Alright Ladies {and maybe a few gentlemen}.  If you are new to cutting coupons or if you’ve cut them out for years you may not know this little tidbit of info.  First off, how many Sunday papers do you buy?  How long does it take you to cut them out??  Well, not long after I started couponing I found this cool technique called “collating”.  Some call it “de-collating”. 

I thought that most of you would be happy to learn this technique as well because I’m tellin’ you…it cuts ALOT of time out on Sunday’s or Monday’s when it comes time to cut coupons!  If you buy more than 1 Sunday paper then you need to watch the following video below made by Coupon Crusaders:  Grab a cup of coffee…there’s a lot of info to take in here! 

A couple of things that I’d like to mention about what I do differently than in this video:

• First of all, this lady uses the “insert filing system”.  What that means is that she doesn’t cut her coupons out until she’s made her shopping list and is ready to go shopping.  She keeps all of her inserts filed in a box and then uses a database to find the coupons she needs and then she pulls from the inserts that she needs at that time.  Personally, I found that technique didn’t work for me.  I like to take all of my coupons that are in my coupon box to the stores with me.  If I have to drive very far to the store and I walked in with only the coupons that were on my list…I am telling you now, that I’ve missed out on alot of “unadvertised” or clearanced deals that way because my coupons were still at home.  So, that is why I like to cut out all of my coupons and file them in my coupon box.  That way they are cut and ready to use at any given “clearance” moment!!

• Secondly, I’d like to mention that she staples her pages 1 time.  She does that because she files the whole inserts.  What I like to do is staple each section where there’s a coupon.  On one “like bunch” of pages there might be 7 or 8 staples.  I make sure to avoid the barcodes though because when you go to use a coupon, you don’t want to accidentally tear up the barcode or it may not scan correctly at checkout.  So, basically when you put a staple at each coupon, when you go to cut them out they’re already neatly stapled and ready to go.  You don’t have to cut them all out and THEN staple them 🙂

• Another thing I want to mention is that when you start to cut your coupons (especially if you have 4 or more) stapled together, make sure to give yourself enough room.  Sometimes the coupon in the back of the stapled bunch slides as you are cutting and you can accidentally cut through a barcode or expiration date…eeeek!  I’ve done it before so I started paying closer attention!

• One last thing.  She talks about how sometimes when your pages are stuck together, you have to tear them in half.  Every once in awhile you’ll get one where the coupon is actually in the very middle of the crease.  So if you tear the page in half, you’ll rip that particular coupon in half.  When I run across these, I’ll just set it to the side and cut those individually. 

I really hope that this video and some of the different tips that I gave above will help you in saving not only money but time.  Sometimes cutting coupons can get to being a burden if you’re cutting one piddly coupon out at a time.  I know, I’ve done it before.  But now, it’s so much faster and a whole lot easier!!  You can check out my coupon organizing technique here!  Just give it a try next time around and let me know what you think.

If you have any questions at all, please don’t hesitate to ask!!  I’d love to help you out!

Blessings~