Do your grocery stores have those "loyalty cards" ?

I hated the idea of those cards years ago when they started that nonsense, of course I caved when it was clear that I wouldn't get any sale prices every week if I didn't have one. I keep the Kroger, Safeway, Walgreens and Petsmart in my wallet. A couple of other stores, I just give my phone number to, don't give anyone my email address if I can help it.

What really bugs me is recently, the Kroger ads offer only special discounts with digital coupons. Well, I never used a digital coupon before in my life, I have a simple Tracfone with no internet connection, and I refuse to jump through any hoops by printing something out on my computer. I already have their card, been a loyal customer for decades, and they still find a way to screw people over. :rolleyes: Okay, my turn to rant. :D
 

SeaBreeze said:
I hated the idea of those cards years ago when they started that nonsense, of course I caved when it was clear that I wouldn't get any sale prices every week if I didn't have one. I keep the Kroger, Safeway, Walgreens and Petsmart in my wallet. A couple of other stores, I just give my phone number to, don't give anyone my email address if I can help it.

What really bugs me is recently, the Kroger ads offer only special discounts with digital coupons. Well, I never used a digital coupon before in my life, I have a simple Tracfone with no internet connection, and I refuse to jump through any hoops by printing something out on my computer. I already have their card, been a loyal customer for decades, and they still find a way to screw people over. :rolleyes: Okay, my turn to rant. :D
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They may have a in-store PC kiosk where you swipe your loyalty card to download the e-coupon discounts onto the card. It gives a list of the items and the items are also marked on the shelf. Don't need a smart phne, then.
 
Seabreeze, you don't print the coupons out. You create an account on their website with your loyalty number, select the ones you want and they are loaded to your card. When you check out and give them your card or loyalty number they are automatically taken off your receipt. I only load the ones I plan on using and then check the website to see what is on my card and then buy what I want to. I like their brand breakfast shakes that I use to take my meds at night. one lasts me 2 nights. Kroger had a 75 cent digital coupon on them bringing the price down to 3.44 for a 4 pack. I could use it 5 times so I bought 3 as they will last me until they have it again. I love the digital coupons and always check my receipt to be sure they were taken off. You can check on the website and see what you have loaded to your card. Its very easy to use and no printing out!!
 

Thanks for that info Terry, easier than what I thought it was, but still don't like the idea of having to make an online account with my info, I'm sure they ask all of it including email. So, those cards I've had for years, they are old....they can still function with these new digital coupons?
 
I still hate those cards, but it's a stroke of genius for the stores. There are people who shop around for low prices, and those who don't care. With the card trick the stores don't have to put things on sale for all their customers, just those that care enough to notice and always use their cards. Meanwhile prices on other items, not discounted with a card, seem to be higher. Anyway, I know when they first came out with those cards the prices on *other* items went up.
 
SeaBreeze said:
I hated the idea of those cards years ago when they started that nonsense, of course I caved when it was clear that I wouldn't get any sale prices every week if I didn't have one. I keep the Kroger, Safeway, Walgreens and Petsmart in my wallet. A couple of other stores, I just give my phone number to, don't give anyone my email address if I can help it.
What really bugs me is recently, the Kroger ads offer only special discounts with digital coupons. Well, I never used a digital coupon before in my life, I have a simple Tracfone with no internet connection, and I refuse to jump through any hoops by printing something out on my computer. I already have their card, been a loyal customer for decades, and they still find a way to screw people over. :rolleyes: Okay, my turn to rant. :D
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You do not need a special phone for the e-coupons at Kroger, SeaBreeze. If you go online to Kroger.com and open your account (which you should have since you have the Kroger card) and sign in, then you can look at the online coupons, and just click “add to card” for any of the coupons that you want. Then, when you go to the store and purchase the item, it will already be loaded onto your card, so you will get the discount. It will show up on your receipt , something like “-$.50 coupon” so you can see that the coupon was applied.
I sort my list of online coupons by newest listed, and then I don’t have to go through the whole list, just the new ones. I add coupons for anything that I think I might possibly buy, because sometimes it is on closeout (half-price) and I will purchase something that I would not ordinarily buy.
I got some tea that way, for something like 50 cents. it was around $2, but was on closeout for $1, plus the 50 cent e-coupon.

Another thing that I like about the Kroger loyalty card is that they will also donate to the charity of your choice, just like Amazon does. If you look on your account page online, there is a place to input a charity, like Red Cross, and then Krogers donates money to that charity based on the money you spend there.
It is not much, but when a lot of people do this, it can make a real difference to the charity. I think you look in the “community” section of their website to choose your charity.
 
I use those cards, too, to get the discounts. I asked at Walgreens why they need my phone number, and they told me that's the way they index their cards. So, if you can't find your card, you just enter your phone number in that reader thing and it pulls up your account.

I use a card at Smiths (grocery) to get their discounts. They also index by phone number.

I haven't graduated to the e-coupon thing yet. Sounds quite complicated, as my smart phone is much smarter than I am.
 
The whole rewards card concept allows businesses to sell demographics info to marketing companies who then sell advertising to Facebook or youtube or whatever. Coupons are used for the same thing; creating demographics data bases for marketing and ad companies.

Also, I'm assuming it's a lot cheaper than individual producers and manufacturers risking marketing trials; actually producing a new product, such as 7-Up Spice, and putting it in a whole bunch of stores to see whether or not it sells. So, we're doing those producers a big favor, actually.
 
The Kroger one should but you still have to load them on the website or your phone. It wasn't hard to set my account up. After you set it up there are headers and you click on "savings" and there is a drop down menu and you can choose the coupons, the weekly ad, etc. I check the ad first as we don't always get the mail ad early. I write down what I need to buy and see if there is a digital coupon for it. Then I go to the coupons and load the ones I need. I also load the free Friday download to my card and have got tons of free stuff. My store has a special section that has the Friday download items so you can easily get them and don't have to find them on the shelves. They just added another 75 cent coupon for the breakfast shake again so I added it to my card again and will pick up a couple of more packs as I hate to pay 4.19 when I can get them for 3.44 just by loading the coupon. I don't mind the click it takes to save 75 cents!
 
Another thing that I like about the Kroger loyalty card is that they have what is called “free Friday download”, and this is located with the other coupons, but only on Friday.
How it works is that each week they have an item that you can have for free. It is different each week, and sometimes it is an item that I want, and sometimes it isn’t. You can only download it on that Friday, but then you have about two weeks to actually get the item, so you do not have to buy it that day.
Kroger will also mail you out coupons each month, and some of those might be to get an item free, like a dozen eggs, or a loaf of bread. Others are regular discount coupons, and the items they choose for you are always from items that you regularly buy at Kroger; so you are not just getting a handful of coupons that you have no use for.
You can sign of for the mail coupons on the Kroger website, and then they will start sending those in the mail each month.
Sometimes, I have gotten products with both an ecoupon discount plus the mail-out coupon discount.
 
I was in Radio Shack (no longer here in Canada). I wanted to pay cash for an item.

The clerk kept insisting that I give him my name and address and phone number.

I said I'm paying cash. If you keep insisting on recording me, you can keep the stuff and I'll find it somewhere else.

The grocery stores have loyalty cards but I don't bother with them because for the amount I buy it's just not worth the hassle.
 
Camper6 said:
I was in Radio Shack (no longer here in Canada). I wanted to pay cash for an item.

The clerk kept insisting that I give him my name and address and phone number.

I said I'm paying cash. If you keep insisting on recording me, you can keep the stuff and I'll find it somewhere else.

The grocery stores have loyalty cards but I don't bother with them because for the amount I buy it's just not worth the hassle.
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Not many Radio Shacks in the US any more either. The last one I was in to was in Arizona and what they had did not look much like the electrical shop I once traded with. Not much help either as the young girl I was working with had no idea how a electronic box was put together.

I walked out empty handed.
 
Yes, well, except for Stater Brothers, they advertise savings without a card. I have a hunch, eventually they too will get on the card bandwagon. The thing is, without the card, you pay more at the register. With the card, you pay at the register what the items should cost without the card but you have to have the card to keep from being penalized with higher prices for not having the card - see? I think it's all a bunch of hogwash. Kudos to Stater Brothers, at least until they cave to the card carrying fanatics *sigh.*
 
Macfan said:
Yes, well, except for Stater Brothers, they advertise savings without a card. I have a hunch, eventually they too will get on the card bandwagon. The thing is, without the card, you pay more at the register. With the card, you pay at the register what the items should cost without the card but you have to have the card to keep from being penalized with higher prices for not having the card - see? I think it's all a bunch of hogwash. Kudos to Stater Brothers, at least until they cave to the card carrying fanatics *sigh.*
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Ive not heard of that store but I don't need a card for savings at Savemart here in Fresno. It's also a big supermarket chain
like Safeway etc.
 
Those "loyalty" cards annoy me too. I only have them from stores I shop at regularly. They throw a few crumbs of savings to us, but it's mostly for their benefit so they can track everything we buy, see trends, etc., all so they can figure out how to make more $$$ from us.

I also hate those coupons that say something like, get so much off of one product if you buy some other product as well. I rarely want both of the items.
 
Granny B. said:
Those "loyalty" cards annoy me too. I only have them from stores I shop at regularly. They throw a few crumbs of savings to us, but it's mostly for their benefit so they can track everything we buy, see trends, etc., all so they can figure out how to make more $$$ from us.
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I don't mind the cards if they are used to get stores to carry the things I want to buy. When Albertson's bought out Raley's a few years ago, the first thing their marketing geniuses did at our small neighborhood Raley's was throw out all of the things we had asked Raley's to stock for us. Then they gradually got rid of our favorite cashiers because we slowed them down by talking to them. I never went to Raley's without being greeted by 7 or 8 friendly people who actually remembered us from previous visits. Of course they all went away.

Albertson's is still trying to regain the customers they lost due to their own stupidity. An Albertson's manager told me they've lost business to Amazon so I explained to him how Albertson's behavior alienated customers like me.
 
Smiling Jane said:
I don't mind the cards if they are used to get stores to carry the things I want to buy. When Albertson's bought out Raley's a few years ago, the first thing their marketing geniuses did at our small neighborhood Raley's was throw out all of the things we had asked Raley's to stock for us. Then they gradually got rid of our favorite cashiers because we slowed them down by talking to them. I never went to Raley's without being greeted by 7 or 8 friendly people who actually remembered us from previous visits. Of course they all went away.

Albertson's is still trying to regain the customers they lost due to their own stupidity. An Albertson's manager told me they've lost business to Amazon so I explained to him how Albertson's behavior alienated customers like me.
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That's good you told him. Those guys can't see the forest for the trees. Or, better put; Corporate forces them to walk blindly all over the acorns to focus on the branches.
 
Smiling Jane said:
LOL, absolutely. I'm sure none of the geniuses asked themselves why that store stocked products they had never heard of, like Cameo cleanser.
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I'll tell you what, though; when a store changes hands all the vendors and distributors have to draw up new contracts. Sometimes the new terms are disagreeable. That could be why certain products disappeared. But they lost business. They were too busy looking at the bottom line...stepping on those acorns. It didn't pay off.
 
Cameo cleanser (IMO a genius product) is manufactured and distributed by the Arm & Hammer company who make baking soda and some other products. The store would have a contract with them.
 
Smiling Jane said:
Cameo cleanser (IMO a genius product) is manufactured and distributed by the Arm & Hammer company who make baking soda and some other products. The store would have a contract with them.
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Yes they would, absolutely. So, in that case they'd decide to no longer carry the Cameo because its sales didn't warrant the precious shelf space. They base that on a digital sales analysis. Their attention is on that, not on the virtues of Cameo Cleanser...and that's why they don't have the traffic they used to have.
 
My Phooey meter goes off when I hear excuses like "digital sales analysis." Just because others haven't discovered a superior product doesn't mean they never will.

Anyway, they were often out of the Cameo so other customers were buying it.
 

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