Contact 6: Saving time and money with back-to-school shopping

MILWAUKEE -- Summer is wrapping up, and the school bell is about to ring! FOX6's Contact 6 has tips for parents looking to save time and money when it comes to back-to-school shopping.

Stores have their back-to-school displays out in full force, and the school supply lists have a few more items listed than just the standard paper and pencils! On Milwaukee Public Schools' fourth-grade shopping list -- zip drives!

Contact 6's Katrina Cravy took the list to four different stores, looking for the same items at each store.

The first stop -- Walgreens. Walgreens has most of the new supplies in one aisle, but standard supplies are in another aisle.

The Walgreens shopping trip took 15 minutes and the grand total was $56.94.

Stop number two was Target. The shopping trip took 16 minutes, with a grand total of $49.84.

Stop number three was Walmart. For a big store, Katrina Cravy was able to find all of the items on the list fairly quickly. The shopping trip was completed in just over 13 minutes. The grand total at Walmart was $48.47 -- the cheapest total yet!

The fourth and final stop was all about convenience. Terri Schulist started "School Pak" more than 20 years ago after getting frustrated going from store to store looking for different back-to-school items.

Now, you can just provide a list and grade level, and Schulist's team will box up your items, and all you have to do is pick them up!

The grand total for zero time spent searching and running from store to store was $53.52 -- comparable to other prices Contact 6 found.

"School Pak" is taking orders through July 31st.