Coupons 2.0: College Students Save Money with Apps

This is a guest post by Ashyia Hill. You can also write an article about saving money.

Clipping coupons is something only cheapskates and financially struggling moms do for groceries, right? Well, those days are long gone! Today, couponing is a trendy hobby that even young, hip college students enjoy.

If you’re ready to try out some solid couponing, check out these five tips for getting the most out of your coupons:

1. Figure out which coupons you can stack or double.

Stacking coupons basically refers to using both a store coupon and a manufacturer coupon on the same product to save the most money. Many retail stores also offer double coupon days, where you bring in your coupons and they give you twice the coupon’s face value off the purchase of the appropriate items. 

If you aren’t sure whether the retailer you have a coupon for allows stacking or has double coupon promotions, just do the old fashioned thing and call.

2. Download a coupon app for your smartphone.

There are plenty of free apps that offer coupons for major stores.

One example is Coupon Sherpa for the iPhone. This app finds coupons online for you. Since the coupons can be read by optical scanners, there’s no need to print them out.

Check out your favorite app store to see what else you can find.

3. Use cash back credit cards for purchases made with coupons.

Cash back credit cards, which reward you with rebates depending on how much you charge to your card, are an easy way to get the most out of your couponing.

After all, not only will the coupon you use give you a discount, you know you will get part of what you spend on each item back as a rebate anyway. Just be sure to pay off your balance each month when using a cash back credit card. The interest that piles up on you could cancel out what your rebate is worth pretty quickly.

4. Always apply for and use loyalty cards with a mobile app.

Many store loyalty cards will give you points you can redeem for various goodies or apply coupons straight to your card.

Remember, loyalty cards aren’t just for grocery stores. Video game retailer GameStop, for example, has a PowerUp Rewards Card that offers customers loyalty points redeemable for GameStop gift cards, iTunes gift cards, invitations to members-only events, and similar bonuses.

If you don’t want to carry around all those cards, consider using the free Key Ring app, which scans and stores loyalty cards on your iPhone, Android, Windows Phone, or Blackberry. You get exclusive coupons and discounts that are automatically applied to your receipt when you checkout at a store.

5. Make couponing a competition.

Some people who are serious about couponing visit forums and chat rooms dedicated to the hobby as a way to have fun and stay motivated.

You don’t have to go that far to enjoy couponing, however. Try recruiting a few friends or family members who want to save money and challenge them to a lighthearted contest. You compete to see who can save the most money each week or month, redeem a discount on the most unusual item, or stack the most coupons on one offer.

If you make couponing a social thing you look forward to, you will get more out of it financially and psychologically.

It’s not hard to see what these tips for getting the most out of your coupons have in common: saving more money; having fun, or both.

After all, we’ve been trained from the time we were little to think of spending money as a fun activity, so why shouldn’t saving money be fun, too?

Do you have any more ideas that can wrestle the stigma of coupons away from mom and bring them into the 21st century?

Ashyia Hill is a blogger at CreditDonkey, where she helps parents and college students save money with cash back credit cards.

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