How to Organize Your Coupons in a Binder

Clip coupons weekly to build your collection.

Using coupons will save money on groceries. To save the most money, organize your coupons to streamline the process of finding and using them regularly. Using a binder will allow you to organize numerous coupons into multiple sections. Once you get used to using a binder regularly, you will save time when planning shopping trips and when you are grocery shopping.

Things You'll Need

• Three-ring binder or photo binder
• Baseball card page protectors or photo pages
• Coupons

Instructions

1. Acquire a binder. You can either use a photo album binder with translucent photo pages or a standard three-ring binder with baseball card page protectors. To prevent coupons from falling out of your binder, use one that zips up. You can create your binder by using office items from a supermarket or office supply store, or you can purchase ready-made coupon binders and supplies.

2. Gather your coupons and divide them into stacks by making logical categories such as dairy, meat, breakfast foods, baking supplies, condiments, baby items, paper products, cleaning supplies, medicine and toiletries. Divide them into categories that fit your lifestyle and shopping habits.

3. Put each coupon in its own pocket unless you have coupons for identical products; in that case, put the coupons together in the same pocket with the coupon with the earliest expiration date in the front so that you will use it first.

4. Organize coupons within each section to make it easier to find coupons when you need them. For example, within the dairy section, put coupons for yogurt products near each other and coupons for cheese near each other. You might find that you need a whole page for just one type of product within a particular section.

5. Use your binder along with weekly store ads to plan your shopping trips to save the most money. Take your binder with you every time you go shopping. If you notice something you need or want is on sale, check your binder for usable coupons.

Tips & Warnings

• Organize your coupons in a way that makes sense to you and in a way that will simplify your weekly grocery planning and your grocery shopping.

• Add new pages to your binder as needed. Upgrade to a larger binder when your current binder becomes overpacked.

References

• North Dakota State University: Smart Food
• Fort Valley State University Cooperative Extension Program: Coupons Save Money
• Purdue University: Couponing 101

Resources

• Coupon Oraganizer Pro