Monday, August 3, 2009

ALBERTSONS- $30 PROMO- GET $15 BACK


I went to Albertsons today and decided I'd try the $30 promo going on right now. You spend $30 in participating products and get $15 in Catalina print outs (they print out as 3- $5 off coupons) for your next order. I had everything figured out and went to do my 1st transaction (they were all out of the Honey Nut Cheerios in the correct size for the price and promo but the grocery manager told me he'd give me two of the bigger boxes instead- which was really nice). My total rang up to $30 for the promo and after all of my coupons I only had to pay $15.94 which was great since I expected to get $15 in Catalina print outs. Well I waited for a minute and it didn't print out so I asked the cashier who brought someone else over and we went through everything making sure I had purchased the right items. They decided that it didn't work because after the coupons my total wasn't $30- this is incorrect, since coupons are like cash to the grocery stores it should have been before the coupon total for the Catalina machine, but they insisted this is what happened. So frustrated I decided to do my second transaction without coupons to see if it would print. I started shopping and realized that everything I was buying, I wanted but I had coupons for them so why not go buy stuff I didn't really have coupons for if I wasn't going to be using coupons. The girls loved this idea because I let them pick out three boxes of fruit snacks that weren't on our list and some chips. I also decided that I wanted a whole bunch of the Suave Kids Shampoo that I didn't have the coupon for and ended up getting 6 of those. So I went through self checkout (now that I think back on it I should have gone through the original register to see what happened- if the Catalina didn't print out the second time I would have known it was a machine error and could have gotten that corrected by the store). Going through self check out it my Catalinas did print out. When I got home I called the Catalina company and after sitting on hold for a LONG time I talked to someone who took all my information from my receipt and said he would look into it tomorrow morning (they get the receipts from the store for today, tonight) and he would call me tomorrow and let me know and if it was supposed to print he would mail it to me. So I didn't get as great of savings as I would have liked to (didn't get the first set of $15 catalinas) and then did a transaction without any coupons, it was still okay.

Here's everything that's in the picture above:

(10) Ragu Sauce
(1) Kix
(1) Honey Kix
(2) Honey Nut Cheerios
(1) Cookie Crisp Srinkles
(2) Suave Shampoo
(1) Gardettos
(2) Bugles
(3) Betty Crocker Fruit Snacks- Fruit by the Foot, Gushers, and Fruit Roll Ups
(3) Yoplait YoPlus 4pks
(2) Klondike Bars- original and Oreo
(6) Suave Kids Shampoo

TOTAL: $50.40 (my total savings were $67.74- still more than I spent out of pocket)

Plus I did get one set of the $15 off Catalina coupons to use on my next order and I might get another in the mail depending on what the Catalina company has to say about it.

AND in the midst of all this I forgot to look and see if they had Josh's pop tarts in! That sale ends tomorrow so I'm going to have to stop there on my way to the airport. Oh well at least I got two free Red Box movies- one for the girls and one for me for tonight- MONDAYS they have free RedBox codes, thanks Michelle for texting that to me since I don't know where I put the paper I had written the code down on!


2 comments :

  1. LAME that your store did that! The Catalinas totally should have printed. They probably didn't want to deal with it since it's hard to correct if Catalinas don't print. I hope that Catalina company comes back with good news for you!

    I went to Albertsons today and they were CLEANED OUT of pop tarts. Good luck finding some! I hope you do!

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  2. Well darn on the pop tarts! I'll have to grab a rain check from them, they've been good about giving me those in the past. I go to the Albertsons in Fairwood near you so we are probably going to the same one. I've read on many coupon blogs that the Catalinas with this promo have been hit and miss for quite a few people.

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