Tuesday, June 16, 2009

ShopDiscover and Tracy's Coupon Clipping

One hobby that my wife Tracy and I have really gotten into through the last six months is bargain shopping. Not only have we saved money, but its also been a nice distraction and given us something else to think about. Tracy tells me that she never used to care a lot about prices, but now she is a coupon wizard—saving money on just about everything she buys!

Probably the best thing that we do is use our Discover Card for just about every purchase we make. With Discover, you can earn dollars back—1% on all purchases and 5% on certain items each month. Right now, we earn 5% cash back on restaurants and department stores. In July, we’ll start to get 5% cash back on gas. Once you earn up to $20 in cash back bonus, you can get that money back from Discover. But what we always do is redeem it for gift cards since $20 in cash back bonus will get you a $25 gift card. It’s fun every month to try to decide what company to get the gift card for—Ace Hardware, Bed Bath & Beyond, Blockbuster, Applebees’s, Sears, etc.

Through Discover.com, you can link to businesses for online shopping. I got 20% cash back from a purchase from ProFlowers and 10% from PetSmart.com. I noticed that Sears.com and other websites offer free in store pick up so you don’t even have to pay shipping. It’s really been kind of a hobby for Tracy and I. And it’s cool to save money after paying for the wedding last year. Plus, now our honeymoon to Hawaii this New Years is already paid for. I don’t think we could have did that without all of the coupon clipping and bargain shopping on Discover.com!

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