What is with naming all these stupid days? For those of you who don’t listen to the media, supposedly Cyber Monday is the first Monday after Thanksgiving where people start looking online for deals.
If you’d rather eat shoe leather than get up at 4am and risk getting trampled or decked by someone’s granny on Black Friday, you’re probably thinking of taking advantage of some of the deals, so here are a couple ways to make sure you’re really getting the most bang out of your buck.
1. Make a list. As I’ve been saying all along, a deal isn’t a deal if you never planned to buy the item in the first place. Sure a $75 Blu-ray player is tempting, but if you’re perfectly happy with DVDs or plan to own a PS3, it’s just a waste of money.
2. Comparison shop. There’s no excuse for not doing this online, because almost every store is at your fingertips. At the very least check out a competitor or two of whomever you’re buying from.
3. Use an online rebate program. A lot of them are running double back. My personal favorites are ebates who pay you in cash and SwagBucks who pay you in ‘swagbucks’ which you can redeem for cash, giftcards or other items. There is also MyPoints, but I haven’t been as pleased with them lately.*
4. Use a credit card with rewards. I just got $94 back from my credit card, so I’m actually ‘up’ on credit cards right now. We usually use Mr’s Upromise card and thanks to several large purchases in the past (furniture, appliances, etc), we’ve actually got a couple thousand back from them. If you use your card responsibly, they’re not actually evil and can help you out.
The only thing I bought this year was 10 maternity shirts for $50 at Old Navy (well, $52 including tax and S/H). We’re not really doing Christmas this year because of the impending arrival of Junior Frurbanite, so the family is getting a nice framed portrait of us and maybe a small personal gift.
Are y’all shopping today (or were you brave enough to do Black Friday)? Are the holidays a little smaller for you this year?
*yes, those are referral links.
Popularity: 28% [?]
Follow me on Twitter 
Our holiday shopping is scaled back — something the family is in agreement on. Doing grab bags on hubby’s side, while on my side, we put a moratorium on presents this year. Still need to get going on gifts for parents, sibling and hubby.
.-= RainyDaySaver´s last blog ..End of the Holiday Weekend =-.