Now that Thanksgiving is over, we are moving full tilt ahead into the Holiday season.

If you’re like me, you probably have loads of shopping to do for the Holidays – and not just presents either. Every single get-together requires bringing a gift, or a dish. Secret Santas, stocking stuffers – everything adds up in a big way.

So, how can you cut that expense? And I mean really cut that expense?

Well, I’ve got a few secrets to share with you today – secrets that I’ve used the last few years to cut hundreds of dollars off of my Christmas and Holiday budget. Not once have I sacrificed quality, or bought someone a “cheap” gift. I also do not normally buy off brands or shop at the dollar store!

I call it Extreme Christmas Shopping – in other words Min / Maxing your holiday budget. Basically it involves using the existing sales at grocery and department stores, and combining them with rebates, coupons, programs like Upromise, online codes, and a cash back credit card. I’ll walk you through it, and you can try it out yourself if you like.

In the last week alone I have:

• Gotten a $30 shirt for free – it will be a Holiday gift for my Aunt. I paid $7 in shipping.
• Actually made $8 after rebates buying a shirt from JC Penny’s. Shipping was free.
• Saved $140 off of my holiday grocery bill by combining store sales with coupons.
• Earned $8 towards my daughter’s college fund with UPromise

So, my total savings this week was: $170
Total earnings were: $16

Now, that may not seem too extraordinary, but it required very little effort on my part, and I’m going to be able to do it again, and again, as I complete my holiday shopping.

Want to try it out? Here’s the lowdown:

Step 1: Create a junk email address that you can use to sign up for various services.

In order to get the best deals you usually have to give out your email address online. If you create a separate email just for this, then you won’t have tons of spam coming into your normal inbox each day.

Step 2: Sign up for one or both of these services:

Step 3: Visit your favorite stores online and sign up for their email newsletter.

As a special note, make sure that you sign up with Starbucks. If possible, register a gift card with them. In they past I have gotten several free premium coffees and even an oatmeal from them. They are very good to their subscribers, and they don’t spam you either.

Seriously, visit every store that you normally shop at, including your grocery store. I frequently get coupons from Kroger online. They load them right into my Kroger Plus card, and they automatically scan when I check out.

Again, just make sure that you use an email account that is specifically set up for this, or you’ll be drowning in ads. It’s a lot easier to just sort through the ads when you are ready to shop than it is to have them in your normal email account.

Step 4: Online Tools

Now, here are the services that I have found to be most useful. We’ve already covered UPromise and Mr. Rebates. There are three others that you will want to know about.

1) Grab the RSS feed at Money Saving Methods.com. The RSS feed is free, and the site owner regularly posts the best online deals and rebates around. About a week ago she explained how to get $100 worth of Barbie dolls for around $20. You seriously can not beat this site if you’re looking to save some money.

2) The second service is not free, but you can get a trial for one or two dollars. It’s called the Grocery Game. Basically, the site compiles weekly lists of all the sales going on in pretty much every grocery store across the nation. Then they take it a step further and compile all of the current coupons for each area. They tell you which coupon to use, and when, so that you get the best deal possible. You can print out a list of sales at your store, grab the coupon, and buy your groceries for next to nothing. (As evidenced by my saving $140 on my grocery bill this week!).

If you don’t currently use coupons, and you would like to take advantage of the holiday sales anyway, you can buy lots of 100 pre-clipped coupons for around $3 all day long on EBay. You also get 1% back on your EBay purchases from UPromise.

3) Get free shipping – Some sites will not let you combine a free shipping code with another type of coupon code, so you may not always be able to take advantage of it. However, if you aren’t using an additional coupon code, you can pretty much always find free shipping codes for most stores at Retail Me Not.com

So, now that you know all of the services you need to begin saving crazy amounts of money, here’s the procedure:

Holiday Shopping

1. Log into your email account and check out the sales from your favorite stores.
2. Don’t forget that most of your credit cards have online affiliates too – the last time I ordered flowers I saved 20% by logging into my credit card account and using their link. So check the deals there as well.
3. Visit UPromise and / or Mr. Rebates before you shop – This gives you a tiny amount of cash back on your purchases, and it’s basically free money back since both services are free to use.
4. Find an item that you want, and use your coupon or rebate code. If you don’t have a coupon code, then search for one on Google, or at least get free shipping.
5. Buy the item with a reward credit card or a cash back credit card- Just make very sure that you pay the balance in full each month. Otherwise the interest that you pay on the card is going to outweigh your rewards.
6. Save your receipt, and mail back any rebates as necessary.

For Groceries:

1. Get your trial with The Grocery Game
2. Buy your coupons off of EBay
3. Print the list of your grocery store’s sales
4. Pull your coupons
5. Get your groceries. Again, use a cash back or reward credit card if possible.
6. Save your receipts and mail back your rebates

So, potentially, you are getting Christmas and holiday food and gifts far below cost, earning money for your child’s college fund, and getting cash back from your credit card as well.

It may sound a little complicated, but I promise you that I spend no more than 30 minutes a week doing these things, and they are getting to be “old hat” by now. After realizing how much money I can save, and sometimes earn by following these steps – I will never do things any other way.

Want even more thrifty and frugal ways to get the most out of the holidays? Check out the articles below!

Get it for Free or Less:

• Prime Time Money dishes on Free Shipping.org where you can find even more free shipping codes.
• Finance for A Freelance Life has some Money Saving Tips for the Holidays
• The Dough Roller has 97 New Ways To Save Money
• Not Made of Money had a Great article on Holiday Decor: How to Keep the Glitz but Spare Your Budget
• Money Smart Life has the lowdown on Christmas Deals to Save You Money While Holiday Shopping.
• Blunt Money tells us How to end over-the-top gift exchanges and have a peaceful holiday
• Money Ning has An Unusual Way to Suggest Holiday Gifts Ideas.

Other articles that are too good to miss:

• No Credit Needed suggests Skipping The Long Lines And Shopping Online
• Money Crashers has some Important Holiday Shopping Dates to Remember
• Free Money Finance reminds us of an awesome financial principle in “All You Need To Make Ends Meet: Just a Little More“
• The Smart Spending Blog talks about some Survival basics from Depression-era kids.
• Frugal Dad had an excellent article titled ” A Thanksgiving Story: What the Pilgrims Taught Us About Capitalism” I loved this article!

Carnivals, Festivals and Celebrations:

• 12th Bankruptcy & Debt Carnival @ Bankruptcy Access.com
• Carnival of Consumer Credit #3 @ Arrive Financial
• The Carnival of Financial Planning @ The Skilled Investor
• The Carnival of Kids and Money @ Money-Hacks.com
• Blog carnival edition 3 @ Million Dollar Investing Tips
• The Carnival of Money Stories @ Funny About Money
• The festival of frugality @ Eco Joe’s
• The money hacks carnival @ Steadfast Finances

That’s it for this week’s roundup. I hope you have a wonderful holiday weekend!

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 29th, 2008 at 18:56 and is filed under Debt Reduction FAQ. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.