Working Walgreens

Until recently, I avoided Walgreens like the plague. I always found the aisles a bit too crowded, the store kind of disorganized, and just not as familiar as CVS. I grew up shopping at CVS. The red logo made my comfy and happy. Walgreens was foreign land. I never even read the circular... until I heard about the free photos.

Yeah, I'll admit it. Free photos got me though the door.

I had these two mystery disposable cameras- I'd had them for years, and I never wanted to pay to have them developed. A few months back, I saw on a blog that Walgreens was developing film for free, so I brought mine in. When I picked up the rolls (oh, they were pictures of a Walk-a-thon with some former colleagues and a "hazy" trip to NYC), a coupon for free digital prints printed out with my receipt. I got over my Walgreens issue then and there, because dang, when they want to, this place has great deals.

In general, there are three ways to kick butt at Walgreens, on top of their weekly sales:

1)The Walgreens EasySaver catalog. These little gems are usually right near the door next to the stack of weekly fliers. Grab a few. Stash them in your bag (they won't mind).

Now here's the deal with the rebates... every month, Walgreens puts out a bunch of EasySaver Rebates. They are honestly easy. Usually, at some point during the month, the items up for rebate will go on sale. Sometimes, they go so much on sale that they will be free after rebate. Sometimes, you can even use a coupon and make a little money.

There are two ways to get your rebates... You can do it the old school way (send it in, get a check), or the even better super-rad way (enter your receipt online and get a gift card in the mail... you can recharge the gift card every time you put in for rebate... PLUS, you get an extra 10% bonus for doing it online).

2)"Stacking"Coupons. Ever heard that term, "stacking?" It means using 2 different coupons for one item... usually a store coupon and a manufacturer coupon. Walgreens is a great place to stack up.

Along with the rebates in the EasySaver booklet, you'll find a bunch of monthly coupons store coupons. They also put them out in their weekly circular. As an example, I recently did this:

Pert Plus was on sale for $3.49.

The EasySaver catalog had a $1.50 off coupon.

The newspaper had a $1 off coupon.

I used both for one bottle, making he final cost $1.

Not bad, huh?

3) Register Rewards -These are very similar to the CVS Extra Care Bucks Program- you buy an advertised item, and then the register prints off "register rewards" that can be used like cash for your next Walgreens purchase. One big benefit to Walgreens though, is that Register Rewards are not tied to a card like CVS... so you are not bound to a limit.

Here's an example of something you can score free after register rewards, starting tomorrow:

Colgate toothpaste, on sale 2/$3.

Use 2 $1 off coupons form last weekend's paper, bringing the total to .50 each.

Get $1 back in register rewards.

There is one catch, if you can call it that, I guess. You can't roll the Register Reward that just printed into the same deal... For example, I couldn't use that $1 I just got for Colgate on more Colgate (I tried it a few weeks back... It didn't work).

So to sum up, get to know Walgreens. The inside of the store might not be as glam as CVS, but there are some good deals to be had (and if you check out the image above, it seems they are even offering a half off deal on some unique fragrances).