I have been asked the question numerous times in the past months: What is the difference between doubling and stacking of coupons?

Stacking coupons refers to using one manufacturer and one store coupon (and sometimes a buy-one, get-one coupon, or B1G1) on top of one another for the same item. This is a completely legal use of coupons and many times will result in free or near-free items if done right.

For instance, say you have a $1/1 (one dollar off one item) manufacturer coupon for shampoo. You can take that coupon and use it in conjunction with a $1/1 in-ad store coupon (usually found in the Sunday paper, with the exception of the Extra Savings booklet from Fred Meyer that you can get at the registers) to get extra savings on an item. So, you would end up saving $2 on that item. Target is one of the best stores for stacking store coupons with manufacturer coupons because you don’t have to buy multiple papers to use the store coupons for one and you can use multiple coupons per shopping trip for another.

Since Target has the online printable coupons and you can print as many coupons as you like, you can use these on the $5 gift card deals.

The $5 gift card deals apply when you buy a certain amount of an item and you receive a $5 Target gift card back. 

So, say for instance, you find that Target is running a sale on cereal, where the cereal is on sale for $2.50 a box and if you buy five boxes of that cereal you’ll get a $5 gift card back. You go through your coupons and find that you have five manufacturer coupons for $1 off that certain cereal and than find that Target has a coupon you can stack with that coupon to get another $1 off per box. Instead of being limited to only being able to print two target coupons for your transaction (the limit normally set by coupons.com and other printable sources), you can go online to the various Target Coupon Generators and print the Target coupon five times, so you can stack your Target coupon and manufacturer coupon on each box of cereal. This way you will be able to get $2 off each box of cereal needed to get the $5 gift card back. By stacking the Target coupon and the manufacturer coupon on each box of cereal you would only pay 50 cents for each box, or $2.50 for all five boxes needed to get your $5 gift card back. This essentially makes you money, as you are only paying out $2.50 out of pocket, but you are getting back a $5 gift card (thus making $2.50 per gift card deal).

Target has started to state the words “one per transaction” on its coupons, and some cashiers will take that to mean one per shopping order. As we like to say on the blogs, “Your mileage may vary when it comes to stacking coupons this way, depending on who you are dealing with.”

Doubling coupons is something you are not going to run into in Alaska at the present time (at least I’ve never heard of it being done). Doubling is a service that stores will do for their customers, often during a promotion for the store (aka Double Coupon Days or Triple Coupon Events) where the store will take a coupon, usually up to a value of $1 and double that coupon at checkout, thus giving you twice the savings on one coupon.

This is a process that is done automatically by the computer, so the consumer does not have to present two coupons at checkout for the same item.

Erika Buswell runs a blog dedicated to coupons and deals in Alaska (alaskanbargainhunter.blogspot.com) and lives in Palmer with her husband and two children.