Price-matching places

Here's a quick list of Ontario stores that price-match 7 days a week. Enjoy, savers!

• Real Canadian Superstore
• Walmart
• Freshco
• No Frills
• Toys R Us (yes, seriously)
• Canadian Tire (yup, this one too!)

Take note: There are "fine print details," so pay close attention. For instance, Freshco sometimes says you can only price-match four quantities of one item in one shopping visit. So ... just be aware before you tell the cashier to shut the front door ;)

Did I miss any stores? Let me know!

Heinz Baby/Little Kids coupons

SmartSource has printable coupons available for Heinz Baby and Little Kids snacks and food. Here's a tip: If you can, wait until there's a great sale or price match at Walmart, Superstore or Freshco; then use the coupons on top for additional savings. Check the site out if you have time, especially if you're starting your baby on solids. I started my daughter on rice cereal at four months old and she seemed to be okay whenever I gave her Heinz. Happy savings!

Price matching

I live by a monthly budget and in order to keep it up to par, I combine two money-saving methods: couponing AND price matching. The best places to price match? In my experience, Walmart, No Frills and Freshco. However, occasionally you'll get a lazy cashier who doesn't want to price match an gives some lame excuse. So if I have time, I just take my items and go to another cashier.

I've had a lot of friends ask me how price matching works, so here's what I do: I get my flyers from my local newspaper, star/circle items that I need and are at a good price. Then I also note on the flyers which items I have coupons for. So let's say I go to Walmart and I want to price match formula that's on sale at Zellers AND I have a $5-off coupon: I simply go to the Walmart cashier, show them the Zellers. They'll charge me Zellers' price, then take $5 off. Simple, right?

But when you're price matching, you do need to take note of the following:

• Pay attention to the flyer dates, in particular, items that are only on sale from "Fri-Sun." 
• Some retailers are ridiculously picky with fruits and vegetables. For instance, I tried to price match bananas from a competitor, but a cashier said I couldn't because the bananas weren't from the country the competitor stated. 
• Occasionally there are limits to the number of items you can price match (i.e. maybe you want to price match six cartons of juice, but the store will only allow you to match four of them).

I'm not going to lie — sometimes this method is tedious and when you have a toddler circling your feet, it can get frustrating. However, I've been able to save up to 75% on items solely through price matching and couponing. In the past, I've paid $0.25 for a box of Catelli Healthy Harvest pasta, $12 for 900g of Similac Go and Grow formula, $0.97 for a box of Nestle baby cereal and $1.97 for a box of Heinz Nutrios.

Oh yea, one more tip: Don't throw away the flyers just because you think you're done shopping for the week! What if you need to do last-minute shopping?

And don't be afraid to ask retailers about price matching! What are they going to do, send you to the principal's office for asking?