CVS Extra Care Deals and Walgreens Register Rewards beginning 4/26. I've included some tips for beginners as well.

I'm only going to highlight the free items and some of the better "other" deals for both stores. If you want to know more, you can go to http://www.iheartcvs.com/ and http://www.iheartwags.com/ for each of the stores.

Also, on Sundays, The Coupon Mom will post a good coupon match for those and other drug stores. The nice thing about her list is she lists the total net % savings. You can just go down the column looking for whatever % savings is your minimum (mine's 65% off or better) and then get your coupons together for that item.

CVS

Free items this week will depend on whether you’ve got coupons or not. Here’s what I found at http://www.iheartcvs.com/

band-aid brand bandages
$1Coupons: -$1 Band-Aid, any SS 3/15/09 or rp 4/26/09

This is also part of a larger Extra Care deal

-$10 ECBs (Extra Care Bucks) with $20 of items Limit 1 deal (not one box of band-aids)

Garnier Fructis Shampoo, Conditioner or Styler $2.99 get $2 eb Limit 1
-$1 Garnier Fructis Shampoo, Conditioner or Treatment, any except trial size RP 1/4/09
-$1 Garnier Fructis Style Product, any except trial size SS 1/4/09

Here’s another deal that might be worth the effort as well:

Crest Cavity, Tartar, or Baking Soda & Peroxide TP 6.4 oz or Oral B Indicator $1.99 get $1 ECBs Limit 2

There’s a coupon for $0.75 off Crest from March’s P&G Brandsaver that should still be good.

So, if you don’t have any ECBs already, here’s what you do.

Buy One:

Price: $1.99
-Q: $0.75

Final: $1.25, get $1.00 ECB

Buy the second one:

Price: $1.99
-Q: $0.75
-ECBs:$1.00

Final: $0.24 get $1 ECB

Now, if your CVS is anything like mine, in addition to the ECBs, you’ll probably get a bunch of other coupons. Look for one that says $3 off $15 purchase. This might vary regionally, but you get the point.

Now, look for another deal of things you might want. I typically am only interested in deals where I get at least one half the purchase price back in ECBs, but once in a while, a lower amount will work.

For example: There’s a Colgate/SC Johnson bunch, get $5 ECBs when you buy $15.

See if you can get online coupons for any of it. Here’s one for scrubbing bubbles automatic shower cleaner or refills.

It’s a $5 coupon off the purchase of 2, so, get 3 items and do this, but read the whole thing because there’s a trick to it:

Price: 3 x $5 = $15
CVS Q ($3 off $15)-$3
Online Q: -$5 (from link above)
ECB from last: -$1
Final: $6 get $5 ECBs

Here’s the trick: make sure you hand the cashier the $3 off $15 first. If they apply any of the other Qs first, the total is now less than $15 and that one no longer applies.

If this is your first try at CVS, my advice at this point is to stop there unless you NEED something else that’s on sale. With patience, you’ll find that sooner or later, your favorite brands all go on sale and most of them will get ECBs.

If you take my advice, the final result will be $7.49 cash out of pocket and $5 ECBs for next time. The total value of products you bring home will be somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 unless you included the freebies listed first. Then it gets somewhere around $45 in goods.

Walgreen’s

There are some good free items this week.

Just an FYI-the blood glucose meter below is one of many that are almost always free after rebate somewhere. I guess the money’s in the test strips. However, with the Register Rewards, you can make money. Thanks to http://www.iheartwags.com/ for this content.

Free Items after RRs

Bayer Breeze2 or Contour Meter $14.99 get $5 RR
-$14.99 Bayer Breeze2 or Contour Meter, free (up to $30) SS 3/22/09, RP 10/26/08, or RP 2/1/09

Bayer quick release crystals 4 ct $2.49 get $2.49 RR

Ecotrin 45 ct tablets $2 get $2 RR
-$1 Ecotrin product any (exp 4/30/09) 1/25/09 SS

Nivea body wash 16.9 oz $4.99 get $4.99 RR -$1 off Any Nivea Body Product 2 oz + (print limit of 25!)-$1
Nivea body wash for women 16.9 oz, or $3 off wyb 2 (Found on store display)

Rembrandt toothpaste 2.6 -3.2 oz or mouthwash 16 oz $5.99 get $5.99 rr

Here are some other deals that caught my eye

Schick quattro, Quattro trimstyle, or Intuition $8.99 get $3 RR
-$4 Schick Intuition or Intuition Plus Razor or Refill SS 3/22/09
-$4 Schick Quattro for Women Razor, TrimStyle Razor or Refill SS 3/22/09

Scrubbing bubbles shower cleaner kit or Windex all in glass cleaning kit $13.99 get $3 RR
-$3 Windex Outdoor All-In-One Glass Cleaning Tool Starter Kit SS 3/29/09
-$7 Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower Cleaner Starter Kit
-$3 Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower Cleaner Starter Kit SS 3/29/09

Suave or rave hair care 3/$5 get $2 RR wyb 3
-$1 off 2 Suave Shampoo, Conditioner or Hairspray RP 3/1/09
-$1.75 off 3 Suave Shampoo, Conditioner or Hairspray RP 3/1/09

Now don’t forget—at Walgreen’s there’s no limit on Register Rewards, BUT, you can’t roll the deals the way you can at CVS.

For example, let's say you buy the Bayer Quick Release crystals above and get your $2.49 RRs.

However, if you try to take that RR coupon and use it on another Bayer Quick Release Crystals, you WILL get the item free, but you won’t get any RRs with the second purchase. If you want to get more, you just need to “tag team” it with another item that you want.

For example, the Ecotrin for $2. You’ll need another item for $0.49 to make it work, but there’s tons of Easter candy on clearance. So you’d spend $2.49, use the RRs from the last deal, get it for free and get $2 in RRs for your trouble.

THEN, you can use THAT $2 RR to get another Bayer.

Make Sense? If not, e-mail me at allen@thekingofcoupons.com and I’ll answer your questions.