Opinion: Are Coupons Worth the Effort?

(July 6) -- I grew up in a coupon-clipping household. Before each grocery shopping trip, my mom would write her shopping list on an envelope, pull coupons from her little file box and stuff them inside. It's a habit I kept when I started shopping for myself after college. I'd look through the Sunday paper, find a coupon for 75 cents off a six-pack of yogurt, clip it and come home slightly smug about the money I'd saved.

Then, a few years ago, I stopped. Why?

It wasn't just that I started making more money, a point that statistics back up. According to a recent article in Retailer Daily, some 41 percent of coupon "enthusiasts" (people who are really into it) come from households with incomes above $70,000. Households with incomes above $100,000 drove the growth of coupon usage in 2009. Like many of these folks who clearly don't have to use coupons, I have a frugal soul. I dislike paying more than necessary for anything.

But I had a few realizations. First, once I looked at the numbers, I realized that if I wanted to save money on food, splurging on whatever groceries I wanted, coupons or not, turned out to be smarter than it seemed. This is because the average American family spends a full 44 percent of its $6,133 food budget on food prepared away from home.

When I looked at which nights my family was resorting to take-out, there was a high overlap with nights when there was nothing in the pantry and refrigerator that looked quick and good. It takes a lot of coupons to atone for the cost of a pizza.

Most importantly, though, time is a nonrenewable resource. Coupon clipping takes time, and time spent on one thing is time not spent on something else.

Now, granted, people like to argue that coupon clipping doesn't take much time. The folks who post at coupon enthusiast sites generally tell me that they spend one to two hours a week clipping coupons and planning meals around those sales.

But if you want to spend one to two hours per week focused on boosting household finances, there are higher-impact activities to choose from. You can:

• Practice negotiating for a raise.
• Brainstorm new projects that might lead to a promotion.
• Call an old client just to say hello (and book some new work while you're on the phone).
• Polish your resume to start the hunt for a better-paying job.
• Take an online class to learn a new skill.

Whenever I find myself eyeing a newspaper with a notice about "$150 worth of coupons inside," I am training myself to sit down and pitch a freelance assignment worth more than that (after taxes).

They don't all come through. But some do -- enough to remind me that while there's a limit to how much even the best clipper can cut, in theory there's no limit to how much you can earn.

So I'm trying to bet my time on that side of the equation, and hoping the pay-off is better than 75 cents off a six-pack of yogurt.


To submit an op-ed or letter to the editor, write to opinion@aolnews.com. If you intend your letter to be published, please specify that and provide your name and location (city and state).