coupons? Feel free to leave comments.
[poll id=”16″]
jess says
July 28, 2011 at 1:07 pmI have evolved over the year and 1/2 i have been trying to find my way in this coupon jungle. I started without getting the paper just picking them up from family each week. I wanted to make sure it would work befoer i put out the money. The first system i used was the no clip filed them by date in an acordian file and just cut befoer i went shopping but i would still bring the file along just in case. It worked but when i had to dig a coupon out while in the store it was a pain and time consuming. So then i went to the hybrid binder. I had a binder but still did not cut the coupons out just put each page in its own page protector. This was fine untill i realizes that i was getting alot of coupons in the mail or picking them up at the store and what was i going to do with them. The fact that everythig did not have a home buged me big time. Also when i did a basic walmart run how was i ever going to find the coupon i needed. without speinding ten min scroling through the coupon lists on my phone. So i started googeling again to find somthing better for me. I now use a binder it has 10 basic catagoirs it is aranged like the stores are set up. I group like coupons on the same page. And becuse my brain works better when there are visual breaks it is divided by colors. So my dividers are colors and the coupon holders have colord paper in them this also alows me to use both sides of the coupon holder. It is a bit of a pain to get a coupon out from the wrong side of the holder but not enough that it has made me change my mind yet LOL. It has taken me a bit of time to convince myself to by diligent and stay on top of it each week. If i do it every week it only takes less than 30 min on sunday to pull out the expierd coupons and put in the new ones. I do not cut out every coupon, just the ones for products that i know we use. I keep all the uncut couons in the old acordian file just incase i need them and somtimes i do. So far this is working realy well for me… and it will work even better when i can get over people staring at me in the store LOL
Mrs. Diner says
July 27, 2011 at 1:38 pmI use an old-school accordian coupon file that fits in my purse. Like Tammy, I clip the coupons I typically use or that are extra great & carry them in the file with me. I keep the rest at home unclipped by date in file folders, then clip them when I plan to use them. I keep all the coupons I am planning to use in a section at the front of my purse-sized file so they are ready to go. Once in a while I wish I had a coupon from the my file folders with me, but rarely. To me, it’s not worth the extra time & hassle of lugging something big around with me (especially if I’m out shopping with my kiddos!).
shelby says
July 26, 2011 at 8:08 pmI went old school, my mom used a shoe box size organizer, so i did some what of the same. I spent a few hours one night and did my own tabby divider cards and now all i have to do is stick the coupons in! I love it! I used to do a binder sort of thing but got to be too much of a pain to slide the coupons back in and to know what was where. now, i have my sections, non-food, food canned etc (large sections color coded, such as frozen, baking, canned, dairy, and then more tabbies within each section) and it is so much easier yet i can put quite a bit in each section without it being too overwhelmed. binders are great if you are SUPER organized BEFORE you go shopping, but I’m not, so I like to take my shoe box sized container with me and I have all my coupons with me. 🙂
Julie M says
July 26, 2011 at 3:58 pmLove my binder. Does take me way more than 45 min. Though, feeding 7. Thanks
Lori says
July 26, 2011 at 3:53 pmI have a binder. It’s an “un-organized” mess. It was great at first, but took toooo long. Now I find the coupons are lucky to end up in the categories the belong in. Most often they are all just piled in the front.
Tammy says
July 26, 2011 at 3:21 pmOur Coupons are in colored envelopes.
They are labeled as like so: Butter & Cheese (after all they are together in the store so why not label them together?) canned goods, Dog items, Yogurt sour cream & cream cheese, Instant Meals, Hot chocolate & marshmallows, paper products etc… Works really well!!!
When we receive the coupons in the paper, we go through and cut out what we usually buy and put them in the envelopes. The rest go in a folder. We wait for the listings for several websites like freebies2deals to come out with the list from each stores deals and cut anything that is another good deal from the folders.
c4u says
July 26, 2011 at 5:44 pmI like colored envelopes. Do you keep the envelopes in some kind of holder?