Extreme Couponers are odd. I've been watching the show and yes, they are odd indeed. In the one episode I just watched, the extreme couponer would spend time in giant recycle bins looking through old newspapers and stuff for coupons. She was dumpster diving right inside the dumpsters. In the one shopping trip highlighted, she had 17 separate transactions. SEVENTEEN!! She took the entire day to do it and 2 cashiers. It took over 2 hours just to ring in her groceries alone
.I worked as a cashier in a grocery store for almost nine years and if I had had to ring through an extreme couponer, I would have flipped out. We had to add those up at the end of each shift!!
It would have been one thing if she really needed all the stuff she bought, but she had enough toothbrushes to last her for the rest of her life!! She had enough laundry detergent to last over 5 years - if she did a load of laundry Every Single Day. The other extreme couponer in the same episode had enough medicine to last years. But that stuff has a shelf life. I'm sure most of it would long be expired by the time she ever got around to using it!
Now, having said that, I won't bother mentioning the 35 BOXES of books I have sitting in my living room piled up higher tha
n I am. I'm only 5'2". Nope - don't see the point of mentioning that.
9 comments:
LOL, you're on a blogging roll Kristie!! :)
It's cool to watch as a show, but yeah, I wouldn't do it... Also, there is no extreme couponing possible in Canada. Actually, I think in Quebec, they no longer make those coupons... and the whole "doubling" it. I mean, seriously, how do these grocery stores survive?!?
Nath - I seem to be don't I? I needed a nice, fluffy piece after my cussin' on the previous post *laughing*.
And no, we can't 'coupon' here like the do in the US (thank goodness for cashiers everywhere). They did mention that 90% of coupons printed were never redeemed. But I think the extreme people probably make up for about 40% of the coupon use themselves :-)
Books don't expire.
Books can be re-read many, many times (more if you are a careful reader).
Books enrich your soul and your mind each time you read them.
Yeah, no need to mention those boxes.
I used to subscribe to a blog for finding deals/freebies, etc. It got way, way too weird for me. The people really into this never seem to do a cost/benefit analysis (time spent and privacy concerns were big ones for me) and wind up having to store massive amounts of crap they don't need, just because it was a bargain. Crazyness. -- willaful
AL, *chuckle* all those things are so true, though for some reason it's a bit more 'in your face' when they are sitting in all their boxed glory in your living room and you are left wondering when it's good to put them back on shelves in your newly redone basement, if the nap in your living room carpet will ever come back :-)
Willaful, a few years ago I was watching yet another reality show, Trading Spouses, and one of the spouses family was an extreme couponing family and what was obvious that isn't in the couponing show was how all consuming it is. It's a lifestyle!! An almost cult-like lifestyle. The visiting spouse had this poor unsuspecting family embarrass themselves by haunting garbage bins, take hours long shopping trips etc to buy things they would never use!
So you are fortunate you escaped the 'cult' *g* before it really got a hold of you. In theory it's great to get all these great deals, in reality - not. One woman said if given a choice she would chose her couponing over husband if she had to.
I use coupons but I'm a baby compared to those people!
Some of them donate to food banks & charities, so that's good. I mean, who really needs all that stuff for themselves? Plus the storage space needed. I'd much rather fill that space with books. :)
I can't think of anything that's worth dumpster diving for. I just....can't.
And AL is totally right. Books? Yeah, a completely different animal. Absolutely none of us have a problem ::crickets chirping::
Leslie: I used to use coupons quite a bit - never on par with what the extreme people do, and I know that some of them do donate food and items to food banks and other needy places, but I don't think the majority do. I can see no earthly reason to hold on to 500 toothbrushes for example. If they gave away what they get but don't use it would be fine. But many of them have little mini grocery stores in their basement or garage.
Wendy, It's kind of like diving in the toilet isn't it? Just how desperate are we - really.
The stores don't limit the number of coupons one person can use in a day?
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