Understanding Buy One Get One Free

Buy one get one free deals are a great way to save money, but sometimes they get a little confusing. Also known as "BOGO" or "B1G1," people often have questions about what happens when you combine a store BOGO item with a BOGO coupon that you might have.


To demonstrate, we will use an imaginary example with imaginary potato chips.


Let's pretend that the potato chips you like (for me it's Lays) normally cost $4.00 per bag when they are not on sale (this is the case with Lays chips at my favorite grocery store).


If I wanted two bags, they would cost me $4.00 x 2, which is $8.00. That's pretty expensive.


Now, let's pretend that this week, the store is running a BOGO deal on those same chips. Buy one bag for $4.00 and you get another free. What a great deal! Without doing anything but waiting for the sale, you are now saving 50% because you can now get two bags for $4.00. The store will actually charge you $2.00 per bag. If you only buy one bag, it will only cost $2.00. Many people think that if the sale is for buy one get one free, you have to buy two bags. This is not the case- if you choose to buy one, it will cost half price, so technically, buy one get one free really means "half off" at the grocery stores.


Now, let's also pretend that you have a BOGO coupon for those chips. How does the BOGO coupon work with the BOGO sale at the grocery store?


Well, the store will ring up up for each bag of chips separately- $2.00 per bag, which again, would be $4.00. If you then redeem your BOGO coupon, they will subtract the cost of one of the bags of chips, which will leave you owing only $2.00 for both bags of chips! That is a 75% savings! What a great deal!


So, as you can see from that example, using buy one get one free is a great way to cut down your grocery bill. Combining BOGO coupons with BOGO sales can also save you BIG bucks at the store!