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Show Refunders make every coupon count ' By MARC HADDOCK Refunding the use of coupons, refunds and rebates to lower the grocery bill, and other expenses requires a rare combination of an elephantine memory, an indexer's knack for organization and a stock speculator's willingness to pay now for dividends that may come later. I know, because my wife is an avid refunder. I have learned that refunding, more than anything else, is a hobby. The people who dedicate themselves to saving money a nickle or dime at a time don't do it just for the money. They do it because its fun. And since what's fun for one person isn't necessarily fun for another, not everyone is inclined to be a refunder. refun-der. Oh, you might hear people saying how much they wish they could use coupons to really save money if they only had the time, but having time isn't the determining factor; having the inclination is. Nancy is one of those who has caught refunding fever, and is enjoying en-joying the payoffs. You can tell our home is different when you enter the kitchen. Scattered Scat-tered on top of the canisters that contain our flour, sugar and other kitchen necessities are labels labels cut off of vegetable cans, lables soaked off of ketchup and syrup bottles. There are cereal boxtops, proof -of-purchase seals from everything that's gone from the shelf to the table for the last few days. There is also a stack of coupons from the insides and the outsides of boxes waiting to be filed for later reference. We have a file box in one cabinet that is supposed to serve as a repository for all of the labels we are saving in anticipation of a rebate offer or a group of more coupons. That box, however, was long ago filled until boxtops spilled over the top and onto the sides. Now Nancy is forced into stuffing the labels wherever she can. The two happiest days at our house are Sunday and Wednesday, when the daily newspaper from Salt Lake comes filled with coupons and offers. Each is carefully perused and clipped and the coupons are filed usually before I get to the paper. (I have come to the conclusion that there is a conspiracy by the people who design these particular papers to make sure that when a coupon is clipped, it will rip the guts out of the only story in the entire paper I'll be interested in. Really, I visualize this list with the heading "Things Mr. Haddock likes to read." When the layout people get to a really good coupon, they hunt for a story that fits that list, and put the coupon on the back of it. Then they all get a good chuckle imagining my frustration as I have to hunt down that particular coupon and match it to the page so I can read the article.) But refunding takes more than just an interest in clipping coupons. In-order to be successful at refunding, refun-ding, an individual has to have a . remarkable mind that can put information in-formation stored weeks before together with a coupon in today's paper and come up with that most elusive of all refunding goals the purchase where the company actually ac-tually pays you to buy their product. Usually, that feat requires a rare combination of a sale price,, a good coupon and a rebate offer all falling , together in the same week. For example, a few weeks ago a 'local store advertised fingernail . polish remover at a sale price. Nancy bought the product at 69 cents. Then, on another offer from ' the manufacturer, she was able to send the label in and get $1 back. As a bonus, sending in the label entered her in a sweepstake. So in effect, the company paid us 31 cents to buy their product. Now you have to deduct the 20 cents it costs to send in for the offer and 11 cents might seem like a waste of time to some. But for a refunder, that's all beside the point. The point is, you are getting merchandise for little or no money, and that's fun. Nancy finds offers that result in these kinds of savings all the time. We have a healthy supply of aspirin, batteries and several other items that were purchased at substantial savings, or that we were paid to buy. The problem with this kind of shopping is that it tends to limit the items in your kitchen and bathroom cabinets to things that are on sale or that have good coupons. And often you are waiting for the right brand of the right item to become available for the right price before a needed purchase is made. Other times you end up with something you really don't need that badly, but it was such a good deal, the refunder can't turn it down but isn't that the way hobbies work? For example, despite the fact that there are five females in my family, none of them uses fingernail polish. So you can see it's not often that we need anything designed to specifically remove that polish. However, when that day comes (and that shouldn't be too long, since our oldest girl turns 8 soon) we're ready. The advantage is, you can buy more for less regularly. And, as I've said before, it's fun, at least its fun for the refunder. You see, I understand h A refunding is not for everybody i have a friend whose wife J C physically ill at the thought tt having to make out a budget St. F simply spends the money andheh! g to make enough to cover for p He's a bank manager in another b county, so he manages. But his rt s would not even consider going (oft, grocery store with a handful i it coupons. j In our house, however, the thou S of going to the store without i t handful of coupons is just j h abhorent. (Our children are lean n the tricks. They are starting to cli e the Sunday coupons we don't ustti y take with them when they plij e grocery store.) b I used to hate to take coupons wilt h me when I ran errands. Unto unrelenting pressure, I have gotta C used to it. Now I simply make my 11 way to the checkout stand, M a over the goods and coupons, ail S stare out the window until Uk 11 transaction is completed. It is more or less painless. Nancy is uncomfortable when I brag about her prowess as i t refunder. After all, she says, sit I hasn't ever gone to the stored bought $230 worth of groceries fori cents, like some of those you taJ about. But she's got a good start. Andshe enjoys the ' hours she spends . organizing, cataloging and mailing in for rebate offers. N Now, if we can just find some aj ' to use that fingernail polish remover before it goes bad.... . |