Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Ad matching - Target:NO, Walmart:OK

About a month ago, I started taking the Pros ranch market and Food City flyers to Walmart and Target and ad matching.

After all 7lbs of Navel oranges for $1, 10 cucumbers for $1 and 4lbs of Fuji apples for $.96 was a great deal. The fresh produce at Food City and Pros leave a little to be desired. They are, in my opinion, bottom of the barrel.

Also, I was able to get heads of lettuce 3/$1 at walmart.

So, here is the breakdown.

I go to Target and Ad match apples with no problems.
So, another day, I go to Target to ad match some chicken.
Well, according to the customer service, I cannot ad match chicken because Target's chicken is Market Pantry brand and the ad was generic. It was just Chicken Breasts.
So, I left the store. I said to the rep, "Well, I can just go to Walmart or to the store directly. Tell me, what is my incentive then, to shop here?"

So, I called the store later to find out if this is really the policy. I was informed that a Target Watermelon is different from an Albertsons Watermelon and they would not ad match that. What????

Yes. They will ad match name brand items but if you can get them to match fruit, vegetables or meat... consider yourself fortunate.

Well, I called Corporate and they confirmed this.

Walmart does ad match apples for apples but if you try to ad match oranges for oranges, they might try to say no.

Remember, they have a new policy for ad matching that came out in April.

"If you can find a lower price anywhere, we will be sure to match it."

Anywhere? Well, that seems a little like misrepresentation. I found an item in Mesa, and Chandler Walmart tried to deny me. I was like, "I have your ad on my phone, would you like to see it?" Then, I was told that since oranges are sold per item and not by the pound, that could not be matched. This changed quickly as I recited the ad matching policy and told a lower level manager that I had spoken to a manager in Gilbert who informed me that, "Yes, they are supposed to match it."

The fact is that they can and have ad matched this in some stores with no problems. I think the cashiers are either misinformed or simply do not know how to manage the register to get the price in lbs rather than per item.

Overall, it is a little bit of a pain in these situations but getting 1.79 Romaine lettuce for .50 or getting $13 dollars in oranges for $3 does save my family a substantial amount of money and the kids can have fresh fruit and veggies that are decent quality.

A Year almost? Really

Wow.

In the past year, I have not needed to buy any cleaning supplies, except for Swiffer wipes, sponges and the occassional dish soap that was a bargain for like 4 cents.

The Kmart doubles deal on Scrubbing bubbles, soap, shampoo, hair products, Windex, and other cleaners has lasted me for over a year. That's crazy, right!

So, when you find those great deals and people may treat you like you are one of those extreme couponers, who cares! Stocking up can really save a load of cash.

Don't buy what you don't need. The trick is to get enough to last and that you can afford.