Free Clubs and Newsletters

Along with entering competitions I have become addicted to joining free clubs and newsletters. Many of the comps I enter require you to subscribe to their email newsletter or have an option to tick whether you want to join.

I find many of these newsletters quite useful for letting me know about upcoming events and sales. I even receive the odd discount or freebie through them.

Most times I join a club that interests me or offers something free for joining. It doesn’t take much of my time to join – simply filling out a form – and since it is free I’ve got nothing to lose.

Some of the benefits I’ve received from being in a club or joining a newsletter list are:

1. Birthday gifts or discounts
2. Free sample products, such as coffee or snacks
3. Discount coupons
4. Everyday VIP discounts when I show my membership card
5. Special events like member’s only nights or first option to purchase products
6. Competitions
7. Earning free products

I have joined many clubs over the years and I still enjoy benefits from most of them. Those that I lost interest in, or didn’t receive the benefits I wanted, I simply opted out. That can be as easy as an email or phone call to cancel the membership.

The free clubs I am currently enjoying benefits from are:

• Foodtown OneCard
• Whitcoulls
• ITM Priority Card
• The Film Squad
• Spotlight VIP Club
• Doubleday Book Club VIP
• Kidspot
• Whiskas
• The Craft Depot
• OurFreeStuff
• View Auckland
• Mitre 10

If you have particular interests try searching the web to find a club to join. You may find VIP memberships at many of the places you regularly shop. If not, try asking the manager if there is a newsletter to keep you up to date.

New clubs spring up all the time so keep your eyes open and let me know what you find.

Samples

Samples are great if you want to try out something before your buy it. A couple evenings a week my local grocery store has stands throughout the shop offering free mouth-size samples of food products. Of course their intention is to get the consumer to immediately buy the product. Often they give out discount coupons as well.

However there are other ways to get free samples. Many websites offer samples when you sign-up to their newsletter. In this way I have received coffee, noodles, cat food, and cereal. Sometimes you can even be bold enough to ask for a free sample. Many companies are quite willing to give a little product away in the hopes of continuing sales.

Recently I received an email telling me I can get a free coffee sample. The interesting thing was the email came from a fashion newsletter! So, you never know who is going to offer something for free or when. If you are interested in a sample of free coffee then check out Barista @ Home. Sign up for a free coffee sample and enter the competitions while you are there!

More samples available online right now are (please note that some of these are for Australian and New Zealand residents only):

Huggies DriNites
Poise Products
Wrigley’s Solano
Life & Leisure magazine
Sustagen
Purina Beneful dog food
Fancy Feast Gourmet Gold dry cat food
LibraGirl starter pack
Marquis Condoms
Resene Testpot
Huggies Little Swimmers
Coffee Break Coffee Bar
Bell tea
So Good trial offer
Calarox
Ethiopian coffee sample
Ecrín Curative Skin Therapy
Chandelier Crystal
Skin Care products
Disinfecting wipes
Olive oil
Tanning lotion
Naturalamb condoms
Purina pet food

Other great places to get samples are “trade” shows. Here in New Zealand there is the annual Parent & Child Show as well as the Royal Easter Show. Of course you have to pay for a ticket to get into the event (unless you win one like I often do) but once inside you can usually get away with buying no food. Have a good look around the venue and you will find many stalls offer free samples of their food. Of course their aim is to get you to buy the product, but if you are clever like me you will simply fill yourself (and your children) up on the free samples all day and not buy anything.

Many times I even have a friendly chat with the vendor and score a bigger sample. My children have even received free small toys because the vendor thought they were cute (it pays to put them in adorable dresses with pony tails!).

I know there are many more free samples available online in the USA, Canada and the UK, so if you live there just do a Google search for samples or go to your favourite website and see if they have anything on offer. Once again, let me know if you find anything worthwhile to share.

Freebies

There are many ways to get things for free. No, I’m not talking about stealing! I mean getting products for nothing, zip, nada, zero. Freebies come in many shapes and sizes – samples, free trials, cash-back, borrowing, giveaways, vouchers, and of course prizes (I mentioned competitions in my last post).

Stay tuned to my blog for tips and stories about getting things for nothing. As the saying goes . . . the best things in life are free . . . and I can show you how true that is!

I sign-up for many different website newsletters so that I can be informed of discounts, freebies, and competitions as well as things of interest – like kid’s school holiday programmes. There are hundreds of thousands of freebies and competitions available online, but only a few are relevant for New Zealand. Being a member of these sites takes the work out of trying to find new comps and wade through the huge lists which appear when using a search engine.

Generally it is free to sign up for a newsletter or online clubs. It is usually very easy to unsubscribe to them as well if you don’t want any more contact with the company. Simply send an email or change your preferences on their website – check the bottom of their email newsletter for details. Just make sure you do it after you receive your freebie, sample or the end of a competition!

I have listed some freebie websites on my blog (to the right) and I will continue to update that link area as I find more sites of interest. Most of the sites listed are New Zealand or Australian, but many times you can find a counterpart for your country. It may be as simple as changing the end of the URL from NZ to COM.

If you come across any more sites of interest for me and my readers let me know in a comment or email. Thanks!