Blog Changes to Stores, Matchups and Posts

Over the last year, many of you have noticed that we made some HUGE changes to our website and grocery matchups. We recently got rid of the Bashas matchups, and because Walmart no longer price matches, we also got rid of the Weekly price List that we had  been  doing for several years. We also stopped carrying prices for the Mega Sale items several months ago, too.

We also stopped providing unadvertised deals for Fry’s, Safeway and all other stores (Target, Walgreens and CVS) — and many of you have noticed that.  We have had some very positive comments about these changes, but then we have seen the opposite as well – some being incredibly negative at times.

Let me be honest, in this post, and tell you why these things have changed, and what this site will be from this point going forward.

Over the last 5-6 years, Couponing has changed. We started this site 7 years ago to help people save money on groceries – couponing was popular, many people were paycheck to paycheck and almost everyone I know was either foreclosing on their home or, going through a short sale on their home. Lots of you were saving some really serious cash – people were picking up 5-10 newspapers every weekend making it almost foolish not to coupon.

The Extreme Couponing show was out and extremely popular – with that also came coupon abuse, too. We saw people clearing shelves to stockpile items only to sell those items on yard sale sites (many of which are still going, and many of you are members of..) – we saw many people push the envelope with imposed limits for their personal benefit.

Many manufacturers knew this and as a result, coupon values dropped; limits were imposed and stores felt that couponing was more of a problem than an asset for their store. Fry’s stopped doubling coupons – and while many thought it would hit them hard, it didn’t – they have excelled and it led Safeway to end doubles too.  I noticed store promotions start to decrease just a few years ago and I had a fear that this popularity would come to an end, or at least was in for a huge change. Couponing has changed – although some opportunity is still there, right now many have taken the opportunity to analyze the purchases and determine if it’s really worth the health sacrifice or if it’s better to pass.

Couponing was not easy – deals became harder to find and the savings did not equate to the effort. Not for me, and certainly not for many of you either. Once Fry’s stopped doubling, we saw a HUGE decrease of interest in grocery matchups – people wanted to save, but they didn’t necessarily want to work FOR that savings (make sense?)

Through those changes, we continued to provide matchups for the stores – we teamed up with Favado, and other bloggers, who worked feverishly to provide matchups for stores for us, in exchange for OUR time providing matchups for Safeway, Bashas and Fry’s.  In that time, we found Amazon to be a great source of deals/savings, so we often mentioned deals through Amazon as a way to save. The commission from those deals covered the cost of grocery matchups (which cost us to provide). We paid a team of people to go into the stores to capture these unadvertised deals, just like we paid for people to type up our grocery matchups each week – not exactly an inexpensive venture at all).

In early 2015, changes continued, and not for the better.

Amazon decided it was the perfect time to drop commissions for bloggers. Where bloggers may have made 8.5% commission on an item before, it was now between 1-3%. Given that many shop via the app, or through Amazon Smile, that took away from our commissions even more – making it relatively difficult to earn any commission unless you had millions of people buying from you on “one” particular item.

Amazon didn’t want bloggers posting the best deals – they, instead, wanted bloggers to post the most expensive deals – which doesn’t jive well with a “frugal” blog. Perhaps some of you are willing to pay $900 for a Treadmill, but that’s not something that’s universal. We still post Amazon deals now, but the commission drop makes it incredibly difficult to justify in some cases.

Many people stopped printing coupons. Many of you stopped couponing entirely – I know this because many of my hard core coupon friends told me over and over, “I don’t read blogs, I don’t print, I don’t coupon.” Many of you printed from mobile, many used Swagbucks TO print — with the sheer number of readers that just didn’t print from our site, the revenue just was not there. While Coupons.com used to provide up to 15 cents per printed coupon, that changed down to pennies… 1-2 cents per unique session, per day, per user. Once again, unless you have millions of visitors, 1-2 cents a print isn’t going to make a dent.

Facebook reach was just non-existent. We may have close to 50,000 “Facebook” fans, but on any given post, reach is anywhere from 500-1,000. Sometimes more, usually less. We track our content on Facebook to see what readers like, and what isn’t clicked. Grocery deals were the least clicked items – a “hot” post for a toilet paper deal might get 23 – 30 clicks, whereas a BuzzFeed Video shared on our page would get a reach of 11,000 if not more. After tracking content and charting our successes/failures for a 1 year period it was evident that grocery and drugstore deals were NOT what people wanted to read. Our drugstore deals were some of the least clicked, not to mention Bashas and Safeway. We DID keep Safeway and the drugstores but there are on an as-is — which means if the use drops more, they will go too.

Considering all those areas, we had to make changes in 2016 – our print revenue and online sales were not enough to pay for the help we had to have on the grocery deals (which really are not a revenue generator at all).  We barely broke even, and in most cases, didn’t break even – we had to pay out of pocket.   In many cases, Mega Sale lists that were typed up took up to 18 – 19 hours of typing just to finish the list. On the day OF the Mega Sale, we would spend upwards of another 16 hours to add prices, and take pictures, of the Mega, in addition to paying people to be at the store at 5 a.m. — after all, we have kids, my responsibility is to my kids as a parent, not to drag them out at 5 a.m. to the store to spend all day grabbing prices.

In many cases, the 2 week sale we would post on Facebook would generate comments on the last day of the sale “I never shopped. I had no idea there was a sale…” — that told us nobody was interested and that our time was better spent doing other things.

The income we made from our blog was NOT our sole family income. We are lucky and thankful we never wanted it to be.  But at some point, the income from the blog HAS to cover the cost of running the blog, and paying for help. Over the years, many people have mentioned that “If you love to help people save, then you shouldn’t care about the income.”

I agree. But – the blog is a business. That is like telling a teacher or a policeman, or a military Servicemember that if they LOVE what they do that much, that they shouldn’t need to earn an income. That’s silly to say to someone.  The blog is a small business – not just a hobby from a bored stay at home mom (as we have had that comment more than a few times, too).  The blog income HAS to cover those things. And several years ago, my husband and I sat down and he said – if at any point, the income from the blog doesn’t cover the costs TO run the blog, then changes are necessary.

And I agree – as any small business would probably understand that stance, too.  The same things that have happened to us have happened to MANY bloggers across the U.S. as well – many of my blogging counterparts have closed down their blogs completely. They have rebranded. These changes have not been experienced by us alone – but everyone.   

Our lives changed as well. We have shared this before – and many of you may have missed this – but we made some significant health changes just under years ago. It has been a VERY challenging road for my husband, and he is doing much better now than he was then.  We got “tired’ of being sick and tired – tired of dealing with health issues, seeing doctors only to get another prescription for his anxiety and PTSD, and in the end, really did a LOT of self study and research behind his issues to help him get better.

We realized that doctors aren’t in the business of helping people get better. Big pharmacy is only in the business of pushing more prescriptions, and so few doctors out there were able to help him find a different path to health other than through a pill bottle and subsequent appointment. We changed the way we shopped. We made drastic changes to the way we eat, and we took our health in our own hands. 3 years later and an entirely different approach to food, he is BETTER – he looks great.  Sometimes you get sick and tired of being sick and tired, and it takes something monumental to make changes.

Those changes have not been well received. As a deal blogger, it’s not mainstream to stop posting deals for food and things that are unhealthy. It’s not popular. Convenience is huge for most – and for many, their own health goes on the backburner until something critical happens in their family.  We don’t spend more than what we used to spend before – but we DO spend it in different places. We do believe that food is a large part of our health and the health of our kids.  I personally got very tired of seeing personal friends with constant health issues, people struggling with sick children almost every week – knowing that a lifestyle change may possibly help them, but their unwillingness to make changes.  

This year, 2016, we decided to leave grocery deals on the site – until they can’t be sustained any longer, but allow people to make their own choices on what they buy – instead of promoting in hopes of a “coupon print” … people can be responsible for their own purchase, and find the deal in the matchups.

We still have some grocery ads. But they will only stay if they are used – we have been partners with Favado for 3 years. We contribute Safeway and Fry’s – in return, we earn other stores. Those 2 stores still cost us to provide – but they will only be available for as long as we can continue to afford to provide. If lists go unused, they will eventually go away too. As long as Favado stays around, the matchups will likely stay. 

Many readers have been displeased. We know this – when we discontinued the Weekly Price List, we heard from long time readers (for the first time) that we never knew we had. Many of you mentioned that you don’t use the blog – you don’t use any other matchups. But you wanted the list to stay just as a guide – many of you made mention that you are parents, with little time. I’m a parent too – of 4, soon to be 5. My time is precious also – but I can’t keep a list just because it’s convenient for some :)  Unfortunately the world doesn’t work like that.

A survey we did last year brought some eye-opening results: many of you didn’t want to see ANYTHING except for grocery deals. No recipes, no money-saving tips, no articles on Essential Oils – and while I understand that deals were your interest, tracking content on Facebook, Coupon Prints, and list use proved otherwise.  

For 7 years, the blog was quite a lot of stress – I worried constantly that I was losing readers.  While I worried almost every second that I wasn’t getting “every” deal, the best deal, the best picture, and doing more than what I could be, my personal life suffered – my family never saw me… I worked ALL the time. The laptop went on every family outing. My website took a front seat in what should have been time with my family and kids – even my husband, who toted the kids all over while I had to stay home and work.  I can’t do it all – and I fully admit that.  Websites don’t run on their own – there is a person behind every post. Many of the larger sites have as many as 20-30 people employed – not this one, and it certainly isn’t our goal. My focus now is on my family – husband, kids and balance between the two.   

I still LOVE to help you save. Except… we do things a little different. It’s important to know where your food comes from. It’s important that people know how to be self reliant. It’s also important that you see a world of savings OUTSIDE of your grocery store. I still post Amazon deals even though the commission is not there. I still have great money saving tips to share, and as a mom of almost 5, we enjoy to create content that will keep you busy as a family. 

What we will say .. is that blog posts have slowed down – from over 500 blog posts a week, we are now down to 140. It has made many of you leave. It has triggered confusion for some – we know that the blog has slowed down, that was our intention. Our website was redesigned- intentionally. Our content posts (recipes, articles) were buried – and many of our partner sponsors are not willing to continue working with a site that doesn’t have CONTENT for all to see. When brands have to dig for your content, they aren’t willing to work with you – as much as I hate to say it, brands aren’t willing to work with a deal site. Deals are come and go – content is forever.

What you Don’t Know… (well, many of you do) is that I DO have a second site. After last year’s survey, we had readers mention they didn’t want to read about health, wellness, Essential Oils or even recipes, we started a second blog for those. We have worked hard on this site, and it’s created on the basis of content that interests us.  Your life needs to go beyond the next grocery deal — perhaps a focus on your own health. Self wellness and real food are passionate subjects to me ~ I love being in the kitchen and that needs to be something that is shared.  Although it might not interest everyone, it will interest a few, and maybe it’ll motivate you to make some life changes.  

Thanks for reading this very long-winded post – I wanted to be as transparent as possible so that you knew why we made the changes that we did. Many readers have left, but I know we have a few very loyal readers that may still follow – and we hope to explain why we made these changes so you could be in better understanding of the shift you have seen the past 6 months.