If you have kids, you know that disposable diapers are stupidly expensive.  I actually switched from cloth diapers to disposables when my daughter was about 18 months old because I figured out how to spend so little on diapers that I was spending more money to do diaper laundry–which is such a minimal expense!–than I was to use disposables. 

There’s a trick to getting diapers for next to nothing, but it’s not rocket science. If I can do this, you can too. 

Concepts

  1. Ditch brand loyalty.  At the end of the day, this is an item that your child is going to poop in once, and then you’re going to throw it away. It doesn’t need to be fancy.  There are always special circumstances–some children are allergic to some brands, for instance.  But, be willing to explore different brands, including store brands. (My favorite diapers are the Walgreens store brand, actually.)
  2. Calculate price per diaper. Smaller sizes have more diapers per package. You can calculate the cost per diaper by dividing the price by the number of diapers per package.  That is the best way to accurately compare prices against brands.  Keep an eye on that amount to make sure you’re getting the best deal possible.
  3. STOCKPILE.  That is important enough to warrant bolding and all caps!   This is really the key.  When you find a great price, buy as many as you can. Diapers can be hid all over your house, if you’re worried about the storage space.  Stick them under the crib, under your bed, in the closet, under the dresser, above the hallway closet, under the stairs, under the couch, in a closed bookcase, in the bathroom…whereever you can find a little space, add diapers.  If you end up buying too many–don’t despair!  You can take a package back to the store and exchange it for the next size up if that’s the problem, or you can add diapers in to your next baby shower gift, or you can sell your off sizes. I get $6 a package for them at yard sales (and by word of mouth) and have sold out every time. I know of people who sell diapers on Craigslist with great luck.  You just don’t want to ever run out and have to pay full price.
  4. Stack a variety of promotions. Basically, you want to combine as many discounts as possible into one purchase.  You want to have a good sale, a manufacturer’s coupon, a store coupon, a purchase-based coupon (like a $5/$25), overage from other coupons in your transaction, a store rebate like Rite Aid’s Single Check Rebates, Register Rewards/Extra Care Bucks, a manufacturer’s rebate, a Caregiver’s Marketplace rebate and a partridge in a pear tree.  You won’t get all of those every time, of course, but the more things you get working for you, the better.

Methods

  1. Sales. Obviously, you don’t want to pick up a pack of diapers at a convenience store.  Currently, the standard price for diapers is around ten to twelve bucks per package, with the occasional sale price of nine dollars.  Just think, if you only bought diapers at nine dollars (not  a terribly difficult thing to do, if you pay casual attention to the sales) then you’d save a lot of money over your diapering career. 
  2. Manufacturer Coupons. The workhorse of diaper purchases.  Huggies and Pampers both release coupons regularly in the Sunday paper. I see more Huggies than Pampers, and usually for a better value.  There are also often printable Huggies coupons on coupons.com and similar coupon websites. 
    1. Action: Sign up at the websites of all the diaper companies to get on the mailing list.  They randomly send good coupons in the mail.
    2. Hint: If you don’t buy the Sunday paper and can’t find printable coupons for a particular deal, check eBay.  Paying a dollar or two for a stack of coupons that will save you ten or twenty dollars just makes good sense.
  3. Store Coupons. Most stores allow you to use a store coupon AND a manufacturer coupon per item.  For example, there is a coupon for $1 off Huggies in a Walgreen’s children’s activity book found in the store.  Say that the price of the diapers is $9.  You have a coupon for $1.50 and the store coupon for $1.  This alone will make a package of diapers cost $6.50–not bad, huh?  Oh, and Walgreens usually lets you keep your store coupons to use again later… though your store might not be so kind. 
  4. Purchase Coupons. Sometimes, stores put out coupons for say, $5 off a purchase of $25 or more.  Let’s imagine that, as before, the diapers are on sale at Walgreens for $9.  Just to make things easy, let’s pretend that you buy three packages.  9 x 3 = $27.  $27 – $5 ($5/$25 coupon) = $22.  We’ll use a $1.50 coupon on all three packages, and a $1 store coupon (which will come off three times at Walgreens). $22 – $1.50 – $1.50 – $1.50 – $1 – $1- $1 = $14.50.  That, folks, is $4.83 per package… less than half of the regular retail price.
  5. Store Rebates. I’m including the Walgreens Register Reward system as well as the CVS Extra Care Bucks program in this category, along with the Single Check Rebates at Rite Aid, to name the three most common.  This is when you pay a certain amount for the diaper, but you get some amount of money back, either at the register via a coupon (at Walgreens and CVS) or a check in the mail (Rite Aid).  CVS had a (albeit poorly executed) promotion a few months ago that gave $5 ECBs when you purchased a package of Pampers. Combined with a coupon and a $5/$25, those were some cheap diapers!  The drugstores often have promotions that sound something like this: Buy $25 worth of [Insert Manufacturer Here] products, get $10 back!  The diapers are often just listed as one of the options. So, let’s pretend that in this case, the promotion was to spend $25 on Huggies and get $10 back, and we’ll keep using the above example (where we purchased three packages for $14.50, after coupons.)  $14.50 – $10 RR (for next purchase) = $4.50.  That’s $1.50 per pack.
    1. Hint: see my posts on how to get started at CVS, Walgreens and Rite Aid!
  6. Coupon Overages. If you happen to have a coupon for an unrelated item that is for more than the cost of that item, throw it into the same transaction and let that overage pay for your diapers.  For example, if you have a $3 coupon that you use on a $2 item, that extra $1 will help pay for your diapers.  This will depend greatly on your cashier and your store.  The other way to get coupon overage is to use a coupon on an item that gives you money back in the form of a coupon at the register, like Register Rewards at Walgreens, or Extra Care Bucks at CVS.  If the item is $5 and you get $3 back for buying it, and you have a coupon for $3, you’ll "make" $1. Again, that extra dollar can help pay for your diapers.
  7. Caregiver’s Marketplace. I love the Caregiver’s Marketplace!  It’s basically just a simple independent rebate program that gives you cash back on the qualifying items you purchase.  Huggies diapers and training pants are some of the qualifying items.  For 2009, you get $.75 rebate for every package of diapers you buy.  All you have to do is save your receipts and send them in periodically.  Nothing to it!   So.. in the above example, we have whittled our diaper costs down to $1.50 each.  Subtract another $.75 and we have purchased three packages of Huggies for $.75 each.  I think that’s not bad!
    1. Hint: see my post about this program here.

Now, I know what you’re thinking.  You can’t do that just any time you want to!  And the answer is… well, no, of course not.  Most of the time, you won’t get the stars to align just so that you can take advantage of most of these promotions at the same time… but it will happen periodically, and when it does, you want to jump on it hard so you don’t have to pay full price the next time.  Also, if you take advantage of just a few of those promotions, you’ll be doing really well!  Remember that back in item 4, we had the total down to $4.83 each–after subtracting Caregiver’s Marketplace (because that one, you CAN add in any time!) That would be $4.08 per package, and that scenario is not dreadfully uncommon. 

I’ve tried to be as thorough as possible on this, but please, if I’ve missed anything, let me know.  If you have specific questions about buying diapers for nearly nothing, I’ll be happy to answer them if I can.  I am thinking of adding a diaper-buying feature, as well–posts specifically about buying diapers on the cheap.  It may be a necessary expense, but it doesn’t have to break the bank!