3/31 Frugal Report: Coupon Counterfeiters Cause an Awesome Coupon to Disappear, Kroger to Sell More Craft Beer, Walmart Ends FREE Shipping in Canada

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Frugal Report Transcript

I’m Aarn Farmer with Grocery Shop for FREE at The Mart and here is the Frugal News that caught my attention today.

Our first story today

Coupon Counterfeiters Ruin Another FREE Coupon

Purina has a My Purina Cat Chow Perks rewards program where if you earn enough points in system, they will send you a coupon for a FREE bag of Purina Cat Chow, up to $15.99.  That is enough to get a big 16lb bag of Cat Chow so this is an awesome coupon and a great perk for being in the program.

However, coupon counterfeiters got a hold of this coupon and now you can find tons of fakes available for sale online.  In response to this, Purina notified the Coupon Information Corporation that they were no longer honoring the coupon, even if you have a real coupon that you earned through the program.

They have modified the reward program where before you had to earn 30,000 points to earn the coupon that got you the 16lb bag, now you have to earn 60,000 point to get a 3.15lb bag.  Not a coupon, an actual bag of cat food shipped to your door.  That’s twice as many points to get about a fifth of the FREE cat food.

That sucks and this is why organizations like the CIC are pushing so hard to get coupon sales off of Ebay and shutting down FaceBook rooms where scams and coupon fraud are discussed and advocated.  Coupon fraud doesn’t just hurt the company that issues the coupon or the grocery store that accepts it, it always hurts the consumer in the long run.

Moving On

Kroger will soon add more shelf space in their stores for locally brewed craft beers.

Every time I read the stats on craft beers they astound me. While the total beer market has stagnated, craft beer sales rose 40 percent last year. There are now more breweries in the U.S. than at any time since 1873. According to the Brewers Association, craft beer now holds 11 percent of the beer market and a whopping 20 percent of the dollars spent on beer,   In fact we had dinner with my brother in law last night and he was telling us he just finished his latest batch of his own personal brew.

Put all these numbers together and one thing is clear, craft beer is big business.  So Kroger is responding by increasing the shelf space for locally brewed beers by 20-30% over the next year.  Great news for all you craft beer fans.

On the blog this week

We had FREE Lysol TipTap, a new product from Lysol.  French’s has a new Ketchup out that they are sure you will love or they will refund your money, and the list of everything that is $1.00 or Under at Walmart has been updated.  You can find links to all these stories and more at Grocery Shop for FREE at The Mart.com/Frugal News.

And our final story, Walmart is dropping Unlimited FREE Shipping for its Canadian customers.

Now that Target is leaving Canada, Walmart is dropping its policy of allowing FREE shipping on just about anything to any address in Canada.  Starting April 2nd, Canadians will be charged a $4.97 shipping fee on any order under $50.  Of course, any order over $50 will still get FREE shipping and you can always use site-to-store for FREE shipping to your local Walmart.

So here is your question of the day, have you ever bought a coupon and found out later it was counterfeit?  What did you do?  I’d love to read your answer.

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