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REDDITUsing coupons comes with a variety of benefits for both customers and businesses. However, as a customer, you need to understand that couponing requires time, effort, and attention to be able to utilize them to their full advantage. At some point, you may even ask yourself whether couponing is worth it.
Here are the pros and cons of couponing to help you decide:
Pros
Coupons can be extremely beneficial in many ways. Thus, if you want to know whether using coupons is the right thing to do, here are the upsides of couponing that you should know from the get-go:
1. You can save money
If you’re extra patient and diligent in looking for the perfect couponing opportunity, you can see its potential to keep more savings in your pocket. With the right coupons in hand, you can likely reduce your grocery bill by half. As long as you find the best deals, you can purchase your usual items with up to 50% discount.
2. You can try new products at a lesser price
When a particular brand launches a new item, using coupons can be the easiest way to get you to try it for yourself. To do that, you should first get a manufacturer’s coupon and go to the store to buy the new products at a super low price.
3. You can do more focused shopping
A typical trip to the grocery store can have you wasting time looking at the aisles and buying extra unnecessary items. However, with a handful of coupons in your possession, you can have a more purposeful shopping experience. This means you’ll head over to the store knowing what items to purchase right away. Also, using coupons can prevent you from deviating from your shopping plan.
4. You can get treats for less or free
If you’re on a tight budget, you’ll less likely spend money on luxuries. However, couponing gives you an opportunity to buy items that you don’t usually spend your money on. If you have the best deals on coupons, you can get treats for a lower price or for free. Using coupons can be one of the effective money-saving solutions for those items that you can’t entirely give up while you’re cutting down your grocery budget.
5. You can stock up on many things
Coupons for commodities like canned and boxed goods are always available. If you use the coupons when you buy these items on sale, you can get a stockpile of products that can last for weeks or months. Because you don’t have to purchase these things for a long time, you save a lot of time, money, and energy.
Cons
Now that you have the advantages of using coupons, it’s time to learn more about the downsides of couponing and how it may affect your daily life. If you want to make sure you make the right decisions, here are the cons of using coupons that you should know:
1. Coupons aren’t available for a wide array of products
In reality, not all companies and manufacturers offer coupons for their products. You may not be able to get a coupon for items that you want to buy. For example, you may want to purchase your favorite shampoo or facial soap, but the manufacturer doesn’t give out coupons. Consequently, you’ll end up buying another item instead of the one you’re looking for just so you can use the coupon you have.
2. You spend more time doing the overall chore of shopping
Even if most people say that using coupons can reduce the time spent in shopping around the grocery store, you’ll certainly take more time and energy at home looking for available coupon deals, such as scouring through magazines, newspapers, websites, and couponing apps to find something that you may use. There’s also that time you spend sorting out your coupons and computing what you’ll spend and how much you save, especially if you intending to use a lot of coupons in one shopping trip.
3. Overbuying something that could expire quickly
Wanting to get the most out of using coupons may cause you to overbuy and keep items that could expire quickly. The problem arises when you can’t use or consume all bought products with near expiration dates. As a result, you end up wasting the products and the money you spent on buying them no matter how little it is.
Conclusion
With the list of pros and cons of using coupons, you can now decide for yourself whether finding one is going to be worthy of your precious time and effort. If you know how to weigh these things out, you can save more money for your family. Exercise your best judgment to ensure you use your coupons the right way.
