The U.S. Economy is going down-hill and everyone knows it. As if knowing isn't enough, we FEEL IT, SEE IT, HEAR IT AND READ IT everyday! The headlines discuss "fuel prices up" "stock market down" and everything else in between.

Here are 10 suggestions on where to find coupons:

#1 Get the SUNDAY PAPER (with coupons of course) subscribe if you can and have delivered bright and early.......... If it is the first weekend of the month get several extra papers from the store, especially if you live in a large metro area, there will be a P&G Brand Saver in that paper as well.

To make it a little easier on you, here is the 2008 coupon schedule:

KEY: V = Valassis
SS = Smart-Source
2SS = Two separate & unique Smart-Source inserts
P&G = Proctor and Gamble

July
20 — SS
27 — SS; V

August
3 — SS; V; P&G
10 — SS; V
17 — SS; V
24 — SS; V
31 — No Inserts (Labor Day)

September
7 — SS; V; P&G
14 — SS; V
21 — SS; V
28 — SS; V

October
5 — SS; V; P&G
12 — SS; V
19 — SS; V
26 — SS; V

November
2 — SS; V; P&G
9 — SS; V
16 — SS; V
23 — SS
30 — No Inserts (Thanksgiving)

December
7 — SS; V; P&G
14 — SS; V
21 — No Inserts (Christmas)
28 — No Inserts (New Year’s Day)

#2 Ask your neighbors, family and/or friends for the coupon sections of their paper, or at the very least the coupons they won't be using! Also, go to the grocery store SUNDAY NIGHT or MONDAY a.m. and ask your cashier friends if you can have the coupons from a paper they are sending back. (see #3 )

#3 Make friends: Cashiers at your favorite, much shopped at grocery store; coupon trains (tons of sites available online have this. cafemom.com is a great resource); or neighbors or even post a "wanted" on your local freecycle or craigslist for Sunday paper fliers and coupons.

#4 Subscribe to free or discount magazines. I go through the magazines as I read them and fold down a corner of the page so the coupons are easier to find to clip after I've read the articles. One of the all-time greatest magazines for this is ALL YOU. Another great resource are baby/parenting mags for items such as diapers, formula, etc.

#5 Grocery/Retail Shopping "valued customer cards": Most grocery stores are offering "valued customer" type cards that you get for no cost by filling out a profile form in the store or take home and mail in a "response card." These cards, when used at check out, take off additional savings from your shopping totals. These are no longer limited to Grocery Stores and Drugstores but I have in my coupon binder waiting to be used. Using these will do one or all of several things.......savings at register, generate offers to be mailed to you, give you points for purchasing, enter you into contests and more. Kroger and several other stores now allow you to load coupons onto your customer card so you don't even have to bring clipped coupons with you. Upromise has also just launched E-coupons.

KROGER & KROGER FAMILY COUPON CARD LOADING SITES:

* shortcuts
* P&G
* Unilever

#6 While shopping check the following places for coupons:

* blinkies: machines that "spit" out coupons hanging by products
* Catalina Machines machines that "spit" out coupons at check out
* SMP: specially marked packages and HT (hangtags)
* Bulletin Boards: these are pretty scarce these days but worth checking out
* Deserted Grocery Carts: sometimes I get really lucky with this tip!
* Pull Outs: Store Ads
* the shelves by the product you want, some people will leave coupons they won't use there
* special Displays: cardboard stands promoting products
bins that people discard the coupons they don't want
* sharing bins some stores and other places (commissary) have sharing bins to deposit your unwanted coupons, this isn't only a place to give but also a place to LOOK to see if there is something you need!

#7 The Recycle Bin: if you take a look you will see many discarded coupons here, I personally don't do this but many do and successfully too! Just make sure the bin you are diving in doesn't land you in jail.

#8 JUNK MAIL? Sign up for all the advertisements you can you will get on lists that send you free products and coupons regularly. I suggest you use your initials or some variation of your name to help keep your "main" name off of other mailing lists.

#9 Fill out Rebates, Coupons, Free Products Offers: Send in for REBATES after using a coupon on product to maximize your savings look for the FREE AFTER REBATE deals, use coupons to purchase and you have covered the cost of your stamp usually! :)

Walgreens.com is just one example of a store that offers many FREE AFTER REBATE products Also, try for riteaid.com coupons and their Single Check REBATE program. Many companies will send you their best, high value coupons along with a rebate submission! "GIMMEES" are also good sources for coupons!

#10 Entertainment Books *********on sale right now FOR ONLY $9.99 each this is GREAT! I usually split the cost with a friend and we each take out the coupons we'll use for sure and make note of the left overs. It's a great way to see and do local touristy things you may otherwise ignore and save while doing it.

#11 Print what is available on line........here are some reliable sites that have printables

* COUPONS COUPONS COUPONS: my personal favorite

* Clean Home Journal

* Coupon BUG

* BOX TOPS for Education

* EAT BETTER AMERICA great source for healthy eating coupons

* ECLIP

* Pillsbury

* Remedy Life

* SMARTSOURCE: they send me email updates all the time so I know if I wanna go take a peek

* BETTY CROCKER: they recently added this ability to their website it is so cool!

* RED PLUM

#12 Create a second email account (hotmail or gmail) for online newsletters, etc. A lot of the times you will receive coupons in your inbox and all you have to do is hit print.

#13 Buying Coupons: Buying or paying for coupons is illegal, but paying someone for their service of clipping/sorting/mailing you coupons is NOT!

This is the standar disclaimer that is found on most Coupon Clipping Service Listings: "I am not selling the coupons, they are free, I am charging for my time and effort in finding, gathering, cutting , listing here and shipping. Thanks!"

Learn the Coupon Lingo:

THIS ARTICLE ABOUT COUPON LINGO WAS PUBLISHED IN THE OBSERVER by SUE STOCK read in its entirety here:

"You’ll find that couponers use a lot of slang when they talk about coupons. You may need some of it to navigate my posts, even though I try very hard not to digress into coupon lingo. Here are some common phrases you may see.

Q: slang for “coupon.”

BOGO: short for buy one get one. A lot of stores offer BOGO sales each week, so this one comes up a lot. You may also see it B1G1. Also sometimes written BOGOF for buy one get one free.

WYB: Short for “when you buy.” Coupons or sales sometimes set terms that are like “Get a free roll of paper towels when you buy two.”

DND: short for "do not double"

EXP: short for "expires"

GC: short for gift certificate or gift card

CC: short for credit card

SASE: Self-addressed, stamped envelope (common for rebates)

NAZ: name, address and ZIP code

POP: short for proof of purchase (again common for rebates)

One more note: You’ll also sometimes see coupon values written like this: .50/1 or $1/2. Those designations give the amount you’ll save follow by a slash and then the quantity you have to buy. So, those two examples are save 50 cents on one and save $1 on two. "

NOW that you know the lingo its time to Shop for coupons you want or need!

I have bought coupons from many sources. ***My favorite source is EBAY! ****

Ebay consistently has "free item" coupons listed that were acquired through rebates, Sunday paper , magazines etc that I am in need of. You can also find "bulk" great coupons such as the Meow Mix Free cup coupon that was in last Sunday's coupon section. You do not have to bid, postage is usually reasonable (at least from the sellers I use) and I get them very timely. I love that I can read feedback from other buyers, have several areas of the country to ship from (shortens wait time) and usually the sellers are eager to please adding extras etc for repeat customers. I get Paypal from doing surveys, Mystery Shops etc , so usually it is FREE MONEY I am spending. Usually I am not spending Paypal money for larger purchases, so coupons are "cheap, easy & help me ROLL MY MONEY into cash and freebies" Now that I am ALSO using a cash back system with ebay it makes this EVEN BETTER! I don't find many of the "local, limited area" rebate forms and wine tags that I need, and you also cannot buy cigarette coupons on the internet. (funny note: you can buy EXPIRED VINTAGE cigarette coupons tho, so if you have any you are not using save them they may be worth money one day!)

Here is how I do it........

* register with this site BIG CRUMBS it has a money back program for shopping EBAY! I don't use it for anything else but this , but you may find other ways to earn money back thru this program.
* BOOKMARK your very own Ebay shopping link to use each time you shop Ebay for coupons its that easy!
* GO TO EBAY and search for coupons you want to use Example: "hunts ketchup coupon"
* I don't like to bother with BIDDING so I then click the BUY IT NOW option if I find an item with a price & shipping that is acceptable to me. Then I "SORT BY PRICE WITH S&H INCLUDED" I will usually pay for the coupons with PAYPAL right away and usually these are shipped promptly.