Penny Experiment: $262 Toiletries for $7 + tax

Hope y’all don’t mind, but in order to participate in The Penny Experiment, I need to post pictures and details of the deals that I do. I’ve pretty much avoided this because I don’t want to be lumped in with some of those bloggers who empty whole shelves of Crest Pro-Health just because they can.

This photo isn’t complete – it’s just what I got at CVS, not Rite Aid because I gave all that stuff away already. As soon as I found out Single Mom-of-1 was on her way, I ran out and did my Rite Aid deals because she was desperate for hair conditioner (both mom and teenage daughter have dry, frizzy hair) as well as the food I’d already accumulated. I didn’t put together that donation pic because, again, I was in a time crunch.

At CVS, I bought (full shelf/sale price):
$32.94 / $32.94  6 x Dove Men+Care body wash
$23.98 / $20.00  2 x jumbo packs Huggies diapers
$31.96 / $23.96  4 x Pantene (large size)
$  6.38 / $ 5.98  2 x Colgate Max Fresh
$  8.38 / $ 7.98  Oust Air & Surface Sanitizer
$  4.08 / $ 2.60  2 x 2L Coke (inc .05 deposit)
——————————————-
Shelf price total:  $107.72
Sale price total:  $93.46 + tax

– $10 (2 x $5/$30 purchase coupons)
– $6 Pantene (2 x $3/2 mfr)
– $1.50 Huggies mfr
– $1 Huggies mfr
– $7.25  Dove Men+Care mfr
– $3.99  Oust BOGO mfr
-$.50  Coke store coupon
-$1.50 Colgate mfr (IP)
———————————-
Total owed: $61.70 + $5.84 tax
Paid with $60 ECBs + $7.54 cash

ECBs earned:
$32.94 Dove Men+Care (more than 1 card…long story)
$4 Colgate
$6 Oust
$5 Huggies
$10 Pantene/Coke
$57.94 ECBs earned – almost a wash!

Then at Rite Aid – sorry, no photo – I picked up (shelf price/sale price):
$9.98 / $7.00  Pantene (2 bottles)
$5.99 / $3.99  Nyquil
$4.99 / $1.75  Post GrapeNuts cereal
$5.99 / $2.99  Nivea body wash
$4.49 / $1.99  Carefree Ultra liners
$17.96 / $7.96  Stayfree pads
———————————————-
Shelf total:  $49.40
Sale total:  $25.69

– $5/$25 purchase
– $2/2 Pantene
– $2 Nyquil
– $2 Post cereal
– $2 Nivea body wash
– $2 Carefree Ultra (RA video values)
– $2 ($1 x 2) Stayfree
– $3.98 (2 x BOGO) Stayfree
——————————————–
Total:  $4.70 + $1.33 tax = $6.03
SCRs due:  $3 ($2 Pantene, $1 Nyquil)
Net out-of-pocket cost after rebates:  $3.03

And yesterday, I dashed out to Walgreens to pull of this deal after Mom-of-10 said she bought a bottle of shampoo because they were out. I “yelled” at her for buying something I could get much higher quality for nearly-free. This total is actually 3 orders, with one done on last week’s sale:

$10.99 / $10.00  Zicam cold sore swabs, 10ct
$  1.99 / $ .79  Ajax dishwashing liquid
$33.96 / $20.00  4 x 12oz bonus bottles NyQuil/DayQuil
————————————————————————
Full price total:  $46.94
Sale price total:  $30.79
– $8.00 (4 x $2) Vicks NyQuil/DayQuil mfr
= $22.79
Paid with $23 in Register Rewards (had to throw in a candy bar for myself to make this work, not included)
Earned back $20 in Register Rewards

$23.98 / $17.98  2 Huggies jumbo packs
$23.94 / $20.00  6 bottles of Garnier Fructis shampoo & conditioner
$ 7.58 / $ 6.00  2 x 22ct Kotex pads
$ 2.29 / $ .99  Aquafresh, 8.2oz bonus tube
—————————————————————————
Full shelf price: $57.79
Sale price:  $44.97

– $2 Huggies store coupon (2 x $1)
– $4 Huggies mfr IPs (2 x $2)
– $6 Garnier Fructis mfr (6 x $1)
– $2/2 Kotex mfr
– $.75 Aquafresh mfr
———————————————–
$30.22 + 2.40 sales tax
Paid with $27 RRs and $5.62

Got back $6 Huggies (2 x $3), $3 Kotex, $10 Garnier Fructis

GRAND TOTAL

BOUGHT:  $261.85 worth of personal care, baby care, OTC meds and other non-food necessities
PAID:  $16.19 out-of-pocket ($6.62 + 9.57 sales tax)

WHO BENEFITS

Single Mom of Teen Daughter and her friend, Single Mom with Tween Daughter, got 6 bottles of Pantene, 1 Oust, 2L bottle of Coke, NyQuil, 4 Stayfree, 1 Carefree, Nivea body wash, 2 Colgate, Post GrapeNuts (plus a few boxes of the free Kelloggs from my previous Penny Experiment purchase) on Sunday. She got tons of other stuff too (2 frozen turkeys, 3 cans of tuna, Ragu, Ronzoni, SoyJoy, Chex Mix, Stove Top, cranberry sauce, gravy, Scrubbing Bubbles, Lysol, Dawn, All), but that pre-dates my participation. Interesting twist: the turkeys and trimming came from Bronx Mom-of-10 – they’re not fans of Thanksgiving foods, so I just redistributed what the church and a very nice local supermarket owner gave her over the holidays.

Semi-Official Shelter Lady, Joanne, will get the 6 bottles of Dove Men+Care body wash with her next delivery.

Bronx Mom-of-10 got 4 packs of Huggies, 6 bottles of Garnier Fructis, Aquafresh, Kotex, 4 bottles of NyQuil and DayQuil, Zicam swabs (one of her kids gets cold sores), Ajax dishwashing liquid, and the other things pictured below: