A Coupon Organizer for Regular People

I'm not a hard-core couponer, but I appreciate saving money. So the other day when I sat down with a stack of inserts, I needed a plan. At one time I had an accordion style file folder, but it must have run its course because it has disappeared. :)

This cheap photo album/brag book has been sitting on my shelf for awhile (i.e. years). Of course there are no actual photographs in it, so I decided to give this a whirl. 

4x6 notecards are what I inserted into each page. Quick and easy. Sticking with my don't-make-this-harder-than-it-needs-to-be approach, I found categories on Pinterest and considered if they would work for us. I changed them around a little bit for my purposes.  Each category is written on the card in 3 different places, because you never know where your coupons are going to land. 

I can use the front and back of each category to store coupons, and since I don't have 12 million coupons to organize, it's easy to see what I have. 

One thing I was worried about was functionality. I love a cute book, but would it be easy to utilize in the midst of a shopping trip with children fighting over who should be pushing the cart? Turns out it's very easy to turn the pages, because they have that plastic covering and just enough stuff in them to give some structure. On the spot it worked quite well and I was pleasantly surprised. 

This was one of those purely-practical projects.  Straightforward and simple. 

Sometimes it's best to just focus on the basics. 

I don't know how long this thing will survive, but so far I'm pleased. It's a functional, inexpensive, reasonably sized solution. It makes me happy to know I have a place to go with my coupons when I'm organized enough to gather them up. 

Happy average-person couponing!  ;)