Here's an example of why getting rainchecks makes good sense. If the store is out of a sale product that you use, don't get upset - get a raincheck! If you are not familiar with how rainchecks work, read on!

Last winter, when we all realized that peanut butter prices were about to increase substantially, I began to stock up it. My husband LOVES peanut butter and eats it every day!  At that time, with good use of sales and coupons, I could regularly find a 16 -18 oz jar of peanut butter for $1 or less.

Since the peanut butter price hikes began in December, we have been lucky to get it on sale for $1.50 these days (including generic brands). Actually, Food Lion has the Planters peanut butter, 16.3 oz.size on sale for $2.50 through 7/31. If you use the $1 coupon for any Planters product from 6/24 SS the total is $1.50 – a decent price.

I realized this week that we were down to our last couple jars of peanut butter and we had already run out of crunchy PB (oh the horror), so it was time to find a deal. 

The Food Lion deal was good, but I found a better one.

Months ago, Harris Teeter ran a sale that allowed you to get 5 participating products for $8 ($1.60 each). Planters peanut butter was included. When I went to the store, they were out of the peanut butter, so I asked for a raincheck at customer service.

If you are new to rainchecks, they are a piece of paper (as seen in the second picture above) that indicates the product name, size and sale price. It also indicates how many you can get at the sale price, which is usually around 3 or 4. In this case, the sale was 5 for $8 so I was able to get 5 at the sale price.

In addition to the raincheck, I had 3 of the $1 coupons for any Planters product from the 6/24 SS insert. That brought my total to 5 jars for $5, making them $1.00 each. As you can see from the picture above, the regular price of this peanut butter is $3.85, so paying $1 each is definitely a good score! Now we have crunchy peanut butter for my hubby and some for the food bank!

So, my point with that rather wordy story is that it pays to get rainchecks when items you use are on sale and out of stock. I get rainchecks for everything from chicken to strawberries to toothpaste.

Here is some additional information about rainchecks:

Rainchecks from Lowes Foods and Kroger expire in 30 days.

Rainchecks from Harris Teeter and Food Lion do not expire.

You can use rainchecks with coupons.

I recommend that you give any rainchecks to the cashier before she/he begins scanning your products. Most stores need to process the raincheck before they ring up the item.

Do you have any deals you have found lately using a raincheck?