CVS

We have a CVS right by our house. Living in Phoenix, we have most stores right by our house, but there's a CVS literally 18 seconds away, one block down. We often use CVS to fill our prescriptions, and we'll run there to pick up more Halloween candy or the diapers that we forgot on our regular grocery shopping list. Which is why I have no idea why I didn't know about their reward program until now. If you are like I was, and ignorant as to all that CVS has to offer, allow me to share: CVS has an awesome awards program for their card members!!

Every week in their sales flyer (which I previously ignored, since they weren't on our regular shopping list) they feature several sale items that will earn you ECBs (extra cash back) Some of these allow you to essentially get the item for free - for example last week they had lots of back-to-school items on sale for .99, with .99 ECB. So you pay the .99 now, and get another .99 back to spend next time! These ECBs print like coupons right on the bottom of your receipt. The next time you shop there, you can spend them like cash and earn even more. The idea is to keep rolling them into the next trip, and by taking advantage of the sales and the ECBs, you can shop there for many of your household and grocery items, and literally pay almost nothing out of pocket.

We tried it out for the first time on Saturday. We got 3 boxes of Kashi cereal (on sale 3/$10 with $3 ECB), and 3 12 packs of Coke - which we would have bought for camping anyway (on sale 4/$13 with $5 ECB) 2 good deals, and $8 to spend on our next trip! Cool!! AND, if you combine manufacturers coupons and in-store coupons with the ECB deals, you can save even more, to the point that they're essentially paying YOU to shop there!

Love it.