This Amazon Lists Hack Is Saving Me So Much Money

I have vivid childhood memories of my younger brother saving up all of his money and heading to a Black Friday sale at the crack of dawn with my dad to buy a video game console. It was a lesson in saving for what you really want and — critical to the Midwesterness deep in my heart — never paying full price.

It used to be easy to know when the right time to buy was. There were sales around holiday weekends, and everyone knew about the predictable Black Friday markdowns. These days, with the many Prime Day sales and other marketing tools, it’s much more complicated to be sure you’re getting the best price.

To capitalize on the rolling holiday sales at Amazon, I employed a new tactic this year. I created an Amazon list of everything I wanted to buy, and I checked the list every day to see what was on sale. I could purchase what stood out as a good deal, and it would automatically be removed from my list. Rinse and repeat until the list is done. This took me less than three minutes a day.

If you’re thinking that you don’t have time to look every day, let’s put this in perspective. We’re online and scrolling every day already, so take that energy and put your thumbs to work on an Amazon list for three minutes. You have time to do something so quick and easy. That guy from high school’s Instagram will be there when you’re done saving money.

Here’s how to do it:

You can create a list by going to the profile icon on the app or by hovering over “Account & Lists” on your desktop.

Once you have your list set up, use Amazon to search for products like you usually would. When you find the item you want, click “Add to List,” which you can find under the “Add to Cart” module on both the app and on desktop. Select the list you want the item to be added to. You don’t have to do this all at once; you can add things as you find them. You can find more information about Amazon lists here.

Now, when you scroll your list, you’ll be able to quickly look for discounts.

My favorite thing about this process is that you can add to it over time, and you can use price comparisons to make decisions. Let’s say you wanted to get your kiddo some new socks, and they’d be equally excited about socks with characters from either Sesame Street or Paw Patrol. Put both of them on your list, and see if discounts for one of them pop up.

I created the list in mid-November for the winter holiday season, and I had a pretty solid idea of what I was buying for everyone. I did add a few things here and there, including gift boxes and ribbon, but this pared-down list allowed me to quickly look for deals throughout November and December. Having it all in one place seriously helped the mental load of creating holiday magic. I set a deadline around Dec. 10, and anything that wasn’t on sale by then was bought at full price that day. That gave me enough time for delivery and wrapping. A few of my favorite gifts? A maze gift card holder, a pinball machine maker, and the game Blank Slate.

Utilizing an Amazon list helped me snag great deals on about half of the items on my holiday shopping list. Really, you could utilize this strategy for anything you plan on buying: vacation items, party supplies, back-to-school products.

A little bit of thinking ahead can go a long way.

This article was originally published on scarymommy.com.