For a few years I used a "pay for" website that told me which coupons to use at my stores each week for the best deals.
I managed to keep a stockpile of about a 3 months supply of non-perishables.
(Think of financial experts advising 6 months of salary in savings reasoning.)
Not hoarding.
(See Extreme Couponing shows for hoarding.)
It was wonderful and really helped me keep a very reasonable budget.. until..
my local Kroger stopped double and tripling coupons several months ago.
Since that time the stores seem to be getting a "heads up" from the manufacturers as to the coupons they'll be issuing and basing their sales on that information.
The deals seem to have just about dried up. The sale items don't have many coupons to match.
I still get a Sunday paper and keep my coupon inserts but now I use a free website:
www.couponmom.com and ad-match the things I want to purchase at Wal-mart instead of trekking to 3 different chain stores.
I don't coupon shop every week like I did in the past, only when I see some really great deals on things I know we'll use.
For the most part, we've gone back to shopping at Sam's Club for a lot of our grocery needs.
I chalk the decrease in coupon deals, stricter coupon policies, and lower coupon values up to
the economy and the Extreme Couponing shows that have exploited -in most cases- blatant abuse of coupons.
I really feel for the family that *depends* on coupons to feed their family within their budget each month.