Free Stuff - Just Ask

Did you know that companies will send you stuff if you ask them too?

So a few weeks ago I picked up some Steak Umms, this is something I loved as a kid and usually forget I love them until I run across them in the store and buy them again.  That said, I've never seen a coupon for them.  So I emailed and asked if they ever put out coupons. I let them know how much I enjoy their product, etc.  They wrote me back to say that they don't do coupons BUT to let me know how much they appreciated their customer (me) they were sending me some "premiums" and a check for $12.96 (the cost of 2 packages at Wal-mart).  Ok, I can deal with that, even if I had no idea what premiums were.  I was guessing that premiums are things with the Steak-Umms brand on them.  I was write.  Today my package from Steak Umms arrived. I happily tore into it to see what "premiums" were.  It seems that in this case it was 2 hats and 2 (very nice) pens (the hats are pretty nice too).  And, of course, that check!  Cool.  $13 for just telling a company that I like their product.  That works for me.

Buoyed by their response I decided to email another company whose product we love but I never see coupons for: Smuckers.  We love their sugar-free peanut butter and while they often put out coupons for their jellys, I've not seen one that I could use on their peanut butter.  So I emailed. I never heard anything back, but they evidently got my email because today in my mail I also received two .55/1 Smuckers coupons.  I'll be honest and say I'd rather they had been .50/1 coupons (they double) but I'll take what I can get.

So the picture, that's what was in my mail today.  It's like a little bit of Christmas ;)

3 Inserts Sunday (including P&G)

There will be a P&G insert this Sunday, as well as 1 each from Redplum & Smartsource. For the full preview of what to expect this week click the image below.

North Alabama Readers

Do I have any readers in North Alabama that got the Enjoy the City coupon books that some schools were selling in the fall?

There were $5/$50 and $5/30 coupons for three different grocery stores in the booklets (Star Market, Griners & Food World). Since Publix accepts competitor coupons you can use these at Publix stores. However, our North AL stores have all gotten together and agreed that a store has to be within X miles for them to consider it a competitor. That being said, I have 4 (and about to have 8 more) coupons for Food World ($5/$50) that I can't use because I'm too far from the closest one. If you are in an area (Decatur?) that has Food World and would like to trade your Griners or Star Market coupons for Food World coupons, please contact me.

800 count Splenda for .99

Ok, so you won't be able to get a deal quite this good (probably) but I just had to share this. I'd heard before about Publix Promise before, whereby Publix guarantees that if during checkout, the scanned price of an item (excluding alcohol and tobacco products) exceeds the shelf price or advertised price, they will give the customer one of that item free. The remaining items will be charged at the lower price. This was my first time experiencing it.

Today while shopping I stopped to check the price on Splenda since I had such great coupons to make a deal with. There was a sign in front of the 200ct boxes pricing them at $4.99 (there were no dates on the sign), so I figured with my BOGO coupons and the $2/1 coupons I had, it was going to be a good deal already at 4 boxes for $6.

While ringing out I was watching the cashier do the coupons and she wrote $6.99 on the BOGo coupon. This would be great if I was getting $6.99 off and they were ringing at $4.99 but when I checked the screen I saw that they were ringing at $6.99 so I spoke up. The bagger ran back to check for the shelf tag and came back with it in-hand. It turns out that the tag had been left up from last week's sale. Around that time a supervisor came by and he started telling her what to do. The end result - 1 box for FREE! and the other 3 boxes at $4.99 and I still got all 4 of my coupons discounted. So all 4 boxes only cost me a whopping .99!

I love Publix more and more every time I go there!

Another Great Way to Get SwagBucks

Swagbucks has now added games and playing games (which you were probably already playing anyway) can earn you Swagbucks.  You can earn randomly while playing games for free.  Or you can sign up to play in their tournaments (trade low amounts of your Swagbucks in to play in tournaments, with the possibility of winning BIG Swagbucks).  

If you are new to Swagbucks this is an awesome time to sign up.  You will receive 30 bucks for registering and you get a bonus 30 bucks when you use code: SBGames.  You will have to hurry though because this bonus code is only good through Friday.  One note is that it is best to register before Friday because they offer mega bucks on Fridays.  So you can win higher value bucks all day.

Are you an Extreme Couponer?

I'll admit it, I don't think I qualify but maybe you do.  As you've probably read by now (I know I shared the info), TLC has decided to make a series out of the Extreme Couponers show, and they are looking for participants.  Here's the info I received:

Are you interested in participating in an upcoming episode of TLC’s Extreme Couponing? If you have the expertise to get amazing deals and accumulate fantastic stockpiles of goodies, we'd love to hear from you! E-mail us at extremecouponingcasting@gmail.com

Also, if you still haven't had a chance to catch the original 1 hour special, you have another chance on Saturday (Jan 15th) at 10pm and then Sunday at 1am Eastern


For an insiders view of what it was like to be on the show, check out WeUseCoupons for posts and videos from Nathan Engels, who appeared on the show.

Snagging the Swagbucks

So now not only is my husband a Swagbucks monster but my brother too.  I'd seen him in my referrals but I just got a message from him telling me that he'd signed up and had already earned over 100 Swagbucks from doing searches and watching SB TV (you can watch videos and a little meter fills up giving you Swagbucks).  He also mentioned about doing the surveys.  I'd attempted to do them before but never seem to qualify for them.  He pointed out that if you don't qualify they enter you into a drawing for 1000 Swagbucks - so I guess that makes it worth attempting to qualify.

I went on tonight and found another easy 8 Swagbucks under the TapJoy special offers, all I had to do was play CityVille on Facebook.

Also, I'd read early on that you could only win Swagbucks from searches twice a day, both my husband and brother have proved me wrong on this.  My brother has already won 4 times today for doing searches.  Here I thought I was doing good averaging 20 Swagbucks/day.  They've given me something new to strive for.  That said, I just redeemed for my 6th $5 Amazon card last night and I've already got enough Swagbucks to get another one.  I'm trying to let them build up to see how much I can get by next Christmas.  Thinking this could make for some really fun Christmas giving.

So, if you haven't signed up for Swagbucks yet....

• Sign Up and get 30 Swagbucks just to get you started.
• Install the Swagbucks toolbar, you'll get 1 Swagbuck/day just for opening your browser.
• Do the daily poll for another 1 Swagbuck/day
• Use Swagbucks to do the searches you'd normally do on Google (it usually takes a few searches to win Swagbucks, so don't give up if you don't win on the first try).  Use it regularly and win often.
• Got time to kill?  Check out the Special Offers on Swagbucks for 100s of easy ways to win.
• Swagbucks TV - watch Youtube videos and earn Swagbucks
• Daily Deals - go through Swagbucks to purchase your Groupon/ Living Social and other Daily deals and you'll earn big Swagbucks.

I think what I like best is just being able to grab bonuses for things I'd be doing anyway. I don't buy extra Daily deals that I wouldn't be buying anyway (sites like Groupon and Living Social are such a great way to get out and enjoy life while spending less), but thanks to Swagbucks I not only get 50% off on something I'd be doing anyway, but 1 of those deals earns me more than half of what it ts to get yet another $5 Amazon card.

Book Review: The Year of Living Biblically

One Year; 365 Days - I'm pretty sure that's how long it took me to read this book  It's not that it wasn't interesting, it was.  Nor was it because it wasn't well-written; it was.  I really can't say why it took me so long to read this book, other than that it is the kind of book that is best taken in small doses.

AJ Jacobs is an atheist who takes on living Biblically (taking the Bible 100% literally) for a year, as a book project.  His goal - to prove that the Bible should not and can not be taken 100% literally.  His approach to research the Bible as much as possible, talk to religious leaders in a variety of religions and do whatever it takes to live as the Bible dictates.  He not only follows the well-known commandments but digs up many lesser known mandates and follows those too.  His family background is Jewish, so he starts there with the Old Testament and chooses to focus the majority of his book (9 months) on the Old Testament laws.  The reality is that it felt his entire focus was on the Old Testament. Even during the final 3 months the references are primarily Old Testament.  I found this a bit distracting towards the end of the book, however I found the last 3 chapters (months) of the book some of the easiest to read.  I can't help but wonder if the greater ease in reading had something to do with a better match in his words and actions.

It was obvious that much like the Psychological idea that smiling makes you feel happier (which I should act on more often), AJ (or his alter-ego Jacob) found that living Biblically actually made him a better and more focused person.  In the early days of the project he was doing things only because it was a project, over time his actions became habit and changed his mindset.  I won't spoil the book and tell you whether or not he "found God" as a result of his project and honestly I don't think that matters.  It's funny that just reading a book like this of someone else doing this makes me want to try to be a better person.  I read his stories and I see that there are many little things I could change and I don't need a Bible to tell me that some actions and choices are better than others.  This book is a good reminder that sometimes we just need to do the right thing because it's the right thing, rather than get too caught up in whether or not it's what a book tells us to do.

*I picked up my copy of this book (after a long wait) on PaperBackSwap.  There's been a wait list for the book the entire time I've had, so I'm sure someone will be made happy when I repost it and give them the opportunity to read it.  I'd love to see a follow-up to this book, perhaps even just an article or interview of "Where is he now".

165 FREE MP3s on Amazon

There are currently 165 Free MP3s albums available for download on Amazon... including -

Nail Winter Sampler 2010
Merge Records 2010 Digital Sampler
Paper Trails [Amazon MP3 Exclusive]
Songs From Hotel Carolina 2010 [Amazon MP3 Exclusive]
Sample This Sh*t
Blanketby Jeff Beck

CostCo Price List

Last night I posted my thoughts on saving money using coupons vs shopping at CostCo, I forgot to post this link in that entry.  This link (and another) inspired me to make that post, QueenBee at QueenBeeCoupons has put together a very nice price list of over 400 products at CostCo, to allow you to easily compare the per unit price of buying something at CostCo vs buying it elsewhere.  Get the list.