Drugstore deals: My plans for Black Friday

I broke out the Excel spreadsheet to figure this out.  I am such a nerd.

Yup, getting up early on Thanksgiving morning to go couponing.  My rational mind is slightly horrified, but my cheapskate Id is frothing at the mouth.  The ads call it "Black Friday" but, as mentioned, I'm going on Thursday with a shred of hope that hordes of other crazy people will be too busy Thanksgiving-ing to be out couponing at the drugstores.

Long breakdown under the cut:

The anatomy of a drugstore deal: make money buying Alka Seltzer

My dear friend Michael is a well-prepared guy.  I mean that in the sense that he is literally prepared to survive the breakdown of society via economic collapse, civil war, and/or zombie apocalypse.  Alien invasion too, but that's not as likely as the other three.  He, his wife, and their friends & family will come through Mad Max just fine because Michael doesn't screw around.  I want to be like Michael when I grow up.

So, when Michael asked me earlier today to give him a heads-up if I find great deals on shelf-stable goods that he could pass on to his apocalypse-avoidant homies, I figured I'd do him and all of you a service by breaking down a good deal on over the counter medication.  Since this is a national sale at a national chain, most anyone will be able to replicate it with a little footwork ahead of time.  Cold & flu season is fast approaching; stock up now while they'll pay you to do it.

Let's begin.

Locate your nearest Rite Aid Pharmacy.  Some time before Sunday, stop in there and sign up for their Wellness+ card.  It's completely free; this is the store loyalty card that gives you discount prices and enables you to earn their +UP store dollars on eligible purchases.  You fill out a short form in the store, they give you a card, and you're on your way.

You will also want to gather your coupons.  First and foremost, determine if the Red Plum sales insert is mailed to you (usually on a Tuesday or Wednesday, arriving with your local grocery sales circular) or if it comes with the Sunday paper.  To find out, go to this Red Plum link, enter your address, and it'll tell you.
If you get this insert in the mail, start asking your neighbors, coworkers, friends and family to save their coupons for you right now.  You'll need six inserts.
If your local newspaper carries Red Plum in their Sunday paper - lucky you!!  Make plans now to purchase six newspapers on Sunday - or ask friends/family/etc if you can have the coupons from their paper.  There are piles of other useful coupons, so if you wind up buying six papers you'll still come out ahead.

However you do it, you want to make sure to have SIX coupons from that circular for $3 off "any Alka-Seltzer Plus Fast Powder Packs product."

Next, you'll want to print out a couple of these $5 off a $25 purchase coupons for Rite Aid.  You'll only need one for this deal, but they come in handy so keep a couple extra on hand.
LATE EDIT: apparently the linked coupon is acting up. If you can't get the PDF to load, please email me and I may be able to help: angrycheapskate (at) gmail (dot) com.

Starting on Sunday, 10/24, this item will be on sale at Rite Aid.

Playin' the Drugstore Game

The major drugstore chains all have programs where if you buy certain items, you get "reward dollars" back that can be spent in the store on your next visit.  These are very much like the Catalinas/OYNOs at the grocery store, and, as I've recently started to figure out - THIS is how those crazy coupon ladies get $30 worth of merchandise for a quarter.  We'll examine how it works momentarily.

The three big drugstores we've got access to in my 'hood are Walgreens, CVS, and Rite Aid.
Of the three, Walgreens' reward program is the most restrictive; Rite Aid's is by far the best.  CVS seems to be somewhere in the middle.

Let's take a look at a razor deal.  A Schick Hydro 5 razor is priced at $8.99 on sale, and if you buy one you receive $5 back in reward dollars.  Better yet, there's a $4/1 coupon.  $8.99 - $4 coupon = $4.99, and you get a $5 store credit in reward dollars back, making the razor a $.01 moneymaker.

• At Walgreens you can buy the razor, use the coupon, get the $5 back, but you cannot use that $5 to purchase another razor.  The reward dollars won't print if you do so.  In  addition, you can only get one deal per transaction.  If you wanted to buy 5 razors, you would have to do 5 separate transactions to get the $5 back on each one, and in the end you'd have paid about $25 and you'll have five $5 Walgreens Register Rewards (their name for reward dollars, shortened to RRs) that you can use on other stuff in the store. 
• At CVS you can purchase multiple razors in one transaction and use the $5 in Extra Care Bucks (their reward dollars, shortened to ECBs) on more razors.  The downside is that most of the really good deals have a limit of one per card for the sale period.  With the Schick razor, you buy your razor for $4.99 with coupon, get $5 back in ECBs, and you could use that $5 to buy another razor - you just won't get another $5 ECB for it.  So you'd be able to get two razors for $4.99, which isn't a bad deal, but it ain't free quite yet.
• At Rite Aid, there are very few restrictions.  Unless there's a restriction printed in the sales circular, and there aren't many times where it is, you could buy a razor, get your $5 +UP (Rite Aid's reward dollars, pronounced plus-ups or ups) and use it to get another razor for free.  You could then use the $5 +UP from the 2nd razor and use it to get another for free.  Or you could buy two razors with two coupons for $9.98, get $10 in +UPs, buy two more at no cost to you using coupons & the +UPs from the last transaction and get $10 more +UPs, THEN buy 2 more at no cost and get $10 more +UPs back.  And on and on it goes.

That all said, I decided to start learning the drugstore game at Rite Aid.  As is usually the case with me, I had to get all crazy and jump into CVS as well due to a couple good deals they have, so I guess I'm learning both stores now.  Let's see how I did.

Friday - CVS
Pepsi 2 liters were on sale for $1ea.  If you purchased 15, you got $5 ECBs back, making them $.67ea.  I had two $1/2 coupons as well.  I am a Diet Pepsi FIEND.  It's almost embarrassing how much of that stuff I drink; suffice to say, the 15 bottles will be consumed.
15 Diet Pepsi = $15 - $2 in coupons = $13.
Receive $5 ECBs back.


They also had gallons of milk for $2.19.  Andy drinks as much milk as I do Diet Pepsi, so we got two gallons of milk as well (normally $2.50-3.00 at the grocery store.

$17.38 with $5 ECBs remaining = $12.38 for 15 sodas and 2 gallons of milk.