Easing the sting of Valentine’s Day flower purchases

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Leading up to Valentine’s Day, you might be wondering how to earn the most miles or save the most money when buying flowers, candy, or other gifts.  Here is a roundup of some of the best deals I’m aware of. 

FTD

FTD: Portals, up to 35X or 20% cash back

AAdvantageeShopping_FTD30X_thumb5

Shop FTD via an online shopping portal.  Here are the best deals I see now:

  • Delta Skymiles Portal: 35 miles per dollar
  • American AAdvantage eShopping Portal: 30 miles per dollar
  • United MileagePlus Shopping Portal: 30 miles per dollar
  • Shop Discover, Shop At Home, Ebates, and TopCashBack are all offering 20% cash back

FTD: Plink

Sign up for Plink, add FTD to your Plink wallet, and register the card you will pay with in order to get up to 750 points (worth $7.50 in gift cards).  This is stackable with portal rewards (above).

Plink_FTD_Frequent_Miler_750pts_thum

FTD: MasterCard Easy Savings

Register your small business MasterCard with the MasterCard Easy Savings Program and you’ll earn 5% cash back automatically at FTD if you pay with that MasterCard.  This is stackable with portals and Plink.

MasterCard_EasySavings_FTD_5pct_thum

FTD: Amex Sync 25% off

If you have an American Express card, check out the “Offers For You” section when you log into your account.  You’re likely to see the following:

Amex_sync_FTD

If you apply that offer to your account and click through the given link, all prices will be automatically 25% off.  This is better than getting 20% cash back from a portal.  It is stackable with Plink, but not with MasterCard Easy Savings because when you go through this link you are forced to pay with an Amex card.

FTD: $10 gift card

Regardless of which approach you use to shop FTD, you should see the option to earn a $10 gift card if you choose early delivery:

FTD_10dollar_giftcard

Note that this gift card expires on 3/31/14 so its not exactly as good as cash.

1-800-Flowers

1-800-Flowers: Portals, 12X or up to 20% off

Get 20% cash back via Shop Discover or Shop At Home.  Get 12 points per dollar via the Southwest Rapid Rewards Shopping Portal.

1-800-Flowers: Plink

Sign up for Plink, add 1-800-Flowers to your Plink wallet, and register the card you will pay with in order to get up to 750 points (worth $7.50 in gift cards).  This is stackable with portal rewards (above).

Plink_1800Flowers

1-800-Flowers: Amex Sync $15 off $50

If you have an American Express card, check out the “Offers For You” section when you log into your account.  You’re likely to see the following:

Amex_sync_1800Flowers

If you apply that offer to your account, then you will automatically get a $15 statement credit if you use that Amex card to spend $50 or more at 1-800-Flowers.  This is stackable with portal promotions and with Plink.

1-800-Flowers: Discover Extras $10 off $39.99

If you have a Discover card, log into your account and click on “ViewExtras” (near the bottom right of the home page).  You may see an offer like this:

Discover_Extras_1800Flowers

This is a great alternative to the Amex Sync offer in case you don’t have an Amex card or in the unlikely event that your total purchase comes to less than $50.  This is stackable with portal promotions and with Plink.

Miscellaneous Others

  • Amex Sync: ProFlowers, Spend $50, get $10 back (stack with portal offers, including 25% back at Shop Discover)
  • Amex Sync: Godiva. Spend $50, get $7.50 back (stack with portal offers)
  • Amex Sync: Wine Country Gift Baskets, Spend $39, get $10 back (no apparent portal offers)
  • Find the best portal offers here: CashBackMonitor.

 

A note about flower / portal offers

When a portal offers miles or cash back for shopping for flowers or gifts, it is almost always just the base price of the flowers or gifts that earn rewards.  The substantial shipping and handling charges are not including in the calculations.  So, “30 miles per dollar” usually turns out to be considerably less than 30 miles per dollar based on the final bill.  On the other hand, offers in which you are automatically paid based on a charge appearing on your credit card are based on the entire purchase price.  This includes Plink, MasterCard Easy Savings, Discover Extras, and most Amex Sync deals (but not the FTD deal because that one applies an automatic 25% savings rather than an after-the-fact statement credit).

Amex Sync

For more about Amex Sync offers, please see this series of posts:

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