How To Coupon: Extreme Couponing or Extreme Lies?

1 Comment | Written on July 20, 2012 at 9:00 am, by Rachel Achmad

When I’ve watched the show Extreme Couponing, I’ve felt both envious and skeptical. Envious because I’m never able to score that much free stuff, and skeptical because you can’t make dinner for your family using Butterfingers and Aspercreme.

These shoppers must be spending more money on foods elsewhere, I always think. And furthermore, where do all their coupons come from? If they’re buying that many newspapers, or buying inserts from a clipping service, they’re not getting these things for free, as claimed.

Well, it seems I’m not alone. Other viewers and bloggers have a growing ire with this show and have been raising a ruckus about how unrealistic the show is — and claiming that it allows coupon fraud.

Recently, a supermarket featured on the show even issued a public apology, explaining that much of the drama in the episode they were featured in was staged.

So, does this mean huge savings are a myth? Is couponing not a legitimate practice? Absolutely not. All this means is that you shouldn’t believe everything you see on TV (shocker, I know).

You’ll never be able to get everything you need for free, and without a team of producers and a camera crew behind them, the folks on the show don’t either. What you can do by couponing on sales, taking advantage of store loyalty programs and the like is get big savings (75-90%) on household and personal care items, and more moderate but still valuable savings on your groceries. Following these practices will result in a significant reduction on your grocery bill. I usually save 50-60% overall, and according to most expert couponers, that’s as good as it gets.