Fabulous Friday Savings! - How I spent only $4.37 on my shopping trip!

I was able to successfully eliminate full price on my shopping trip today. I only spent $4.37 on items worth $58.62!

Here's a breakdown of my savings and how I did it:

I first went to Sprinkles Cupcakes at Stanford Shopping Centre. Each cupcake costs $3.25 but on Twitter they randomly release a word or phrase you have to whisper in order to get a free cupcake. Today's free cupcake was called "Choco Loco." It's a special cupcake dedicated to Cinco de Mayo coming soon. Then I bought a Vanilla Milk Chocolate cupcake with sprinkles.

$3.25 per cupcake x 2 = $6.50
$6.50 - $3.25 (free cupcake from Twitter) = $3.25 total
Savings = $3.25

After Sprinkles I went to Victoria's Secret and used a coupon for a free PINK panty or thong valued up to $9.50. My juicy booty isn't built for thongs so I picked a black lace waist hipster.

$9.50 panty - $9.50 free panty coupon = $0.00
Savings = $9.50

My next stop was Papa Johns Pizza. I had won a free medium 1 topping pizza and 2 bottles of 20 oz. Cokes valued at $11.50 from My Coke Rewards' "Coke Zero Taste The Madness Instant Win Game" (the game has already ended).

Medium 1 topping pizza & 2 bottles of Coke $11.50 - $11.50 My Coke Rewards Code = $0.00
Savings = $11.50

Then I went to CVS to redeem some coupons. I had 12 coupons for free Nestle Crunch chocolate bars that I won from their Nestle Crunch Challenge on their Facebook page (the challenge is now over). The full price of each bar is $0.89. I took advantage of their "buy 2 Nestle Crunch bars get 1 bar free" offer so I got 18 Nestle Crunch chocolate bars for free!

Without coupons and in-store discount: 18 Nestle Crunch bars x $0.89 = $16.02
$16.02 - $5.34 with "buy 2 get 1 free" offer = $10.68

I had 2 coupons for free Vitamin Water so I got my favorite flavor XXX because it's delicious and my thoughts tend to verge on XXX (especially when I look at Nick Carter :p).

2 Vitamin Waters x $2.00 + $0.10 bottle deposit fee = $2.10

I have been craving ice cream since Backstreet Boy Brian Littrell talked about it during his web chat on the Backstreet Boys fan club. I picked 2 Haagen-Dazs ice creams. One flavor is Dulce de Leche and the other is Caramel Cone.

2 Haagan-Dazs Ice Creams x $3.00 = $6.00

Then I got 4 cans of Campbell's Spaghetti.

4 cans of Campbell's Spaghetti x $1.00 = $4.00

I have a CVS Extra Care Card which helps me get store coupons and offers both online and in store.

Without coupons & without store discounts the total of everything is: $28.12
Without coupons but with the "buy 2 get 1 free" Nestle Crunch promo the total of everything is: $22.78

With coupons & store discounts all I paid was $3.12!

Here's how I only paid $3.12:

I had one $4 off a $20 off purchase coupon that I got online.
I had $2 Extra Care Bucks (ECB) that I got from a prior purchase.
I had 2 coupons for free Vitamin Water.
I had 12 coupons for free Nestle Crunch Bars.

Breakdown of coupon savings:

$22.78 (total) - $4 ($4 off a $20 off coupon) = $18.78
$18.78 - $2 ($2 ECB) = $16.78
$16.78 - $10.68 (12 free Nestle Crunch coupons) = $6.10
$6.10 - $2.98 (2 free Vitamin Water coupons/cashier was supposed to deduct $2.00 but she deducted the maximum value of the coupons which was $1.49 x 2 = $2.98) = $3.12 total!

$28.12 (no coupons/discounts) - $3.12 (with coupons/discounts) = $25.00
Savings = $25.00!

Then I went to Safeway to redeem a coupon for a free box Smuckers Uncrustables which costs $3.00.

Smuckers Uncrustables $3.00 - $3.00 coupon = $0.00
Savings = $3.00

I only spent $3.25 for the Cupcake and $3.12 at CVS. My total out of pocket expenses was $6.37.

Hold on, I'm not done yet!

I had 2 lottery tickets. Each lottery ticket won $2 for a total of $4. Since the Mega Millions jackpot is over $220 million today I used $2 to buy 2 lottery tickets and then I kept the other $2 winnings.

I consider the $2 lottery win as a little rebate to what I spent on my shopping trip.

$6.37 out of pocket expenses - $2.00 lottery winnings = $4.37!

The total of everything without any coupons/discounts is: $58.62
The total of everything with coupons/discounts/$2 lottery win: $4.37 Total

Savings of my entire Friday shopping trip: $54.25

Feel free to share your coupon stories and tips with me! In a previous post a reader had advised me to use the free item coupons along with the CVS store coupons and that really helped me out so much.

PS. Some of you may be thinking oh but you used up gas in your car and that costs money too. I actually used a $25 Arco Gas Gift Card I bought with $25 I won from a contest so my current tank of gas is free.