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Since the beginning of the year, I've been looking for the best cost cutting tips. Well, I think I've found my favorite--so far. It's an online service called The Grocery Game. On Thursday night's Ten at 10, I featured the supermarket saving site that's saving two local women hundreds of dollars every month. After hearing their testimonials, it didn't take me long to sign up.

FYI, you do have to pay for the site. There is a four week trial period, for $1 a week, and then it will cost you a minimum of $5 a month. Let me tell you, the $1 was totally worth it. When you sign up you get a color coded list of the lowest prices on products you use everyday, at grocery stores right here in the area. During the trial, you can have as many lists as you want. Now, black items on the list are the items you buy if you absolutely need them, blue items are your stock up items and green items are free. The entire concept of the grocery game is to stockpile. It says that takes about 12 weeks to stock your pantry. Then there is no need to buy those items anymore--so your grocery bill automatically goes down. Coupon clipping is also involved, but the game makes that a whole lot easier. The game tells you what coupons to clip, where to find them, and what products to use them on! Shane took me to the convenience store Sunday before church, so I could get two newspapers. He knew I was excited to clip coupons!

So, needless to say, I was so excited to play this game. As you know, I LOVE saving money. After clipping coupons, I took Shane to Kroger to shop for free. And, that's what we did. By the way, he was very excited about the FREE part.

At Kroger I saved $20. Can you believe it? I paid $9.11 for four rolls of toilet paper, 1.11 pounds of tomatoes on the vine, two pounds of lean ground beef, 2.13 pounds of red seedless grapes, two bottles of Lawry's marinade, one jar of McCormick Grill Mates, two bags of Birds Eye frozen vegetables and a family size box of Pillsbury brownie mix.

So, how did I do it? Well, as many of you may know Kroger doubles and triples coupons. According to The Grocery Game, Kroger will triple coupons up to .39 and double up to .50. For example, a .25 coupon yields .75 savings, a .50 coupon yields $1.00 but a $1.00 coupon only yields $1.00. FYI--You have to have a Kroger Reward Card to get the extra savings.

So, for example, the Pillsbury brownie mix was on sale at Kroger for .99. I had a .35 coupon, so the brownie mix was basically FREE.

Now, that's fun shopping!

To find out more about The Grocery Game, click on the link below. If you have any cost cutting tips, I would love to hear about them. Send me an email at stancik@kbtx.com, or just leave your thoughts here. I can't wait to hear about your saving you money ideas!

Happy Saving!

Meredith