6 Brilliant Ideas for Saving More Money

Clearing your browser's cache—or surfing the web in incognito mode—could help you snag better deals on travel. Insiders told Bargain Fever author Mark Ellwood that some companies use cookies to track your visits, so your airfare (or hotel or rental car bids) could go up with each additional search. "It's like going to a bazaar and going back to look at the same rug four times. The owner knows you're interested," he explains.

Searching on different devices could also save you money: On a desktop, a search for a two-night stay at a Kansas hotel came to $122 per night. On mobile, the same stay was offered for $89.50 for the first night, $94.50 for the second (total savings for a three-minute price check: $60).
— Candace Braun Davison

Turns out, Americans spend 30 percent more on Saturday than the average weekday, according to a Gallup poll. The bump gets even bigger on weekends after a payday, which suggests this increase isn't just the result of more time to shop. Researchers behind the poll say this "paycheck effect" may be a reflection of consumers' overconfidence when they have more cash on hand.
— Taniesha Robinson

After a week of cooking, many of us want to let someone else do the work on weekends, and data from the online food-ordering company GrubHub, which serves more than 700 U.S. cities, backs this up: Sunday evening is its busiest time, nationwide. Beware, though, if you're using your tablet or phone to place your order electronically. Research shows we tend to order more food when we're tapping versus talking. One San Francisco online ordering service found that because people can see the entire breadth of menu options online, they tend to throw in more appetizers, salads and other extras.
— Lynn Andriani

Daydreaming about the trip you want to take to the Bahamas in August may provide great motivation for socking away cash, but research shows that focusing on the $6 energy bars you're going to skip three times a week might get you to the beach faster. A study published in the journal Psychological Science explains that people who concentrated on cutting recurring expenses saved 82 percent more than those who were thinking about the future.
— Lynn Andriani

You know how some areas of the supermarket can seem almost apocalyptic in their disarray, with packages of beef looking three-quarters empty and what few offerings are left scattered about? Researchers have found that messes like those can scream "Great deal!" to us—even when they may not actually be. A Journal of Marketing article explains that in some cases, disorganized, not-fully-stocked shelves tend to increase our perception of an item's popularity, and can even boost sales (although jumbled egg cartons can have the opposite effect, making customers think the food is subpar). Bottom line: Stick to your list and don't be swayed by displays—whatever they look like.
— Lynn Andriani

David Weinrot, chief marketing officer at the coupon code site Tada!, says apparel is the top category for sitewide coupon codes (flowers and home goods are big, too), since there's so much inventory and retailers constantly need to make room for new items. Clothing is also where you'll find the biggest discounts, says Daniel Washburn, general manager of another coupon-code site, Coupon Mountain. While some sites broadcast a "25% off today only!" coupon code at the top of their home page, more use coupon sites (which get a commission of about 5 percent when you click on a code) to get the word out. There are a couple of tricks to finding these money-saving treasures, aside from searching for a store name with a term like "coupon" or "coupon code," says Sarah Jones, coupon editor at DealNews.com. For clothing, she searches the brand name and style name (e.g., "Michael Kors Chain Lace-Up Shirtdress") plus the word "coupon." Then she searches for coupons for stores that sell the item, to see what they are currently offering. The idea is to do a mix of general and specific searches to see what comes up.
— Lynn Andriani