A not-quite-what-I-planned trip to CVS…but look what .79 bought!

I like writing shopping trip reports to break down deals and show you how to put them together. Things don’t always work out perfectly though, so I’m sharing what happened to me on today’s CVS/pharmacy shopping spree.

The background: I got a $10-off-$40 coupon for CVS in my email, so I headed to the store earlier this week planning to do this deal:

– Buy six $3.33 Pantene haircare products ($20.00) and get $5 in ExtraBucks. Use two $5-off-3 coupons from the 3/1 PG.
– Buy five $3.99 Colgate toothpastes ($19.95) and get $10 in ExtraBucks. Use four $2 coupons from the 2/22 SS and one $2 printable.
– Buy one Easter candy single for .87 and get .87 in ExtraBucks.

The way I figured it, I would have a $40.82 pre-coupon total. My $10-off-$40 would drop it to $30.82. After manufacturer coupons, I’d pay $10.82 and get $15.87 in ExtraBucks — all free and a $5.05 moneymaker! Good deal, right?

Unfortunately, my local CVS has been sold out of Colgate all week long, and the coupons expire tonight. I stopped at another CVS (Higgins Rd., South Barrington) today on the way home to try again…

This store had just three tubes of Colgate that qualified for both the ExtraBucks deal and the coupons I had cut for it. I grabbed those three and six Pantenes:

– Three $3.99 Colgate toothpastes (two Optic White Platinum, one Enamel Health) ($11.97)
– Six Pantene products ($20.00)

Now I was at $31.97. I still wanted to work the $10-off-40 into the mix, so I figured I’d grab the Easter candy single, then add some Dawn dish detergent, also a deal this week. I headed to the cleaning aisle, where just three Dawn remained on the shelf.

– .87 Easter candy single (I went for the Kit Kat!)
– Three .99 Dawn Hand Renewal dish detergents ($2.97.) I had three .50 coupons from the 3/1 PG for these.

Now I was at $35.81 before coupons.

I walked around the store looking for things to add to the deal that I also had coupons in my wallet for..! I spotted a $3.69 bag of Gold Emblem Abound almond clusters. I also had a $1 printable from CVS’ site for these, so I figured they’d be a good filler.

I headed to the register with a pre-coupon total of $39.50, lamenting that there wasn’t one more bottle of Dawn on the shelf to push things over the $40 mark!

At the register, I added two .33 caramels for a pre-coupon total of $40.16. (Who hasn’t used those caramels as a last-minute deal filler? They’re convenient. They’re your reward for being such a smart shopper!)

I handed over the $10-off-$40: Now $30.16
I handed over the two $5-off-3 Pantene coupons: Now $20.16
I handed over three $2 Colgate coupons: Now $14.16
I handed over three .50 Dawn coupons: Now $12.66
I handed over the $1 Gold Emblem Abound coupon: Now $11.66

I paid $11.66 for everything and got $5 ExtraBucks from Pantene, $5 ExtraBucks from Colgate, and .87 ExtraBucks from the Easter candy. That’s just .79 for everything! While this deal wasn’t as good as my original scenario, it still ended up being another great CVS run.