Save cash when online shopping this season

If you’re a little short on the dinero as the holidays approach, don’t fret. You’re not alone.

After having a baby in the NICU for five days followed by another 11 weeks of unpaid maternity leave (save my vacation time), the budget is tight in my household this year too. So I’m finding ways to save a buck without altering my lifestyle and/or uh... starving.  :)

I live in a rural area where the nearest grocery store is 12 miles away. I plan to do some shopping locally (Strive for Five has a point :)  ) but for some gifts, I must shop elsewhere. I doubt a trip to Fargo or Bismarck are in store this year as my newborn is acquiring oral and fine motor skills but doesn’t have bargain-hunting ones mastered just yet.

I plan to shop online.

My first stop: shopathome.com which gives CASH BACK for purchases I’m already making.
ShopatHome is a little toolbar you install... it’s kind of like the Google search engine toolbar you likely already have.

Let’s say you’re like me and want to buy a Nebraska Cornhuskers t-shirt for your brother. Easy. Just type in something like “college football apparel” into the toolbar and shopathome gives you a variety of stores selling such items.

If I purchase from FootballFanatics.com, for example, I get 9 percent cash back. The money goes into a little account and once you reach $20, shopathome sends a check at the end of the month. Each store offers a different cash-back percentage.

So, if I wanted to shop at Kohl's, for example. I can type “Kohl's” into the toolbar, click the link and *boom!* anything I buy qualifies for 4 percent cash back.

The site has coupons for in-store purchases as well.

And speaking of coupons, my second favorite online saver is retailmenot.com. I rarely go to the site itself, I just google words like “Kohl's coupons” and find codes for free shipping or 15 percent off my purchase. All you do is copy and paste the code when you do your online checkout. Some of the coupons work for in-store purchases too.

No one in Jamestown sold the baby travel system I wanted and the store I tried in Fargo had sold out. So, I googled “Babies R Us” coupons and found a deal through retailmenot.com. PLUS Babies R Us offers 2 percent cash back through shopathome.com.

So, are you tight on cash this year? What are your money-saving tips?