Putting the KRAZY in KCL

Over the past few months, I've gotten really into using coupons, including sporting my binder at the stores and coveting this wallet. (I love how the description says there's places for "debit cards and store discount cards." Do we need that many spots for credit cards? Of course not!)

Anyway, being in a small city that seems to have a high level of Coupon Crazies per capita, it's not uncommon to go into a store hoping for a good sale, only to find it sold out.  After last night I went to Target with coupon in hand for Pop Arts water bottles, and not only where the water bottles gone, but so where most of the other smaller kits that would end up at the $1.50 price, except for the Mosaic picture frames, which I went ahead and bought to throw in my birthday-gift stockpile...but still, with the way the shelves were cleaned out, it was fairly obvious someone else had to have known about using the printable coupon with the sale and gift card deal.

Heather at the Krazy Coupon Lady recently posted a video on how to take special orders to make sure your item will be in stock and you'll be able to get the amount you want, but I have another idea to keep high-demand items off the shelves. With only two Safeways, three Walgreens, one Target, one Walmart, and a fairly small commissary, just need to make sure no one else in the area starts using coupons.

And I think the easiest way to do this is truly look crazy while we walk through the stores with our binders so any coupon skeptics will be convinced that anyone who takes the time to organize their coupons that neurotically must be totally out of their minds and want nothing to do with it.

Right now I get a positive reception when I walk through the stores with my binder, usually like "I wish I could be that organized!" or asking how I do it.  The other day at the commissary an older gentleman said, "Wow, it looks like you have that down to a science."  The problem with giving this  good vibe is that people might actually go home, look up the KCL website, and consider starting their own binder...and that's exactly why there's never any Wholly Guacamole or Disney Vitamins in the commissary when the sales are good.

So the obvious step is to make ourselves totally unapproachable when we're on a coupon mission.  And I think we could start this by starting a fake cult.  Hear me out here.

Of course there would have to be some sort of outfit that makes us stand out from across store.  My initial idea is old fashioned wizard outfits with robes and big pointy hats (a friend said she wanted to carry a staff that lights up in rainbow colors, and I think she's on the right track.)  Of course we will have to be chanting some mumbo jumbo as we walk up and down the aisles and if anyone asks (okay, no one would actually talk to us, but if we get a strange look) we can explain that we are appeasing the marketing and stocking spirits to make sure we get the items we came in the store hoping to find.   We'd have to preform dances and rituals in the store parking lots to prepare the spirits for our entrance, and I imagine we'd carry something that smells funny as we walk though the store. I'd say incense, but setting things on fire would probably get us kicked out of the store.  We'd probably have to settle for spraying different scents of Glade sprays (which we can get with coupons) as we shop, depending on which spirit we want to please.

The goal would, of course, be to make coupon crazies really look totally out there, so no one wants anything to do with extreme coupon shopping and we can keep the best deals to ourselves.  However, if someone wanted to join the group thinking that the crazy amount of money saving is worth it to the point where they'd be willing to join a cult, they can go on a waiting list until someone else leaves the group (moves away or whatever), and then when a spot opens up, they can go through a bizarre series of initiation rituals until they are allowed to our meetings, where they learn the true secret of the cult...that we don't believe that the Spirit of Cheap Produce likes Vanilla Scented Glade spray anymore than the next guy, but we're just trying to get first dibs on stockpiling the good deals. Then we'd go on to eat appetizers and swap diaper coupons we don't need for $1 off our favorite brand of shampoo.

But the fact remains that I live on a small base, and the commissary is right across from the building where my husband works. It's not uncommon for me to run into one of his co-workers when I'm shopping, and I don't think David would appreciate looking out the window and see me dancing with a staff in front of the commissary.  I think he'd prefer if I just talked to a manager about special ordering the vitamins.