By Ida Brown

ibrown@themeridianstar.com

It's a Sunday ritual for many — like Toomsuba resident Sheila Bunyard.

After a quick scan of the day's headlines, Bunyard immediately moves to the middle section of her newspaper.

"Most of the time it's first thing I go for," she said. "And what I don't find in the newspaper, I usually will go online on Web sites to search or I may see one on the back of a can or bottle."

The "thing" Bunyard feverishly searches for are coupons.

"I'm not coupon crazy," she quickly notes. "But I admit I'll do anything to save a dollar."

However, Terri L. Kelley of Meridian has no shame about her passion for coupons. In her response to The Star's online request for coupon clippers, Kelly gave herself the moniker "Coupon Crazy Lady."

"I enjoy looking forward to Sunday's newspaper so I can cut the coupons," she said. "I go to Wal-Mart and take all the sales ads to do comparison shopping — then I enjoy using my coupons."

While pulling out a stash of coupons at the checkout counter sometimes prompts deep sighs and rolling eyes from other shoppers standing in line, it's usually worth it to the savvy shopper — many of whom are able to cut their grocery bill in half.

"When Fred's (Dollar Store) doubled coupons, I bought all of our household stuff one or two times a month and NEVER ran out of anything," said Jeannie Ross of Louisville, another responder to our online request.

"I have gotten $30-$40 worth of stuff for maybe $10 or more," said Ross, who receives coupons from her mother, who receives them from an aunt who lives in Amory.

"We might have numerous bottles of shampoo, boxes of toothpaste and other items in our line closet," Ross said. "I put wire shelves on the inside of the line closet door because I ran out of room for stuff!"

Managers at several local groceries could not provide an estimate of the number of customers who use customers.

"Some customers use more coupons than others," said Lee Hand, co-manager of the Wal-mart Supercenter at 1733 Second St. South.

"We have one customer who has a coupon for every item she purchases, which means she saves quite a bit," he said.

A manager at Winn-Dixie on Highway 49 North said his store has an impressive number of coupon users.

"They tend to use them more for food, but they also use coupons for items such as laundry detergent and bath and beauty products," said the manager, who asked that his name not be used.

Hand said he especially notices an increase in coupon use at the Supercenter when new products are introduced.

"Like when the Febreeze CDs first came out — every time you turned around there was a customer with a $5 coupon off the $18 price," he said.

Howard agrees that coupons are a good way to try out new products.

"For instance if the product is $1.50 and you have a 75 cents or $1.00 off coupon, you've only spent 50 cents or 75 cents," she said. "So you really haven't loss anything if you didn't like it."

Bunyard, who smokes, said she saves up $20 a month on cartons of cigarettes.

"I know I shouldn't smoke, but I do. And cigarettes cost so much," she said. "So the coupons are really a big help."

Bunyard said any coupons she doesn't use she passes on to her children.

"They have babies, so I give them coupons for things like diapers, baby food and wipes," she said. "People just don't realize how much money you can save with coupons. Those 20 cents and 30 cents (savings) can really add up."

Kelley agrees.

"When I in line and pull out all my coupons, other people in line will go 'Oh, my goodness!' But I love my coupons and I really do save a lot with them," she said.

"A lot of people don't know this, but some stores will accept coupons from another store just to get your business," Kelley said. " And because I use coupons so much, my grocery store will sometimes send me a $5 off coupon. It's really worth all the comparing and clipping when you see how much you save."

Even though most local grocery stores accept coupons, some don't never receive them — particularly the smaller, neighborhood stores.

"I don't know why, but our customers just don't use coupons," said Robert Owens, manager of M & B Grocery at 1802 26th Ave.

While inconvenience is often cited as the reason some people don't use coupons, Hand said it really isn't that difficult.

"Now it's so much easier for cashiers to enter them into the register. All they have to do is scan the bar code," he said.