You can’t use Digital Coupons with Instacart and Shipt

If you read the How-to on Kroger Digital coupons, you’ll know that finding and applying them to your Clicklist (soon to be called something else) grocery list is relatively simple and saves you tons each year.  Now that we’ve established Target’s competitive presence you should also note that when using Target’s app on your mobile device you save even more.  Both companies have apps, both have digital coupons you can apply at any time during the purchasing cycle (middle of the night or just before you check out) but Target gives you an extra 5% off of your purchase with a Redcard and matches competitors pricing.

So what happens if you want to use Instacart or Shipt to order groceries but have coupons?  You will be out of luck.  At the time of this writing, both companies do not take any form of coupons.  Except of course, for their own little “sales” items they identify while you are shopping.  Grocery Delivery popups tell you to order more to save more but remember it all comes at a cost!

Remember, both grocery delivery services charge you a delivery fee and mark up each item 10-20%.  So if you can’t use digital coupons from other manufacturers that you are used to applying to your regular grocery trip then that 10-20% goes even higher.  Just how much are you willing to pay to have someone shop for you and deliver groceries?  It’s evident that Instacart and Shipt know precisely how much.

Recently, Instacart and Shipt made some adjustments so that your Kroger loyalty card could be used.  It means that you can still get the points and use those towards gasoline purchases.  Shipt warned contract shoppers to use their own Kroger loyalty cards no longer.  If you think getting $.10 to .20 cents off of a gallon of gas is nice, imagine someone who shops for groceries for a living!  That benefit of being an Instacart and Shipt shopper is now gone because you must use the customer’s loyalty ID.

You can use digital coupons and paper coupons with Kroger along with any coupons Kroger sends you (You should have your home address linked to your loyalty card).  However, Kroger’s coupon policy says that you can use either an electronic (digital) coupon or a printed coupon; but not both.  Even though that is policy, make sure you take your paper coupons when you pick up your curbside groceries and hand them to the attendant.

Target’s coupon policy, on the other hand, says, “only one manufacturer coupon (paper or Cartwheel digital), one Target coupon (paper or digital), and one Cartwheel℠ offer can be combined per item.”  That means you could double your savings by combining Target coupons, manufacturer paper coupon, and the Cartwheel offer.  Add this to an excellent price matching policy, and you can save considerably on groceries and just about anything else you also can find on Amazon.

Speaking of Amazon.  They don’t take coupons at all.  Whole Foods?  Yes, Whole Foods has a similar coupon policy by combining store and manufacturer.

Stick to curbside delivery until the upcharge is much lower and use those loyalty mobile phone apps to find digital deals.  Eventually, grocery delivery cost will be a fundamental approach from each grocer and little autonomous vehicles will deliver your food.  Well, one can hope!